The Motorised Submersible Canoe (MSC), nicknamed 'Sleeping Beauty', was built by British Special Operations Executive

Special Operations Executive

The Special Operations Executive was a World War II organisation of the United Kingdom. It was officially formed by Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Minister of Economic Warfare Hugh Dalton on 22 July 1940, to conduct guerrilla warfare against the Axis powers and to instruct and aid local...

 (SOE) during World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 as an underwater vehicle

Submarine

A submarine is a watercraft capable of independent operation below the surface of the water. It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability...

 for a single frogman

Frogman

A frogman is someone who is trained to scuba diving or swim underwater in a military capacity which can include combat. Such personnel are also known by the more formal names of combat diver or combatant diver or combat swimmer....

 to perform clandestine

Clandestine operation

A clandestine operation is an intelligence or military operation carried out in such a way that the operation goes unnoticed.The United States Department of Defense Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms defines "clandestine operation" as "An operation sponsored or conducted by governmental...

 reconnaissance

Reconnaissance

Reconnaissance is the military term for exploring beyond the area occupied by friendly forces to gain information about enemy forces or features of the environment....

 or attacks

Military strike

A military strike is a limited attack on a specified target. Strikes are used, amongst other things, to render facilities inoperable , to assassinate enemy leaders, and to limit supply to enemy troops. A strike can often be the prelude to a war or siege, whose initial strike is for a strategic or...

 against enemy vessels.

Design

The MSC was designed by Major Hugh Quentin Reeves

Hugh Reeves

Hugh Quentin Alleyne Reeves was a British inventor and engineer. He was one of the most productive and creative engineers attached to Station IX the SOE research station during World War II....

 to attack ships anchored in harbours. The craft got its nickname "Sleeping Beauty" when Reeves was found sleeping in it by a passing officer.

Constructed of mild steel, the canoe

Canoe

A canoe or Canadian canoe is a small narrow boat, typically human-powered, though it may also be powered by sails or small electric or gas motors. Canoes are usually pointed at both bow and stern and are normally open on top, but can be decked over A canoe (North American English) or Canadian...

 is 12 in 8 in (3.86 m) long with a beam of 27 inch (0.6858 m), used a 5 hp

Horsepower

Horsepower is the name of several units of measurement of power. The most common definitions equal between 735.5 and 750 watts.Horsepower was originally defined to compare the output of steam engines with the power of draft horses in continuous operation. The unit was widely adopted to measure the...

 electric motor

Electric motor

An electric motor converts electrical energy into mechanical energy.Most electric motors operate through the interaction of magnetic fields and current-carrying conductors to generate force...

 powered by four 6-volt

Volt

The volt is the SI derived unit for electric potential, electric potential difference, and electromotive force. The volt is named in honor of the Italian physicist Alessandro Volta , who invented the voltaic pile, possibly the first chemical battery.- Definition :A single volt is defined as the...

 batteries, had a top speed of 4.4 kn (8.6 km/h; 5.4 mph), and could travel 30 to at a cruising speed of 3.1 knots (6.1 km/h). Its maximum operating depth was 50 feet (15.2 m).

The Sleeping Beauty was designed to carry up to 3.5 pounds (1.6 kg) of explosives as well as being able to be dropped near its target by a heavy bomber

Heavy bomber

A heavy bomber is a bomber aircraft of the largest size and load carrying capacity, and usually the longest range.In New START, the term "heavy bomber" is used for two types of bombers:*one with a range greater than 8,000 kilometers...

