HMS Doterel (1880)
Encyclopedia
HMS Doterel was a sloop
launched in 1880. She sank at anchor off Punta Arenas after an explosion on 26 April 1881 with the loss of 143 lives while on her way to join the Pacific Station
. Her loss was initially the source of much speculation. Causes considered included an attack by the Fenian
s, a lost torpedo and a coal gas explosion. It was eventually determined to have been caused by the explosion of a flammable oil-drying compound called "xerotine siccative", which was subsequently withdrawn from use in ships.
as a development of William Henry White
's 1874 . The graceful clipper bow of the Opsreys was replaced by a vertical stem and the engines were more powerful. The hull was of composite construction, with wooden planks over an iron frame. Power was provided by three cylindrical boilers, which supplied steam at 60 pound per square inches (413,685.4 Pa) to a two-cylinder horizontal compound-expansion steam engine driving a single 13 inch screw. This arrangement produced 900 ihp and a top speed of 11 knots (21.6 km/h).
Ships of the class were armed with two 7-inch (90 cwt) muzzle-loading rifled guns on pivoting mounts, and four 64-pounder muzzle-loading rifled guns
(two on pivoting mounts, and two broadside). Four machine guns and one light gun completed the weaponry. All the ships of the class were provided with a barque
rig, that is, square-rigged foremast and mainmast, and fore-and aft sails only on the mizzen mast.
and laid down on 13 May 1878. She was launched on 2 March 1880 from Number 3 slip, and was named by Miss Hunt-Grubbe, daughter of the captain of Steam Reserves at Chatham. She was commissioned on 7 December 1880.
and guns to deal with petty tyrants, minor insurrections and banditry. Doterel was assigned to the Pacific Station
, which included the western coasts of North and South America as well as China and Japan. Under Commander Richard Evans she sailed from Sheerness
, Kent on 17 January 1881. Having called at Madeira
, St Vincent
and Montevideo
, she anchored at Punta Arenas on 26 April 1881 at 09:00.
, presided over the funeral of the sailors killed in the explosion.
Commander Evans, the captain of Doterel telegrammed the Admiralty from Montevideo on 3 May 1881:
The ship's guns, screw and other valuable fittings were salvaged by and . A memorial plaque was placed in the "British section" of Punta Arenas Cemetery
in 1936. A marble wall tablet was placed in the Old Royal Naval College
in Greenwich
, London. The contemporary rules governing pensions allowed the widow or dependent children of the dead men a gratuity equal to a year's pay, although the loss of their property was not compensated.
in the bunkers and that no crew members were at fault.
On 21 November 1881, an explosion occurred in caused by a drying compound called "xerotine siccative". A surviving crewmember of Doterel, upon smelling the compound while on board , stated that he had smelled xerotine siccative before the explosion of Doterel. He explained to authorities that a jar of liquid had cracked while being moved below deck. Subsequent investigation revealed that just before the explosion in Doterel, two men were ordered to throw the jar overboard. While cleaning the leaking explosive liquid from beneath the forward magazine the men may have broken the rule of not having an open flame below decks. The first explosion experienced by the survivors was the explosion of the xerotine siccative, followed shortly after by the explosion of the forward magazine, containing 4 tons
and 7 cwt
(4,456 kg) of explosives. The use of xerotine siccative was ceased thereafter and a system of ventilation was recommended for all ships of the Royal Navy.
Sloop-of-war
In the 18th and most of the 19th centuries, a sloop-of-war was a warship with a single gun deck that carried up to eighteen guns. As the rating system covered all vessels with 20 guns and above, this meant that the term sloop-of-war actually encompassed all the unrated combat vessels including the...
launched in 1880. She sank at anchor off Punta Arenas after an explosion on 26 April 1881 with the loss of 143 lives while on her way to join the Pacific Station
Pacific Station
The Pacific Station, often referred to as the Pacific Squadron, was one of the geographical divisions into which the Royal Navy divided its worldwide responsibilities...
. Her loss was initially the source of much speculation. Causes considered included an attack by the Fenian
Fenian
The Fenians , both the Fenian Brotherhood and Irish Republican Brotherhood , were fraternal organisations dedicated to the establishment of an independent Irish Republic in the 19th and early 20th century. The name "Fenians" was first applied by John O'Mahony to the members of the Irish republican...
s, a lost torpedo and a coal gas explosion. It was eventually determined to have been caused by the explosion of a flammable oil-drying compound called "xerotine siccative", which was subsequently withdrawn from use in ships.
