16 October 1940

Monitor HMS Erebus and three destroyers bombarded Dunkirk on 16 October 1940. Erebus was a one-trick pony – she and her sister HMS Terror were designed and built around a single twin-15in gun turret mounted on a tall barbette just forward of the bridge, giving her a range of around 22 miles. Displacing 7,300 tons, the ships, built by Harland and Wolff at Govan on the Clyde, were well-protected by thick deck armour and effective torpedo bulges and easily capable of 12 knots. Launched on 19 June 1916 and commissioned on 2 September the same year, Erebus saw action in World War 1 when she bombarded German naval forces at Ostend and Zeebrugge, though she suffered damage when struck by a remote-controlled motorboat packed with explosives on 28 October 1917. Post-war she was in action at the British invasion of Russia in 1919, then spent much of her time as a gunnery training ship. On the outbreak of World War 2 she served with the Eastern and Mediterranean Fleets, carrying vital supplies into the besieged city of Tobruk as well as bombarding enemy forces ashore. However, on 16 October 1940 she was engaged close to home, firing shells into Dunkirk as part of Naval operations against a build-up of German shipping, with fears growing that the Germans were preparing an invasion fleet. Erebus was escorted by three destroyers, one of which was the new Hunt-class ship HMS Garth. She went on to serve as an anti-aircraft gun platform in Trincomalee, being damaged by Japanese air attacks in April 1942, then pounded German defences during the Italian invasions in 1943 and at Utah Beach during the Normandy Landings on 6 June 1944, targeting batteries at Barfleur and La Pernelle, though one of her 15in gun barrels was wrecked when a shell exploded prematurely. She was paid off after the Japanese surrender and placed on the Disposal List in 1946; bought for scrap by Ward’s, she was broken up at Inverkeithing on the Forth in January 1947.

17 October 1939

Elderly battleship HMS Iron Duke was bombed in Scapa Flow on 17 October 1939, and though she never moved again during the conflict she played an important role in World War 2. The 30,000-ton name ship of the Iron Duke class was built at Portsmouth Dockyard and launched on 12 October 1912, going on to serve as the flagship of the Grand Fleet at the Battle of Jutland in May-June 1916, where she mauled the German battleship SMS Konig. After the war she served with the Mediterranean Fleet , seeing action in the Russian Civil War and the Greco-Turkish War of 1919-22. She was effectively demilitarised under the terms of the 1930 London Naval Treaty, with armour and part of her armament being removed as she was converted to a gunnery training vessel. At the start of World War 2 she was moved to Scapa Flow as an base ship and floating anti-aircraft platform, with her secondary guns being removed and placed around the main harbour as additional defensive points. On 17 October 1939 Iron Duke was damaged by several near misses when four German Junkers Ju88 bombers attacked the harbour, and her crew drover the old battleship ashore to prevent her sinking. She was further damaged in another bombing raid on 16 March 1940, and did not move from the shoal on which she was beached, but still managed to affect matters around her. It is thought her presence influenced German naval commanders when they planned Bismarck’s raiding sortie into the North Atlantic, a reconnaissance appeared to show a strong active Home Fleet unit in Scapa Flow, though in reality it was the stranded Iron Duke and two decoys, merchant ships made to look like Revenge-class battleships. Iron Duke was repaired and returned to service as a harbour ship for the rest of the war, though she never moved – indeed, she was still beached when she was sold for scrapping in 1946. She was finally refloated in April that year, moving to Faslane in August. Her final voyage was in late 1948 when she was moved on to Glasgow and scrapped on the Clyde.

18 October 1812

The brig-sloop HMS Frolic was captured by American sloop Wasp on 18 October 1812, but was recaptured within hours. Frolic was a Cruizer-class warship carrying 18 guns, built in Bridport in 1805-6, and saw her first significant action in the Caribbean after she crossed the Atlantic in February-March 1808. She took part in the invasion of Martinique (February 1809) and the invasion of Guadaloupe a year later. On 12 September 1812 Frolic set out from the Gulf of Honduras as escort for a convoy of 14 British merchant ships bound for England. On 16 October they were around 300 miles north of Bermuda when they ran into a gale which scattered the convoy and damaged Frolic, which lost part of her rigging and her main yard. By evening the following day her crew had carried out some repairs and six of the 14 ships of the convoy had rejoined Frolic. Shortly before midnight the American sloop-of-war USS Wasp, which had also taken some damage in the storm, spotted some of the merchant ships and shadowed them until daybreak, when they sighted Frolic. In heavy seas and with a strong wind still blowing the two warships prepared for battle, closing to 60 yards or so before opening fire and gradually moving closer. Frolic’s gunners aimed high, causing severe damage to the American’s rigging and masts, while Wasp’s crews aimed for Frolic’s hull, taking a bloody toll. After around 20 minutes both ships were out of control, and Frolic collided with Wasp, which fired a final raking broadside. Shortly before midday the Americans, whose gunnery had proved superior to that of their foe, boarded Frolic to find that every officer and more than half the crew – 90 men in total – were either dead or wounded; 30 British sailors died in the encounter, while the Americans suffered three dead and eight wounded. With battle over, both of Frolic’s masts collapsed, so a prize crew from Wasp attempted to effect enough repairs to sail the battered ship back to port. However, just four hours later the 74-gun third rate HMS Poictiers appeared on the scene, capturing both Frolic and Wasp with very little fuss and taking them to Bermuda along with a number of merchant ships from the convoy. Frolic was too badly damaged to be of any further use and was broken up in November 1813, while Wasp was repaired and returned to service in the Royal Navy as HMS Loup Cervier, later taking on the name HMS Peacock, though she did not last long – she disappeared off the coast of Virginia in 1814 and was presumed to have been wrecked.