. Fore and central trimming tanks within the hull

Hull (watercraft)

A hull is the watertight body of a ship or boat. Above the hull is the superstructure and/or deckhouse, where present. The line where the hull meets the water surface is called the waterline.The structure of the hull varies depending on the vessel type...

 can be flooded to sink the craft underwater or have compressed air blown in them to surface the craft. The pilot controlled the craft by a joystick that is connected to the rudder

Rudder

A rudder is a device used to steer a ship, boat, submarine, hovercraft, aircraft or other conveyance that moves through a medium . On an aircraft the rudder is used primarily to counter adverse yaw and p-factor and is not the primary control used to turn the airplane...

 and hydroplanes

Hydrofoil

A hydrofoil is a foil which operates in water. They are similar in appearance and purpose to airfoils.Hydrofoils can be artificial, such as the rudder or keel on a boat, the diving planes on a submarine, a surfboard fin, or occur naturally, as with fish fins, the flippers of aquatic mammals, the...

, breathed through a Siebe Gorman MkII Amphibian rebreather or Dunlop Underwater Swimming Breathing Apparatus (UWSBA) , and would have to come close to the surface to establish his whereabouts. The canoe can also be paddled or moved by raising the mast

Mast (sailing)

The mast of a sailing vessel is a tall, vertical, or near vertical, spar, or arrangement of spars, which supports the sails. Large ships have several masts, with the size and configuration depending on the style of ship...

 and erecting a sail

Sail

A sail is any type of surface intended to move a vessel, vehicle or rotor by being placed in a wind—in essence a propulsion wing. Sails are used in sailing.-History of sails:...

. Although the Sleeping Beauty was designed to accommodate only one pilot, sometimes a second frogman was employed lying on the bow. Different configurations were tried on the MSC such as the positioning of the hydroplanes, these were positioned aft but sometimes moved forward during experimental work.

During the end of 1943 the MSC was referred to the “Assault Warfare Sub Committee” (AWSC) and had trials conducted at Queen Mary Reservoir

Queen Mary Reservoir

The Queen Mary Reservoir is one of the largest of London's reservoirs located in the Staines/Sunbury area of West London within the borough of Spelthorne in Surrey. It lies south of the A308 and west of the M3 motorway...

. There the MSC was compared with the Chariot and Welman

Welman submarine

The Welman submarine was a Second World War one-man British midget submarine developed by the Special Operations Executive. It only saw action once and was never particularly successful.-Design:...

. The MSC was found to be small (up to 15 canoes could be carried in a larger submarine's torpedo storage compartment), light, easier to navigate, simple to operate, and quick to build. However, the craft was very difficult to control.

Operation

The MSC's usual method of operations was ‘porpoising’ in quick rises to the surface to check bearings, then shallow diving. Porpoising is when the pilot puts the bow of the Sleeping Beauty to the water's surface and watches the reflection of it underneath the surface, and just when the bow was about to meet with its reflected image the Sleeping Beauty is put in a dive so that the pilot's head would come out of the water and able to see his direction.

The pilot could leave the Sleeping Beauty to swim and plant limpet mines on enemy ships, rather than piloting the MSC to the target directly.

Operational service

SBs were also used for Operation Rimau

Operation Rimau

Operation Rimau was an attack on Japanese shipping in Singapore Harbour, carried out by an Allied commando unit Z Special Unit, during World War II using Australian built MKIII folboats. It was a follow-up to the successful Operation Jaywick, which had taken place in 1943, and Rimau, a shortened...

, a raid on Japanese shipping in Singapore

Singapore

Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...

 in September 1944 by commandos from the joint Australian, British and New Zealand 'Z Special Unit

Z Special Unit

Z Special Unit was a joint Allied special forces unit formed during the Second World War to operate behind Japanese lines in South East Asia...

', sometimes known as 'Z Force'. After being found by a patrol boat, the Sleeping Beauties had to be scuttled along with the junk

Junk (ship)

A junk is an ancient Chinese sailing vessel design still in use today. Junks were developed during the Han Dynasty and were used as sea-going vessels as early as the 2nd century AD. They evolved in the later dynasties, and were used throughout Asia for extensive ocean voyages...

 they were carried in. Ten of the attacking force were taken prisoner by the Japanese and subsequently beheaded.