Design and construction
The Doterel class was designed by Nathaniel BarnabyNathaniel Barnaby
Sir Nathaniel Barnaby, KCB was Chief Constructor of the Royal Navy from 1872 to 1885....
as a development of William Henry White
William Henry White
Sir William Henry White was a prolific British warship designer and Chief Constructor at the Admiralty....
's 1874 . The graceful clipper bow of the Opsreys was replaced by a vertical stem and the engines were more powerful. The hull was of composite construction, with wooden planks over an iron frame. Power was provided by three cylindrical boilers, which supplied steam at 60 pound per square inches (413,685.4 Pa) to a two-cylinder horizontal compound-expansion steam engine driving a single 13 inch screw. This arrangement produced 900 ihp and a top speed of 11 knots (21.6 km/h).
Ships of the class were armed with two 7-inch (90 cwt) muzzle-loading rifled guns on pivoting mounts, and four 64-pounder muzzle-loading rifled guns
RML 64 pounder 64 cwt gun
The RML 64 pounder 64 cwt gun was a Rifled, Muzzle Loading naval, field or fortification artillery gun manufactured in England in the 19th century, which fired a projectile weighing approximately...
(two on pivoting mounts, and two broadside). Four machine guns and one light gun completed the weaponry. All the ships of the class were provided with a barque
Barque
A barque, barc, or bark is a type of sailing vessel with three or more masts.- History of the term :The word barque appears to have come from the Greek word baris, a term for an Egyptian boat. This entered Latin as barca, which gave rise to the Italian barca, Spanish barco, and the French barge and...
rig, that is, square-rigged foremast and mainmast, and fore-and aft sails only on the mizzen mast.
Crew
Doterel would have had a normal complement of 140–150 men, although on the day of her loss she had 155 men on board, despite five having deserted since leaving Sheerness. Some of the supernumeraries may have been bound for ships already on station in the Pacific; certainly, one of the survivors, Engineer Walker, was due to join .Construction
Doterel was ordered from Chatham DockyardChatham Dockyard
Chatham Dockyard, located on the River Medway and of which two-thirds is in Gillingham and one third in Chatham, Kent, England, came into existence at the time when, following the Reformation, relations with the Catholic countries of Europe had worsened, leading to a requirement for additional...
and laid down on 13 May 1878. She was launched on 2 March 1880 from Number 3 slip, and was named by Miss Hunt-Grubbe, daughter of the captain of Steam Reserves at Chatham. She was commissioned on 7 December 1880.
Service
Sloops such as Doterel were used in the far-flung parts of Britain's maritime empire for constabulary duties. Barnaby, Dotrels designer, was an enthusiast of heavily-armed but un-armoured frigates, sloops and corvettes, arguing that the Navy's tasks were best accomplished by a number of small, cheap ships. The system of colonial cruisers provided an inexpensive peace-keeping force for the protection of British interests, and gave imperial representatives a supply of sailors, marinesRoyal Marines
The Corps of Her Majesty's Royal Marines, commonly just referred to as the Royal Marines , are the marine corps and amphibious infantry of the United Kingdom and, along with the Royal Navy and Royal Fleet Auxiliary, form the Naval Service...
and guns to deal with petty tyrants, minor insurrections and banditry. Doterel was assigned to the Pacific Station
Pacific Station
The Pacific Station, often referred to as the Pacific Squadron, was one of the geographical divisions into which the Royal Navy divided its worldwide responsibilities...
, which included the western coasts of North and South America as well as China and Japan. Under Commander Richard Evans she sailed from Sheerness
Sheerness
Sheerness is a town located beside the mouth of the River Medway on the northwest corner of the Isle of Sheppey in north Kent, England. With a population of 12,000 it is the largest town on the island....
, Kent on 17 January 1881. Having called at Madeira
Madeira
Madeira is a Portuguese archipelago that lies between and , just under 400 km north of Tenerife, Canary Islands, in the north Atlantic Ocean and an outermost region of the European Union...
, St Vincent
Saint Vincent (island)
Saint Vincent is a volcanic island in the Caribbean. It is the largest island of the chain called Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. It is located in the Caribbean Sea, between Saint Lucia and Grenada. It is composed of partially submerged volcanic mountains...
and Montevideo
Montevideo
Montevideo is the largest city, the capital, and the chief port of Uruguay. The settlement was established in 1726 by Bruno Mauricio de Zabala, as a strategic move amidst a Spanish-Portuguese dispute over the platine region, and as a counter to the Portuguese colony at Colonia del Sacramento...
, she anchored at Punta Arenas on 26 April 1881 at 09:00.
