Sinking of HMS Speedy

On 3 September 1914, off the coast of England near the mouth of the Humber estuary, the British warship HMS Speedy sank. She struck a mine while clearing a minefield laid there by the Germans a few days earlier.

An old ship in a new role

Speedy was an Alarm-class torpedo gunboat, built by Thornycroft and launched in 1893. Ships of this class were meant to protect the fleet against torpedo boats, but they quickly became obsolete. In 1908–1909 Speedy, like several of her sister ships, was converted into a minesweeper. Her torpedo tubes were removed and she was adapted for clearing mines. After the outbreak of war the Royal Navy assigned her to clearing the waters off the east coast of England, where German ships had begun laying minefields.

The minefield off the Humber

On the night of 25 August the German minelayer Nautilus, escorted by the light cruiser Mainz and torpedo boats, laid a minefield in the approaches to the Humber, which led to the ports of Kingston upon Hull and Grimsby. Soon fishing vessels and small minesweeping craft began to be lost on the mines.

On 3 September Speedy was sweeping this field together with several drifters, fishing vessels mobilised by the navy for minesweeping. One of them, Lindsell, struck a mine and sank. Five of her crew were killed. Speedy lowered her boats to rescue the survivors, but herself struck a mine. She went to the bottom about an hour later. According to the available figures one sailor of her crew of about 90 was killed. The rest were rescued.

Significance

After the cruiser Amphion, she was the next Royal Navy ship lost to German mines in the first weeks of the war. The losses suffered in attempts to clear the minefield off the Humber led the Admiralty to change tactics. Instead of removing entire minefields, minesweepers began to mark out safe channels through them for shipping.