19 October 1818

Experiments to defeat weevils by adding caraway seeds to ship’s biscuits proved unsuccessful as the insects simply ate their way round them and ignored the seeds. These biscuits, also known as hard tack and containing just wheat flour, water and salt, were a crucial part of the sailor’s daily diet – so long as the sailors could actually eat them, as they were notoriously solid items. They could be broken up and eaten as small pieces, or soaked in liquid such as small beer or stew, providing plenty of calories for men working in physically-demanding circumstances. The idea that these biscuits were teeming with maggots or weevils is probably somewhat far-fetched; they could be turned to dust in storage by insects if left alone for long periods, and could also decay from damp sea air, but if stored in airtight conditions they would last for months or even years and still be quite edible. By the mid-Victorian period ‘proper’ bread (initially known as ‘soft bread’ to distinguish it from hard tack, which was officially described as bread) was being introduced, along with tinned food, and the idea of the weevil-infested ship’s biscuit began to fade from public view.

20 October 1915

Hired drifter HMD Star of Buchan struck a mine to the east of the Isle of Wight and sank on 20 October 1915. The 80-ton Fraserburgh-registered drifter, built in 1913 and also known as the Star o’ Buchan, had been hired by the Admiralty as a patrol boat at the start of 1915 but never saw out the year; she struck a mine off the Nab Buoy on 20 October and was lost, along with seven members of the RNR. The mine is believed to have been laid by submarine UC-5.

21 October 1976

Fleet submarine HMS Sovereign held what was believed to be the most northerly Trafalgar Night dinner on 21 October 1976. The S-class nuclear-powered boat was en route to the North Pole for under-ice manoeuvres when the dinner was held. Sovereign, launched at Barrow by Vickers on 17 February 1973, had set out from Devonport for a five-week patrol on 1 October 1976, completing a number of tasks by 19 October, by which time the boat was 850 miles inside the Arctic Circle and some70 miles off the north-eastern point of Greenland. At this point she started Exercise Brisk, ten days of exercises under the ice cap – a task for which nuclear submarines are ideally suited, as they can remain submerged for weeks on end (the only limitation is the crew’s need for food). Sovereign made its final turn towards the North Pole on the evening of 21 October, arriving at around 1900 the following day, at which point the search began for a suitable polynya – a patch of thin ice through which the submarine can break through to the surface. Using upward-facing sensors, a suitable polynya was found early in the morning of 23 October, but the surrounding ice was found to be unstable, so the boat dived again after breakfast and a further polynya was found at 0915. Conditions on the ice were relatively benign – minus 35 Celsius, dry, light winds and visibility of around 1,000 yards. By the time she dived again, six hours later, 105 of the 114 men on board had been out on the ice, medals and certificates had been presented, a football match played (the Seamen beat the Technical Department 2-0) and a round-the-world race held, though bad light prevented a cricket match from being played and the ship’s diver were unable to access clear water around the 4,500-ton boat to carry out their expedition. Sovereign gathered reams of data as she travelled beneath the ice cap, for both military and civilian analysis, and the submarine was back in Devonport on 5 November. Sovereign was the second Royal Navy submarine to visit the Pole – HMS Dreadnought, the first British nuclear-powered Fleet submarine, had broken through the ice there on 3 March 1971.

22 October 1683

The first officials were appointed to open Jamaica Dockyard on 2 October 1683. The facility, in Port Royal, had long been a haven for pirates, privateers and buccaneers, earning it the title of the ‘wickedest place on Earth’, but the presence of these high seas thugs, who preyed mainly on Spanish trade (having been displaced by the Spanish over the years) gave the island of Jamaica a certain security. Port Royal grew to become one of the largest cities in the British colonies after they took the island in 1655; initially known as Cagway, it had hundreds of houses, shops, taverns and warehouses around a series of forts, and was regarded as the unofficial capital of the island until a devastating earthquake struck in 1692. The first resident Royal Navy officer was in place by 1675 to oversee a careening wharf and rented storehouse on the waterfront, and on 22 October 1683 officials were appointed to oversee the development of a proposed dockyard. The earthquake of 1692 put a spanner in the works. By now the population had reached almost 7,000 people and the settlement boasted substantial brick buildings – but when the powerful quake struck on 7 June it liquefied the deep sand deposits below the city, causing many buildings to slide into the harbour or simply sink into the sand. A subsequent tsunami completed the initial damage, and up to 3,000 people died in the disaster, though a further 2,000 or so were killed by disease in the following weeks. While Port Royal never recovered from its reputation as a city of pirates, wild taverns and brothels, and Kingston assumed a pre-eminent role as a commercial centre, the Royal Navy continued to persevere, rebuilding and expanding its facilities there, even when hampered by disastrous fires and hurricanes. By the mid-18th Century the port had new docks, wharves and storehouses, cooperages, accommodation and workshops, and within another 50 years or so there was a small victualling yard, with a Naval hospital opening in 1817. It was the headquarters of the Royal Navy in the Caribbean (the Jamaica Station) until 1830, then a vital part of the North America and West Indies Station until its closure in 1905.