Divers Discover Sunken Warship Torpedoed by Germany in World War I

On October 15, 1914, a British warship called the HMS Hawke was sailing off the coast of Scotland when it was hit by a German torpedo. Out of 594 sailors, only 70 survived the Hawke’s quick descent into the depths, where it’s been lost for over a century.

Now, divers say they’ve found the wreckage of the Hawke—one of the first ships that went down during World War I.

“She’s lying on her starboard side and under there … seems to be quite intact,” as diver Will Schwarz tells CNN’s Issy Ronald. “The guns look as if they’re still active. They’re so highly polished it’s unbelievable … I’ve never seen guns like that in such amazing condition; it’s absolutely beautiful. But we’re very aware that 524 lads lost their lives on it.”

Schwarz was one of the scuba divers working with Lost in Waters Deep, an organization that searches for Scottish shipwrecks. Earlier this summer, the group’s co-founder, Kevin Heath, had been researching the Hawke, a 400-foot-long ship that was part of the Allies’ blockade of Germany during World War I.

A German U-boat commanded by Otto Weddigen launched the torpedo that sank the Hawke, as Heath tells Live Science’s Tom Metcalfe. Weddigen’s U-9 boat had sunk three other British vessels a few weeks prior, killing over 1,400 people. The attacks forced Britain to see Germany’s U-boats as a serious threat.

Heath identified a possible location for the wreck using historical reports of the attack, and he joined up with a diving organization called the Gasperados to get a closer look, per NPR’s Joe Hernandez. The team took a boat about 70 miles east of Fraserburgh, Scotland, where Heath waited while the divers lowered themselves more than 350 feet below the surface.

“We’re sitting there waiting, waiting, waiting. Excited. You know, are they going to say, ‘Oh, it is a rock’ or ‘It’s not the Hawke’?” Heath tells NPR. “They all come up and say, ‘Yeah, there are guns everywhere, and the wreck is in very, very good condition.’”

The Hawke launched in 1891, and as diver Steve Mortimer tells BBC Scotland News’ Ben Philip, its wreckage is “a really remarkable time capsule.”

“Lots of the decking is still in place—teak decking,” Mortimer adds. “There is a wonderful captain’s walkway around the back of the stern. … You can look into the portholes and see rooms with artifacts: teacups, bowls and plates just there on the floor.”

The explorers reported their discovery to the Royal Navy and the United Kingdom’s Hydrographic Office, an agency that creates nautical charts. Officials with the Royal Navy will examine the team’s evidence and formally identify the wreck.

The divers didn’t have much time at the wreck site, and they didn’t find definitive proof of the ship’s identity. Still, the team is quite confident.

“There’s only one warship in that area which has been registered lost,” Schwarz tells CNN. “The fact that she matches the identifying features of an Edgar-class destroyer means that she can only be the Hawke.”

Sonja Anderson | READ MORE

Sonja Anderson is a writer and reporter based in New York City.