Images of shipwrecks are always evocative. Regardless of whether the ship in question might have been the most modest and unassuming of sea faring craft or as world famous and iconic as Titanic (and who hasn’t found their breath being snatched away at the first sight of its mighty bow looming up in her final resting place?), there is always an interesting story to accompany its demise.
And they’re rarely, if ever, happy ones.
SS Richard Montgomery (SS RM) has laid, inert, on a sandbank off Sheerness for a little over 75 years now. Yet, rusting hulk that she is, the real story relating to her is not so much about what happened to her one night in 1944 but what might still happen to her.
SS RM was one of 2,710 ‘Liberty Ships’ built in the USA in order to provide essential supplies to the war effort from across the Atlantic. Liberty Ships had a short operational lifespan-no more than five years service was expected of them-but, during the time, she and her contemporaries would be expected to carry thousands of tons of much needed materials to destinations all over Europe.
She set sail from the US for the UK in the Summer of 1944. With every single bit of space available on board crammed tight with 7,000 tons of high explosives, the deadliest of cargos that included dozens of 1,000 lb bombs.
Imagine being a crew member on such a vessel. Every creak and groan, every unexpected bump and sudden lurch would fill your heart with sheer and abject terror.
Luckily for her crew, SS RM had an uneventful Atlantic crossing, docking at Southend prior to making the final leg of her journey, a swift hop down England’s east coast before a planned crossing of the English Channel for Cherbourg. That was, however, not a journey SS RM was expected to make alone and she remained berthed in Southend waiting for a protective convoy to accompany her on the trip. She was therefore directed by Southend’s Harbour Master to make for an area known as the Great North Anchorage, a little way off the coast, to do so.
His decision was duly challenged by the Deputy Harbour Master who, aware of the enormous weight of SS RM’s cargo, felt that this was, given how shallow the waters were at that point, an unsuitable mooring location. He was, however, over ruled and, for reasons best known to himself, decided to take his challenge no further.
His caution was understandable. SS RM was heading for a mooring that, at low tide, had a depth of less than 30 feet…whilst the fully loaded draft of SS RM was around 31 feet.
You can see that this is going to be a bit of a problem.
Things were, clearly, not going to end well, something that the Deputy Harbour Master had already worked out for himself. But his initial plea had come to no avail. The ship made its way to where it had been told to go, anchored, and, over night, started to drift towards the shallow waters of the nearby sandbanks.
This was noted by the members of other craft in the vicinity who sounded warnings in her direction but these were steadfastly ignored by the Officer of the Watch who didn’t even bother to wake his sleeping Captain up in order to at least appraise him of the potential seriousness of situation they were drifting into.
SS RM promptly and predictably ran aground on the sandbank which meant that she would now have to be left there, exposed and unprotected for two weeks. This was the time it would take for a high enough tide to flood in and float her off again-providing, that is, all of her cargo was removed first.
This work commenced but, over time, the ongoing stresses on the ships body led to her breaking in half and sinking atop the sandbank she had drifted onto.
SS Richard Montgomery today. Keep away! (Christine Matthews/geograph)
With no-one knowing exactly what to do next, the wreck was eventually abandoned and she remains there today, with part of her superstructure still permanently visible above the dark and very cold waters of the Thames Estuary.
Along with, of course, the remaining 3,500 tons of high explosives that were never removed from her hold, a gargantuan stockpile of rapidly decaying explosives that could, quite feasibly, and at any given time, do what they were meant to do: go bang.
All ships, big and small, must give the SS Richard Montgomery a very wide berth (Christine Matthews/geograph)
Except this would be like a bang that no-one has ever heard before.
If this was to happen, it would be, according to a study recently carried out by explosive experts, the biggest ever non-nuclear explosion in the history of mankind, one that would send enormous chunks of molten steel and iron up to two miles in the air and create a tidal wave that would be at least 40 feet high
Big enough to cause considerable damage along that part of the coast as well as London as the wave the detonation would cause surged up river, overwhelming the Thames Flood Barrier (not that there would be time to put the barriers into place) en-route.
Damage and loss of life on an incalculable basis-or, as one local resident has opined, ‘biblical’. Yet, in spite of all that, the residents of Sheerness and the neighbouring towns all get on with their lives as normal.
‘Monty’, as she is referred to, is a part of their daily lives and one that is, for many, still visible. But what else can they do but, as one wartime phrase famously stated, ‘Keep calm and carry on’?
I'm not sure I’d be able to do either if she was a neighbour of mine.