Lord Kitchener,having arrived at Scapa Flow on 5 June 1916 aboard HMS Oak,crosses at 1225 to HMS Iron Duke for lunch with Admiral Jellicoe and his officers. It is already wet and windy. (IWM)
The initial proposed routing for Hampshire from Scapa Flow was up the east coast of Orkney. But as a result of strong easterly winds and reports of German submarines operating to the east, that route was abandoned in favour of a route up the west coast. Hampshire struck a mine off the 200-foot high cliffs of Marwick Head near Birsay at 2040 on 5 June 1916. She sank within 15 minutes, with the loss of737 souls. There were only 12 survivors.
On 5 June however, as final preparations were being made for the voyage, the weather worsened. By the afternoon, a gale was blowing from the north-east and a heavy sea was running along the east coast, which made minesweeping difficult. The Admiralty felt that the heavy sea would make it difficult for the Hampshire’s two destroyer escorts to keep up with the bigger and more powerful cruiser – and so the fateful decision was made to re-route Hampshire and send her along one of the routes up the west side of Orkney.
Of the two available west routes, it was decided to use the route set up in January 1916, which went past the western island of Hoy. This route was not regularly swept for mines, but it was thought that no German minelayer would dare to operate this close to the heavily protected main Grand Fleet base. It was believed that this route would give the two escort destroyers some shelter from the north-easterly gale and enable them to keep up with the Hampshire.
The fateful decision having been made, Hampshire slipped her mooring buoy and cleared the harbour at about 1640. She steamed south out of Scapa Flow through Hoxa Sound, and then turned westwards into the Pentland Firth to rendezvous with her escort destroyers, Victor and Unity, off Tor Ness on the south-west of Hoy. By 1745 she had picked up the two destroyer escorts, which fell into line astern of Hampshire at 18 knots.
The prevailing weather conditions had however been misinterpreted, for within an hour the storm centre had passed overhead and the wind backed sharply to the north-west and increased to a Force 9 severe gale.. The conditions now facing Hampshire and her escorts were exactly the opposite of what had been predicted.
At 1805, the smaller and less powerful destroyer, Victor, signalled that she could only maintain 15 knots.
At 1810, Unity then signalled that she could only maintain 12 knots, and shortly afterwards at 1818, signalled that she could only make 10 knots. At 1820, Hampshire signalled that Unity should return to base.
Shortly after this, Victor signalled that she could not maintain any speed greater than 12 knots, and so at 1830, Hampshire signalled that she should also return to base. Off the entrance to Hoy Sound, the two destroyers turned for home whilst Hampshire went on alone, fighting the fury of the Force 9 severe gale and its 7–10-metre-high swell.
Hampshire struggled to make progress up the west coast. Her bow dipped and crashed in the heavy seas and the bow splash billowed over her fo’c’sle – she was only able to make 13.5 knots.
At about 2040, when she was about 1.5 miles from shore between Marwick Head and the Brough of Birsay, a rumbling explosion suddenly shook the whole ship as she hit a mine. A hole was torn in her keel between her bows and the bridge, the helm jammed and the lights gradually went out as the power failed. With no power, she could not make radio contact with the shore to call for assistance.
The explosion seemed to have taken place on the port side, just forward of the bridge and according to survivors, seemed to tear the heart right out of the ship. Her bow immediately began to settle into the water and a cloud of brown, suffocating smoke poured up from the stokers’ mess forward, making it difficult to see on the bridge.
Most of the crew had been down below decks and most of the hatches were battened down and shored up for the night. The crew began to knock out the wedges and proceed to their stations. The after-hatch to the quarterdeck was open, and as the crew streamed aft away from the explosion, an officer was heard to call out: ‘Make way for Lord Kitchener.’ He passed by, clad in his greatcoat, and went up the after-hatch, just in front of one of the few survivors. He was last seen standing on the quarter deck of the Hampshire.
The cruiser was settling quickly into the water by the bows, heeling to starboard. As all electric power was gone, none of the larger boom boats could be hoisted out. Those smaller boats that were lowered into the water on davits were smashed to pieces against the side of the Hampshire by the force of the gale. No survivor saw any boat get clear away from the ship. The Times of Friday 9 June 1916 reported that Kitchener’s party were put in a boat that was subsequently swamped by the sea.
About 15 minutes after striking the mine, Hampshire was well down by the bows, heeling to starboard. Her stern lifted slowly out of the water and her propellers were seen clear of the water, still revolving slowly. She capsized to starboard and an explosion was reported as she went that brought smoke and flame belching from just behind the bridge. Then she sank from view.
Only three oval cork and wood Carley floats got away from the sinking ship. These rigid floats were made from a length of copper tubing divided into waterproof sections, bent into an oval ring, then surrounded by cork or kapok and covered with a layer of waterproofed canvas. The raft was rigid and could remain buoyant even if the waterproof outer skin of several individual compartments was punctured.
One Carley float had only six men in it and, faced with the severe conditions, it was flung over twice, jettisoning the men into the sea. Only two men were alive when it reached shore.
A second larger Carley float got away with 40 to 50 men on it. The men in the open rafts were drenched and badly affected by wind chill; most of them were soon suffering from exposure, losing consciousness or foaming slightly at the mouth. Those that lost consciousness never regained it. When the raft made the shore some four hours later at 0115, only four of its occupants had survived.
The third Carley float had about 40 men in it when it left the sinking ship, and another 30 were picked up from the water. Not all crew were wearing their life preservers and it is reported that as the raft couldn’t hold the number of men now on it, an officer ordered those men wearing life preservers to enter the water and swim for shore. None survived. Almost four hours later, when the raft finally surged up on to the rocks, there were only six men left alive on it.
The subsequent search at sea in the days that followed located 13 mines in the vicinity of the wreck site, laid at a depth of 3 to 9 metres – deep enough to let smaller vessels such as fishing boats sail over the top of them and designed to catch only the bigger vessels. On 22 June 1916, a Royal Navy minesweeper, HM Drifter Laurel Crown, hit a mine in the same minefield as she was sweeping, and sank with the loss of nine of her crew.
It was later revealed that 34 mines had been laid by the German submarine U 75 on 29 May as part of German plans for what had developed into the Battle of Jutland. The German High Seas Fleet had put to sea to lure the British Battlecruiser Fleet out of its anchorage in the Firth of Forth. Anticipating that the main elements of the British Grand Fleet based at Scapa Flow would also put to sea, German submarines would be waiting for it. Three minelaying submarines, including U 75, were also sent out to mine the likely areas the British fleet would pass – and German intelligence was aware of the route that would tragically be used by the Hampshire. U 75 sailed from Germany two days before Jellicoe even knew of Lord Kitchener’s proposed journey.
The Kitchener Memorial, a 48-foot-high stone tower, was erected by public subscription on Marwick Head, the closest land point to the scene of the disaster, and was unveiled in 1926 to remember Britain’s Secretary of State for War, one of the men who died. No other names appeared on the tower however, so when Orkney Heritage Society came to restore the memorial for the 100th anniversary commemorations on 5 June 2016, an adjacent low archshaped wall was constructed and engraved with the names of all those