In just 13 minutes, the Royal Oak went down with the loss of 833 of its 1,400 crewmen. (Some 386 men were rescued from the icy, oil-covered waters by the ship's tender, Daisy 2, commanded by John Gatt of the Royal Naval Reserve who was later awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for his heroic actions).
The sinking of the Royal Oak at Skapa Floe was at once a tragedy and a triumph, a major propaganda coup for the Nazis (though it would have little impact in altering the naval balance of power). On returning to Germany, the crew of U-47 were given a heroes welcome and personally greeted by the Fuhrer. Lieutenant Prien was awarded the Iron Cross First Class (the first submarine commander to receive this award) while the rest of the crew were given the Iron Cross Second Class. For the British, it was not just a human tragedy but a wake up call that Skapa Flow was not as i
mpenetrable as had been believed. The disaster sent shockwaves through the admiralty and pre-empted a major rethink of coastal defences. First Lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill described the raid in the House of Commons as 'a remarkable exploit of professional skill and daring' while demanding a major strengthening of the Scapa Flow defences including the building of the Churchill Barriers.
Royal Oak Memorial at
St Magnus' Church, Kirkwall
Those lost in the Royal Oak disaster are commemorated by a memorial at St Magnus Cathedral, a magnificent 12th century church in the heart of Kirkwall. The ship’s bell, salvaged by divers in the 1970s, forms part of the display. The small number of bodies recovered from the water are buried at the Lyness Royal Naval Cemetery on Hoy. At the site of the wreck, a buoy complete with commemorative plaque and poppy wreath marks the spot where the ship
rests, its hull just 5 metres beneath the surface. The Royal Oak is a designated a war grave and all unauthorised diving is prohibited. Each year on the anniversary of its sinking, Royal Navy divers place a white ensign at the stern. The wreck still leaks oil to this day with ongoing concerns over the impact on the environment.
One of four Churchill barriers guarding the eastern entrance to Scapa Flow
Another legacy of the Royal Oak disaster, the Churchill Barriers are an impressive relic of Britain’s coastal defences. They form a series of four causeways linking the Orkney mainland with South Ronaldsay and the smaller islands inbetween. Work on the barriers began in May 1940 but so huge was the task that they were not yet completed by the end of the war in Europe.
The bases of the barriers were built from 250,000 tons of broken rock from local quarries covered with 66,000 concrete blocks each weighing up to ten tonnes. Over 1,300 Italians transferred to Orkney specifically for the purpose of building the barriers were involved in their construction.
The Italians were held at three nearby prison camps, one of which – Camp 60 – became the location of a chapel constructed by the prisoners out of two Nissen huts and whatever meagre resources they could lay their hands on. The corrugated interior was covered with a façade of plasterboard and skillfully decorated while the altar and alter rail were constructed from concrete left over from work on the barriers. Most of the interior decoration was done by Domenico Chiocchetti who remained to finis
h the chapel after the rest of the prisoners were released. His masterpiece was a painting of the Madonna and Child behind the altar, based on a battered postcard which he carried with him throughout the war.
Entrance to the Italian chapel
Today, the Italian Chapel still stands above one of the Churchill Barriers on the former site of ‘Camp 60’, of which only a few foundations remain. Its simple yet ornate beauty is a reminder not only of the triumph of the human spirit to overcome adversity but as a symbol of peace and reconciliation between nations. Chiocchetti twice returned to Orkney after the war while a small number of former prisoners returned as recently as 1992. The chapel is a Category A listed building and a major tourist attraction with over 100,000 visitors each year. Booklets in English, German and Italian can be obtained inside in return for a small donation towards the upkeep of the building.
A 35-minute ferry trip from the Orkney mainland, Hoy is the second largest of the Orkney Islands and offers some spectacular coastal scenery particularly around St John’s Head where some of the highest seas cliffs in the British Isles are to be witnessed. The island itself is sparsely populated; its only town, Lyness, looks like it has seen more prosperous days. It has something of a deserted feel, certainly on a grey and overcast October afternoon. The hotel is closed for the season. A smattering of houses, some empty, some for sale line the quiet road that extends uphill from the ferry terminal; a red phone box surrounded by overgrown grass looks like it may not have been used for quite some time.
