The British battleship HMS Vanguard was a massive ship of the St. Vincent class. Only three of these ships were built. During World War I, the Vanguard, seen in this colorized photograph, was assigned to patrol the North Sea and to conduct training activities.
Colorized photograph of the HSM Vanguard prior to July 9, 1917. (Wikipedia.org)
On the evening of July 9, 1917, the battleship was anchored at Scapa Flow, a protected harbor in Scotland’s Orkney Islands when the unthinkable happened. A series of explosions rocked the ship, sending it swiftly to the bottom of the sea. What sank the Vanguard? And how did two sailors manage to survive the disaster?
Morning Exercises Were Prophetic
The Vanguard did routine training exercises before anchoring for the night. (Wikipedia.org)
The morning of July 9, 1917, the HMS Vanguard had conducted a series of routine training exercises. One of the exercises included training and practicing how to quickly abandon the ship if the need ever arose. During the training, the ship’s captain, Captain James Dick, addressed the sailors. He presented two scenarios, one in which the ship exploded and sank in less than a minute and one in which the ship took on water and sank after several hours of floundering. He meant to present both ends of the spectrum – a case in which the sailors were doomed to go down with the ship and one in which everyone could be rescued. None of the more than 850 men aboard the Vanguard realized that they would be facing the worst case scenario in just twelve short hours.
Scapa Flow
An ideal natural harbor, Scapa Flow was large enough for numerous ships to anchor at the same time. (history.navy.mil)
Scapa Flow, a harbor in the Orkney Islands of Scotland, is an ideal natural harbor that served as the United Kingdom’s main naval base in both World War I and World War II. The sheltered harbor has an average depth of about 100 feet. The harbor is large enough for numerous battleships to anchor in place at the same time. When the Vanguard exploded on the evening of July 9, 1917, several other nearby ships sustained damage.
No Signs of Trouble
There was nothing to indicate that the Vanguard was in trouble. (onthisday.com)
By all accounts, there were no signs of trouble in the evening hours of July 9. During routine patrols of the HMS Vanguard, none of the sailors reported anything amiss. At 11:20 p.m., the Vanguard was shaken by a small explosion in the foremast. Moments later, another, much larger explosion occurred, followed closely by another. Wreckage from the explosions, mingled with body parts, was thrown high into the air. Some landed on nearby ships. In mere seconds, the Vanguard sank to the sandy bottom of the harbor.
Tremendous Loss of Life
Two lucky men, seen in this colorized photograph from 1917, miraculously survived the explosion. (forces.net)
By sheer coincidence, some of the Vanguard’s senior officers were not on board the ship when it exploded. They had accepted an invitation to attend a concert aboard another ship that evening. They watched in horror from afar as their ship sank. Of the 845 sailors who were on the ship that night, all but three were killed immediately. One of the three men who survived the blast, Lieutenant Commander Duke died shortly afterwards from his injuries. The other two men, Marine J Williams and Stoker 1st Class FW Cox, were injured, as you can see in this colorized photograph taken at the hospital but survived the ordeal. When asked to detail their escape from the Vanguard, neither Williams nor Cox could remember the explosions. Both men stated that they were sleeping soundly in their bunks only to wake in the water of the harbor. They both claim they swam as quickly as possible away from the sinking ship. Among the casualties were two Australian sailors from the HMAS Sydney who had been arrested and were housed in the Vanguard’s brig. In addition, a military observer from the Imperial Japanese Navy, an ally of the Royal Navy at that time, Captain Kyosuke Eto, was also killed.
A Naval Inquiry
Some of the crew of the fated Vanguard. (greatwarforum.org)
An investigation was launched into the cause of the Vanguard’s explosion. Based on the testimonies of witnesses on nearby ships, the inquiry believed that the initial explosion was caused by a faulty cordite in either the P or the Q magazine. That smaller explosion touched off the other two, much larger blasts that ripped the ship apart. As many bodies as possible were recovered from the sunken wreckage, but most of the sailors’ bodies were never recovered. Under the Protection of Military Remains Acts of 1986, the site of the Vanguard wreck is now a protected war grave area.