Sinking
At about 10:15 on 26 April while at anchor off Punta Arenas, an explosion occurred in the forward magazine. Eyewitnesses described how objects of every type were thrown high into the air and a huge column of smoke was seen to rise from the ship. The ship sank instantly, and boats of every kind put off from shore, from the missionary schooner Allen Gardiner, from the Chilean schooner San Jose and from the ponton (sic) Kate Kellogg. 143 of the 155 crew members were killed. The captain was one of the few survivors, rescued by one of San Joses boats, naked from the blast and bleeding from several wounds. The afternoon was spent recovering bodies; only three were recovered whole. The various parts were put into boxes and buried the same afternoon. Reverend Thomas Bridges, a missionary at UshuaiaUshuaia
Ushuaia may refer to the following:*Ushuaia, a city in Argentina.**Ushuaia Department, an administrative division**Ushuaia River**Ushuaia International Airport**Colegio Nacional de Ushuaia, National School of Ushuaia....
, presided over the funeral of the sailors killed in the explosion.
Commander Evans, the captain of Doterel telegrammed the Admiralty from Montevideo on 3 May 1881:
The ship's guns, screw and other valuable fittings were salvaged by and . A memorial plaque was placed in the "British section" of Punta Arenas Cemetery
Cemetery of Punta Arenas
Cemetery of Punta Arenas is the public cemetery of the city of Punta Arenas, Chile. It has four hectares and is located in the northern area of the city, in Bulnes Avenue, and between the streets Francisco Bilbao and Angamos...
in 1936. A marble wall tablet was placed in the Old Royal Naval College
Old Royal Naval College
The Old Royal Naval College is the architectural centrepiece of Maritime Greenwich, a World Heritage Site in Greenwich, London, described by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation as being of “outstanding universal value” and reckoned to be the “finest and most...
in Greenwich
Greenwich
Greenwich is a district of south London, England, located in the London Borough of Greenwich.Greenwich is best known for its maritime history and for giving its name to the Greenwich Meridian and Greenwich Mean Time...
, London. The contemporary rules governing pensions allowed the widow or dependent children of the dead men a gratuity equal to a year's pay, although the loss of their property was not compensated.
Cause of the explosion
Initial reports blamed an explosion in the boilers, which then detonated the magazine. This was definitively proven to be false when Garnet found the boilers in perfect condition. Conjecture also suggested the Fenians could have blown up the ship, the explosion could have been caused by a Whitehead torpedo lost by in 1878, or that coal gas from the bunkers might have caused the explosion. An enquiry was held at Portsmouth, which referred the evidence to a scientific committee. In September 1881, inquiries into the explosion determined that it was caused by the detonation of coal gasCoal gas
Coal gas is a flammable gaseous fuel made by the destructive distillation of coal containing a variety of calorific gases including hydrogen, carbon monoxide, methane and volatile hydrocarbons together with small quantities of non-calorific gases such as carbon dioxide and nitrogen...
in the bunkers and that no crew members were at fault.
On 21 November 1881, an explosion occurred in caused by a drying compound called "xerotine siccative". A surviving crewmember of Doterel, upon smelling the compound while on board , stated that he had smelled xerotine siccative before the explosion of Doterel. He explained to authorities that a jar of liquid had cracked while being moved below deck. Subsequent investigation revealed that just before the explosion in Doterel, two men were ordered to throw the jar overboard. While cleaning the leaking explosive liquid from beneath the forward magazine the men may have broken the rule of not having an open flame below decks. The first explosion experienced by the survivors was the explosion of the xerotine siccative, followed shortly after by the explosion of the forward magazine, containing 4 tons
Long ton
Long ton is the name for the unit called the "ton" in the avoirdupois or Imperial system of measurements, as used in the United Kingdom and several other Commonwealth countries. It has been mostly replaced by the tonne, and in the United States by the short ton...
and 7 cwt
Hundredweight
The hundredweight or centum weight is a unit of mass defined in terms of the pound . The definition used in Britain differs from that used in North America. The two are distinguished by the terms long hundredweight and short hundredweight:* The long hundredweight is defined as 112 lb, which...
(4,456 kg) of explosives. The use of xerotine siccative was ceased thereafter and a system of ventilation was recommended for all ships of the Royal Navy.
External links
- Finding The Doterel Bow from Episode 1 of Season 5 of the television programme Clive CusslerClive CusslerClive Eric Cussler is an American adventure novelist and marine archaeologist. His thriller novels, many featuring the character Dirk Pitt, have reached The New York Times fiction best-seller list more than seventeen times...
's The Sea Hunters.