Astonishing to think that at one time or another, Lyness was home to over 20,000 servicemen and women, a buzz of activity with an array of cinemas, clubs, public houses, shops and post office. While Hoy undoubtedly has its attractions for climbers, hill-walkers, birdwatchers and nature lovers, the local economy has probably never recovered from the closure of the naval base.
The pumping station of the old naval base now houses the Scapa Flow Visitor Centre
The unsightly concrete structures were largely demolished in the 1970s after being purchased by Orkney Islands Council. Little remains aside from the old pumping station, an oil storage tank and air-raid shelter though a few Nissen huts can still be found scattered about the vicinity.
The Scapa Flow Visitor Centre was opened in 1990, the main display being housed in the pumping station with an audio-visual show and vehicle display within the huge oil storage tank situated on the hillside above. The centre contains excellent displays tracing the history of the base chronologically from the First World War through to its closure in 1956. Guns and propellers salvaged from Kaiser Wilhelm’s once-proud Imperial Fleet are displayed on the concourse in front of the base while there are many fascinating photographs and artefacts relating to the ships, seaplanes and personnel once stationed here. There is also a café and well-stocked gift shop with a large collection of books, postcards and souvenirs.
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Overlooking the visitor centre is a new memorial (unveiled in August 2009) to the thousands of seamen who perished during the Arctic Convoys of World War 2 while delivering vital supplies to Soviet Russia via Archangel and Murmansk. In total, there were 78 convoys between 1941 and 1945 involving some 1,400 ships. 85 merchant ships as well as 16 Royal Navy warships escorting the convoys were lost. Several dramatic photographs of the ice-covered ships braving this most perilous of journeys are displayed in the visitor centre. In July 1942, just 11 of the 35 ships that set off reached their destination, the majority destroyed by German U-Boats and bomber aircraft. The fate of this doomed convoy inspired Alistair MacLean’s first novel, HMS Ulysses.
Atlantic Convoy memorial
While displays relating to the Royal Oak form an integral part of the museum, earlier tragedies of equal magnitude are also recounted. Just before midnight on 9th July 1917, HMS Vanguard, which had engaged the German fleet at Jutland the previous year and emerged unscathed, suddenly blew up as a result of cordite being accidentally ignited. Subsequent enquiries failed to conclusively determine the reason for the explosion, though a build up of excessively high temperatures possibly caused by a smouldering fire in one of the ship's two munitions magazines serving the turret guns may have been the primary factor.
The impact was swift and catastrophic; the ship sank almost immediately with only 2 survivors from a crew of over 800 – the greatest maritime loss as a result of an accident in British naval history. According to the Orcadian newspaper, recent research has numbered the casualties at 843, a higher total than even the Royal Oak. Like the Royal Oak, the wreck of HMS Vanguard, which lies of the island of Flotta, is a war grave and no anauthorised diving is permitted. The vast majority of bodies could not be recovered, the names of the dead recorded on registers at Chatham, Portsmouth and Plymouth. Only 18 remains were buried at Lyness.
The Vanguard was not the only accidental loss at Skapa Flow during the First World War; the Narborough and Opal ran ashore heavy gales and snowstorm on 12th January 1918, with a combined loss of 188 men. The small M-class destroyers had been on a routine patrol mission off Scapa Flow in moderate weather conditions; at around 5.45pm, the weather began to deteriorate and heavy snowstorms ensued.
A gun salvaged from
the wreck of HMS Opal
The order was given for both ships to return to base but visibility was cut to just a few hundred yards. At 10.17, a message was received from the Opal that she had run aground but no further communication followed. Rescue operations were hampered by bad weather and it was not until the morning of 14th January that the wrecks were spotted at Windwick Bay, South Ronalsay. Both ships had been broken up by the impact of the collision against the rocks; almost the entire crews perished, either drowned below deck or consumed by the violent waves. The only survivor, Able Seaman William Simmons, was recued by trawler suffering badly from frostbite; he later gave the only eye-witness account of the fate that had befallen the two ships. The enquiry later found poor seamanship and bad judgement in attempting to enter Scapa Flow during such bad weather conditions to be the cause of the disaster.
