The Story of the Blowing-Up of H.M.S. Natal

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21924, 6 October 1934, Page 5 (Supplement)

The Story of the Blowing-Up of H.M.S. Natal

By Torpedoman Albert E. Pratt

One of the crew of H.M.S. Natal at the time of

the disaster

IT is said (hat the two beetling headlands, scarcely a mile, apart, which form the bottle-neck opening to Cromarty Firth, in Scotland, are called The Sutors," because on the crest of each there used to live a cobbler with only one last between the two of them. - This, says legend, they shared by throwing it backwards and forwards as required—" sutor " being the Latin and an old Scottish word for cobbler. But, whatever you may think of this local lore, there can be no doubt that nowhere on the coast of Great Britain is there a better protected or more sequestered natural harbour. This is the reason Cromarty Firth was one of the most important naval bases during the war. Some <if the swiftest and most vital naval dramas had their beginning in that twenty-mile stretch of water, with the straggling burghs of Invergordon on the one side and Cromarty on the other. / / A Pulse of the War .'The Admiralty was constantly in touch with this northern stronghold, for sometimes the entire High Sea Fleet would be moored there in readiness for action. Special trains often left London secretly in the middle of the night and raced non-stop over those 700 miles that lay between London and Invergordon carrying with them / munitions, food supplies, and not infrequently some of the big naval chiefs in a special saloon coach attached to. the rear. Cromarty Firth was one of the pulses of the war. An urgent message flashed from one of the Sea Lords in London would in a few minutes send a squadron of our greatest ships steaming between " The Sutors/' Toward the end of 1915 there was considerable movement in the Firth. " The Sutors " had been fortified. A mine-loAding station had been established at a local distillery. A line of oil tanks for the refuelling of the great men-o'-war of the Fleet stretched for a quarter of a mile along the northern shore. The water was dotted with every description of craft. There were battleships and cruisers, destroyers and submarines, torpedo-boats and aircraft carriers, mine-layers and mine-sweepers, and auxiliary craft of various kirjds—eighty to a hundred in all. Among the medley of craft anchored off Comarty was the 13,500 tons armoured cruiser Natal, one of the last s6ips of the pre-Dread-nought age. A New Year Party She had been built a go6d many years before at a cost of £1,213,244, including her six 9.2 and four 7.5 guns, and normally she carried a complement of 704 officers and men. On the morning of December 30 there was a good deal of activity aboard the, ship, for it was known that the commissioned' ranks were giving a New Year party that same afternoon to which their brother officers from other boats had been invited, as well as friends and relations living on shore and nurses from the hospital ships. The cook had been ordered to prepare a special :feast, with all the customary dishes and delicacies of celebration, and the officers' quarters were gaily decorated with flags, bunting and coloured balloons. The ship's band was to play and there was to be dancing. A cinema show also was included in the programme, and games for the children, of whom a num,ber were to be present. Lord Jellicoe—then Sir John Jellicoe—and Lady Jellicoe, who were at Invergordon, had been sent; an invitation, and were expected aboard the Natal during the festivities. 1 remember, that day very well—dull and dry, with a cold, wind sweeping across the Firth from the north, and causing the smaller of the craft rhythmically to rock in the grey, ruffled waters. Tower of Yellow Flame Shortly after noon a large number of the men left the ship, myself among them, for, apart from the fact that the party, excepting a number of helpers from the noncommissioned " ranks, was only for officers and their friends, we noncommissioned ones had our own particular pastime—a football match at Cromarty between the petty officers and men of the Natal. Af'ier the match I happened to take a look at the Natal, which lay below the playing field alongside her sister ships—the Shannon, the Cochrane and the Achilles. A proud " ironclad " she looked, indeed, with the Union Jack flut- , tering from the masthead. I wondered how the party was going and if thu children were enjoying themselves. And it was at this moment that "there occurred a flight that froze the blood /in my veins, that lives •with me to this day in nightmares —a sight that set me shouting to my football friends and impelled one

—TWENTY YEARS AFTER —— 'T'WENTY years ago our country began the four 1 most tremendous years of her history. Strange and perilous things happened in those four years—things of which the full facts were never really known. This is the first of a short series of articles in which actual survivors will fell their stories of the dramas in which they were suddenly called to play a part, and of the events that will remain the outstanding memories of their lives. To-day a naval man tells of the blowing up in the Cromarty Firth on New Year's Eve, 1915, of the armoured cruiser Natal. Four hundred persons on board were killed.

J and all to rush pell-mell down to the | waterside. I A tower of sickly yellow flame had : suddenly shot up from the aft of the ship. It leaped above the masthead. It seemed even to dwarf the mountains in the background. It struck terror to the hearts of all who saw it—and they say its flash was noticed ten miles away at Fortrose, in spite of the daylight. It was unmistakably the flash of burning cordite. Almost simultaneously there sounded a deep, rumbling explosion, that, by reason of its remoteness, seemed to come from the depth of the sea. It was followed by two sharper explosions. The vessel immediately swung and swayed in alarming 'fashion. Foundered in Five Minutes Then she suddenly began to heel to port. Over, over she slowly went. Those of her crew and others who had by then reached the deck slid into the water like beans from a shovel. Some who managed to cling on to the ship's fixtures made frantic efforts to scramble up the rapidly steepening deck. Further, further she went, till her rail touched the water, with her bilge keel pointing heavenwards. For a moment she lay there, while a straggling line of survivors floundered on her slimy hull. Yet another explosion from her depths—so muffled that it seemed more like the dull throb of a pulse —and with a great shudder the Natal had disappeared. It all happened in less than five i minutes. So short had been the ■ enactment of this great disaster that ; one felt it to have been unreal—i the grotesque hallucinations of some haunting nightmare. Nothing but a seething mass of white foam to mark the spot, dotted with patches of struggling human j beings who had survived. ' An immediate rush to the rescue was made by every available craft. There was a string of tenders, j. launches, and tugs, follovred by a flotilla of rowing boats and dinghies, ! whose oarsmen pulled feverishly. Terrible Scenes in Water | The scenes in the water as boats drew alonside were indescribably | terrible. Many of the survivers | were striving to keep up in spite of j their dreadful injuries caused :.io i doubt bj r the explosion. Many sank j before help came.

