HMS Volage (R41)
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HMS Volage (R41) was an V-class destroyer of the British Royal Navy that saw service during World War II. She was later converted into a Type 15 fast anti-submarine frigate, with the new pennant number F41.
She was commissioned on 26 May 1944. On 22 October 1946 the Volage together with HMS Saumarez were badly damaged by mines laid in the North Corfu Channel. On 9 April 1949, the International Court of Justice ruled that Albania was responsible under international law for the damage and loss of human life which resulted from that incident, and that there was a duty upon Albania to pay compensation to the United Kingdom. The Volage was reconstructed as a Type 15 frigate during 1952-1953 and scrapped in 1972.
[edit] Mining
After steaming from Corfu at 13:30 on 22 October 1946, the destroyers Saumarez and Volage and the cruisers HMS Mauritius and HMS Leander approached Kepi Denta (Denta Point) at the southern edge of the Bay of Saranda. At 14:47, the lead ship, HMS Mauritius signalled a port turn and a new course of 310 degrees. A reconstructed track course in Leggett (1976:36) depicts the turn outside the bay while Meçollari (2009:96-99) reconstructs the turn past the point and inside the bay. At 14:53 hours, while underway on this new course, HMS Saumarez struck a mine, later determined to be a German EMC (GY in British nomenclature) contact mine of Second World War manufacture. The EMC was a spherical weapon 44 in (1.12 m) in diameter with seven Hertz horns (a German-invented chemical detonator that closed the circuit for firing) with a charge of 661 lbs (300 kg) (Campbell 1985:270). The blast occurred a few feet forward of the bridge on the starboard side, opening an approximately “thirty-foot section…from the keel to just below the bridge” to the sea (Leggett 1976:35). Saumarez stopped and began to drift, with a fire from spilled fuel engulfing the bow area as the bow, flooded from the explosion damage, settled beneath the surface. HMS Volage approached to assist and take Saumarez in tow. After one failed attempt (the line parted) a new towline was secured and Volage proceeded to tow Saumarez at 15:30 (Leggett 1976:60-61).
At 16:06 (or 16:15, according to Leggett), Volage struck a second mine. That mine was also later determined to be a German-manufactured EMC. Volage reportedly hit the mine head on; “In a split second forty feet of the destroyer, from the fore peak to just in front of ‘A’ gun turret, had vanished. Mess decks, store rooms, the paint shop, the cable locker containing tons of anchor cable, the anchors themselves, literally dissolved in the air” (Leggett 1976:71-72). Fragments of the bow were observed flying into the air, and other fragments, “some weighing up to half a ton” landed on the ship, some on to the bridge (Leggett 1976:72). Leggett (36) and Meçollari (96-99) chart the site of Volage’s mining off the north point of the Bay of Saranda. As previously noted, despite their damage, both destroyers remained afloat, and subsequently returned to Corfu under tow. Saumarez suffered 36 dead, 25 of whom were missing and presumed killed, while Volage lost eight men, seven of whom were missing, presumed killed (Leggett 1976:154-155).
Following the Corfu Channel Incident, both destroyers successfully reached Corfu, and subsequently were sent to Malta. No known attempt was made to salvage or recover material from the bow of Volage, which sank at the site of the mine explosion. Saumarez was written off as a constructive loss and sold on 8 September 1950, and was reported scrapped in October 1950. Volage, after initial repairs, returned to the U.K. and was rebuilt as a Type 15 frigate in 1952-1953. Laid up and reported by some sources as scrapped in 1965, Volage was sold for scrap (some accounts say sunk) on 28 October 1972 (Chesneau 1980:42-43).
[edit] Discovery of remains of Volage’s bow in 2009
In July 2007, the RPM Nautical Foundation, a U.S. and Malta-based not-for-profit organization, began a comprehensive, ongoing archaeological survey of the coast of Albania in cooperation with the Albanian Institute of Archaeology (AIA) and the Institute of Nautical Archaeology (INA). The inaugural season, conducted from the R/V Hercules, involved a multibeam sonar survey with remotely operated vehicle (ROV) assessment of targets to the 120 m contour. The area surveyed was from the border with Greece, through the Corfu Channel (but not into Greek waters) and to the Bay of Saranda, 21 kilometer from the border. A total of 125 anomalies were encountered, and 67 were assessed with the ROV during the 2007 season. The majority of anomalies were found to be geological mud and mud/sand formations created as silt from the mouth of the Butrint River to the south is transported by current in a N-S direction. Fifteen shipwrecks were identified, fourteen of which were classified as “modern” and one of which was an ancient wreck of ca. 300-275 BCE. One of the fourteen other targets, briefly examined in 2007, was later (2009) determined to be the bow of HMS Volage.
During the 2009 field season the sonar target in this area was re-examined by James P. Delgado of the Institute of Nautical Archaeology, Jeffrey Royal of the RPM Nautical Foundation, ROV specialist Kim Wilson, and George Robb, Jr., President and founder of the RPM Nautical Foundation, who immediately assessed the potential of the 2007 “wreck” as the possible bow of Volage in response to Delgado’s question of whether the surveys of 2007-2009 had encountered any traces of the Corfu Channel Incident. After consultation with Dr. Adrian Anastasi as the AIA and Albanian government representative, it was decided to non-intrusively reassess the site on 28 June 2009. An hour-long ROV dive was made to the site on that afternoon.
The site is located in the area of the mining of HMS Volage. The seabed is a loose mud and silt. The sonar anomaly delineated by multibeam in 2007 and reconfirmed in 2009 is approximately 15 by 10 meters in area and has a height of 1.5 meters above the current level of the seabed. Active siltation and burial of the vessel remains at the site is visible. Some localized scouring and uncovering of cultural material is also possible. The majority of the remains visible were a section of a steel ship’s hull, with explosion damage consistent with an implosion, exposed steel frames, electrical wiring, and a series of diagnostic artefacts. While identification of the site would have been better aided by the recovery of one or more diagnostic artefacts, because of the possibility of the site being the bow of HMS Volage and hence a war grave, no disturbance was planned and nothing was disturbed or removed from the site. The British and Albanian governments were notified of the find and provided with video and still images of the site after the survey.
[edit] References
- Burt, R.A (1985). British Destroyers in World War Two. London: Arms and Armour Press.
- Campbell, John (1985). Naval Weapons of World War II. London: Conway Maritime Press.
- Chesneau, Roger (1980). Conway’s All The World’s Fighting Ships, 1922-1946. Annapolis: U.S. Naval Institute Press.
- Gardiner, Leslie (1966). The Eagle Spreads Its Claws: A History of the Corfu Channel Incident and of Albania’s Relations With the West, 1945-1966. Edinburgh: William Blackwood.
- Final Judgment, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland v. Albania (Corfu Channel Case), December 15. 1949. http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/files/1/1663.pdf.
- Kola, Paulin (2003). The Search for Greater Albania. London: Hurst & Company.
- Leggett, Eric (1976). The Corfu Channel Incident. London: New English Library.
- Manning, T.D. (1961). The British Destroyer. London: Putnam & Co..
- Meçollari, Artur (2009). Incidenti I Kanalit Të Korfuzit: Dresjtësi e Annuar. Vlorë: Triptik.
- Thomson, Stuart (2005). "Maritime Jurisdiction and the Law of the Sea". in Speller, Ian. The Royal Navy and Maritime Power in the Twentieth Century. London and New York: Frank Cass.
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