A pair of Sleeping Beauties are believed to be captured by German forces after an unsuccessful attack on enemy shipping in Måløy

Måløy

is a town and the administrative centre of the municipality of Vågsøy in Sogn og Fjordane county, Norway. Måløy is located on the southeastern side of the island of Vågsøy, about northeast of the village of Holvik and about south of Raudeberg. The Måløybrua connects the town to the village of...

 by members of the Norwegian Kompani Linge. The divers were landed with their SB's on the nearby island of Gangsøy. However, a local shepherd girl saw them and, thinking that they were thieving Germans, she reported them to the authorities. The divers were then chased across Norway by the Germans until they were picked up safely and taken back to their base on the Shetland Islands

Shetland Islands

Shetland is a subarctic archipelago of Scotland that lies north and east of mainland Great Britain. The islands lie some to the northeast of Orkney and southeast of the Faroe Islands and form part of the division between the Atlantic Ocean to the west and the North Sea to the east. The total...

.

In the summer of 1944, ‘Sleeping Beauty Number 72’ was delivered to the US Office of Strategic Services

Office of Strategic Services

The Office of Strategic Services was a United States intelligence agency formed during World War II. It was the wartime intelligence agency, and it was a predecessor of the Central Intelligence Agency...

 (OSS), the fore-runner of the CIA, and became the early prototype

Prototype

A prototype is an early sample or model built to test a concept or process or to act as a thing to be replicated or learned from.The word prototype derives from the Greek πρωτότυπον , "primitive form", neutral of πρωτότυπος , "original, primitive", from πρῶτος , "first" and τύπος ,...

 for today’s Swimmer Delivery Vehicle

Swimmer Delivery Vehicle

Swimmer Delivery Vehicles are midget submersibles designed to transport frogmen from a combat swimmer unit or naval Special Forces underwater, over long distances. SDVs carry a pilot, co-pilot, and combat swimmer team and their equipment, to and from maritime mission objectives on land or at sea...

. It was used from December 1944 to August 1945 to evaluate US harbour defences, stage mock attacks on capital ship

Capital ship

The capital ships of a navy are its most important warships; they generally possess the heaviest firepower and armor and are traditionally much larger than other naval vessels...

s and and develop underwater communications equipment.

UCWE Trials Report on Sleeping Beauty

In November 1954, the Clearance Diving Trials Team attached to the Admiralty's Underwater Countermeasures and Weapons Establishment

Admiralty Research Establishment

The Admiralty Research Establishment was formed on 1 April 1984 from various Admiralty establishments. It became part of the Defence Research Agency on 1 April 1991.-Constituent parts on formation:...

 (UCWE) at Leigh Park

Leigh Park

Leigh Park is a large suburb of Havant, in Hampshire, England. It has four electoral wards: Battins, Bondfields, Barncroft and Warren Park ....

 House near Havant

Havant

Havant is a town in south east Hampshire on the South coast of England, between Portsmouth and Chichester. It gives its name to the borough comprising the town and the surrounding area. The town has rapidly grown since the end of the Second World War.It has good railway connections to London,...

 in Hampshire

Hampshire

Hampshire is a county on the southern coast of England in the United Kingdom. The county town of Hampshire is Winchester, a historic cathedral city that was once the capital of England. Hampshire is notable for housing the original birthplaces of the Royal Navy, British Army, and Royal Air Force...

 issued a report on the Sleeping Beauty, signed off by the Officer-in-Charge of the team, Lt Cdr Gordon Gutteridge RN:

Sources

• http://www.mcdoa.org.uk/News_Archive_25.htm
• http://www.underwatertrust.org.uk/chariots/sleeping-beauty
• Popular Science
  Popular Science
  Popular Science is an American monthly magazine founded in 1872 carrying articles for the general reader on science and technology subjects. Popular Science has won over 58 awards, including the ASME awards for its journalistic excellence in both 2003 and 2004...
  
  magazine, March 1947 issue
• The Cockleshell Canoes: British Military Canoes of World War Two by Quentin Rees (ISBN 978-1-84868-065-4)
• http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwtwo/soe_gallery_11.shtml