There was one man whose hands had been blown off. A rope was thrown to him by a rescue party in a launch. He gripped the rope with his teeth and was thus drawn to safety. , Not one of the civilians who had gone aboard the cruiser, however, was to be seen. None, in fact, has ever been found from that day to this.

No doubt they were imprisoned in the part of the ship where the party was being held. Perhaps they were already dead before the ship sank, for although, considering the magnitude of the disaster, the detonations were comparatively small, it was apparent when salvage work on the boat began some years later that the force of the concussion must have been terrific. The entire stern of the ship was found to be missing. Divers discovered pieces of her propellers on the bed of the Firth many yards away from the wreckage. This surprising disparity between noise and damage is probably because the explosion was well down in the ship below the waterlinc. Submarine Theory Many theories were advanced to account for the disaster. At first it was thought that an enemy submarine had succeeded in eluding the defences of " The Sutors " and! passed between them into t.hei Firth, but this view was subsequently dismissed, because it was unlikely that any under-water craft could have safely negotiated the network of mines laid at the entrance to the Firth. Another, conjecture was that an enemy agent, had introduced an infernal machine into one of the after magazines. Yet the magazines and shell rooms which it was assumed had exploded and caused the ship to isinlc were found intact by the salvors. Even their cordite charges and projectiles were discovered still in their places. The theory which gained greatest ground was that an infernal machine set to explode at a given hour was introduced into the ship's coal bunkers. The fact that the Natal had returned: from a Liverpool docking only a Jew days before the disaster, nnd it was notorious that the dock gateis were unguarded and that even eighteen months after the outbreak of war, it was a comparatively easy matter for any one to board vessels! in the guisie of workmen, cciuplell with the coincidence that the other two battleships de-

stroved by internal explosions during the war—the Vanguard and the Bulwark —were coal-burning ships, lent a certain credence to the theory. Moreover, it was well known that during the war Germany produced skilfully camouflaged bo'mbs to resemble blocks of coal, oil drums and parts of ship's gear in readiness for the opportunity to " plant " them in British battleships. Yet another hazard as to the cause of the disaster discussed at the time was that the cinematograph film that was to have been shown accidentally caught alight and ignited the explosives aboard. But this has since discounted by the discovery by divers of the film, quite intact, strips of which practically every one in the surrounding towns and villages now possesses as a souvenir. Possible Explanation Perhaps the most feasible explanation is that in some way one of the magazines became ignited and exploded, immediately flooding the others. This would account for the salvors finding them intact. This theory is most possibly correct, since the Natal at the time was in harbour trim with ah her watertight doors open. No one will ever be able to relate what actually happened in those few terrible minutes. Of those who were in the very heart of the ship none survived, for

even if they were alive after the explosion their escape was cut off through the concussion slamming and jamming the doors of the interior gangways. Salvors had to hack them open when working on the ship. Of those who were picked out of the water alive shortly after the disaster every one was too dazed to give a coherent story. In all 428 officers, men, nurses and civilians were lost. A number of survivors later succumbed from their injuries. Grim Reminder Many stories of miraculous escapes were told. One man ashore missed the launch which would have put him aboard the Natal five minutes before the disaster. An Invergordon doctor and his wife were among those invited. They v ere about to leave their house for the Natal when a telephone message called the doctor to an accident in the town. He tried to persuade his wife " not to miss the fun," and precede him to the party. He would follow later. She, however, insisted on waiting his return from his case. Before he came back for her the Natal had disappeared. The news that Sir John and Lady Jellicoe were aboard the cruiser spread through the town, but as it happened they were, fortunately, unable at the last minute to attend the celebrations.

Black Isle, as they call Cromarty and the surrounding locality, is con-

stantly reminded of the tragic fate of that proud ship and those who were aboard in the grim monument that every day emerges from the water when the tide ebbs.

Then the long line of the Natal's " bilge " keel can be plainly seen protruding several feet above the water like the humped back of a whale, surmounted each end by a beacon to safeguard shipping in the channel. There she lies, masts downward, at a slight angle, which brings up her " bilge " keel squarely from the water's surface. Sometimes a diver, groping his way about her watery barnacle-hung corridors in connection with the salvage work, will come across an ominous heap of bleached bones. Razor Blades Now A naval funeral with full honours is at once given to the remains. Meanwhile work on salvaging the metal has been going slowly ahead for some years, and by an ironical trick of fate the heavy plates of high tensile steel that were intended to protect her from the attacks of her adversaries are now being cut and ground into blades for safety razors. Next week, a survivor of the great Silvertown explosion the most appalling disaster !ln London for generations describes what happened on that terrible evening.