Rather more sinister (though no less tragic) was the fate that befell HMS Hampshire which sailed from Scapa Flow on the evening of 5th June 1916 with Lord Kitchener on board en route for Russia. A Force 9 gale caused two accompanying ships, the Victory and the Unity, to return to Scapa Flow. At around 8pm, the Hampshire - itself struggling in the heavy seas - struck a mine off Marwick Head on Orkney’s precipitous north-west coast. The ship suffered a rapid loss of power and was unable to make radio contact with shore; the local post office at Birsay sent an urgent telegraph message to naval headquarters but the response was slow. For reasons never established to this day, the Stromness lifeboat was on standby to give assistance but was refused permission to launch by naval authorities.
The Hampshire sank in less than 15 minutes. Many perished in the rough seas or found their life rafts dashed against the treacherous cliffs. There were only 12 survivors from the ship's compliment of 665. Due to the slow response, some men who did manage to scramble ashore died of exposure before they were rescued.
Kitchener Memorial at Marwick Head where HMS Hampshire met its doom
Lord Kitchener’s body was never recovered; the Kitchener Memorial was erected above the cliffs at Marwick Head in 1926 as tribute to the Field Marshal and the other crewmen who perished. Conspiracy theories surrounding the fate of the Hampshire and its illustrious passenger are documented elsewhere and remain a source of controversy.
The few bodies recovered from the Hampshire, like those recovered from Orkney's other naval tragedies of the two world wars, lie in the Royal Naval Cemetery, located a short walk from the visitor centre on the outskirts of Lyness. The cemetery was begun in 1915; there are 439 burials dating from the First World War and 200 from the Second. The majority of graves from the 1914-18 conflict belong to men from HMS Hampshire, Vanguard, Narborough and Opal. There are several memorials including one to men lost at the Battle of Jutland in 1916. It was from Scapa Flow that the bulk of the British Fleet sailed prior to the battle which resulted in the loss of 14 ships and 6,097 lives.
Lyness Royal Naval Cemetery, Hoy
The cemetery also contains the graves of 14 sailors of the Imperial German Navy, part of the fleet interned at Scapa Flow after the 1918 Armistice. The scuttling of the German fleet is an integral part of the lore of Scapa Flow; the interned ships arrived between 23rd and 27th November 1918. Skeleton crews remained on board the ships for several months while peace negotiations continued in Paris. The sailors, disillusioned by the loss of the war and long periods of inactivity, became indisciplined and mutinous as the talks dragged on with no apparent resolution. Sailors were confined to their ships at all times; they were allowed meagre supplies from home but resorted to fishing and catching seabirds as much to relieve the boredom as to supplement diets.
At 10.30am on 21st June 1919, Rear Admiral Von Reuter – fearful that the fleet was to be handed over to the Allies – gave orders to scuttle the ships. By 5pm, 52 of the 74 ships had sunk, the others being beached in shallow water. The last to go down was SMS Hindenburg, the only ship to sink on an even keel. The scuttling was a final, defiant gesture and one that did not go down well with the British authorities; Admiral Sydney Fremantle who had responsibility for the internment condemned the act as a shameful breach of the Armistice terms. The crews were now declared prisoners of war even though the war was over and many other prisoners already returned; they were held captive for a time at Nigg near Invergordon.
The scuttling prompted one of the biggest salvage operations in history with the majority of ships raised during the 1920s and 30s by the enterprising Cox and Danks; ships were raised in an inverted position by pumping air into the hull until buoyancy was achieved. Ironically, the Hindenburg proved the most stubborn and costly wreck to salvage, leading to the partial abandonment of the operation. Many items salvag
ed from the wrecks are displayed at the Scapa Flow Visitor Centre and Stromness Museum. Today, the seven remaining wrecks are protected and have become the centre of a major diving industry. The opportunity to ‘Dive Skapa Flow’ attracts thousands of visitors each year and has proved a major boost to the local economy.
Graves from HMS Hampshire
While these maritime wrecks remain the main attraction for visitors to Scapa Flow, it is perhaps the tragic stories of ships such as the Royal Oak, the Vanguard and the Hampshire that leave the greatest impression.