Silent Warriors: Submarine Wrecks of the British Isles - England's East Coast to Kent [Paperback]

Ron Young is well known to the UK's diving fraternity as someone who enjoys answering questions posed by them about shipwrecks. It is usually hard for anyone else to add any further detail once Ron has given his definitive answer. I mention this because, as a fellow author, I have a great admiration for his wealth of knowledge which has never been found wanting. In this latest work, Mr Young has teamed up with Pamela Armstrong to provide us with a book which is clearly his best work to date.

As the full title of the book shows, this is the first part of the story of those submarines which failed to make it home and remain on the seabed in British waters - covering the East coast of England from Northumberland to Kent.

I began by reading both forewords (yes, there are two!) which give completely different viewpoints, yet both add a great deal to the expectation of what is to follow within the book itself. I was never disappointed. As the technology to find new shipwrecks on the seabed - and to reach those shipwrecks once found!, continues to advance and improve, so the world of the ordinary scuba diver is being drawn more and more into the realms of historical research. This book goes a long way towards bringing those two disciplines closer together.

The book itself is extremely well laid out. The authors begin with some much-needed explanatory notes on naval terms and ranks - both British and German. From then on we are taken, literally, on a submarine journey all the way down England's eastern coastline. Along the way we pause to discover wreck after wreck covered in splendid detail - with everything written in the most readable style to make this a book which becomes harder to put down as you look at your watch and decide to read about "just one more."

With all the technical information as well as an account of the loss of each vessel, this is a book from which expert and amateur - researcher and diver, will all learn much that they did not previously know. In addition the book is extremely well illustrated throughout with a thoughtfully chosen selection of black and white historic photographs plus the occasional map and schematic drawing.

Altogether an essential addition to the bookshelf of any British Diver plus any person with a serious interest in British and German maritime history.

SILENT WARRIORS

by Ron Young and Pamela Armstrong

This book covers all submarine losses off the coasts of North East England, Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, East Anglia, Kent and the South East.

It is a real eye-opener, especially with regard to the vast amount of detail given for U-boats of the First World War, and the terrible conditions endured by all who went to sea in that era.

During WW1 the North Sea and the English Channel were heavily mined by both the British and the Germans. No submariner of either side could ignore the ever-present danger posed by these unseen weapons, silently waiting for someone to blunder into them, and no amount of skilled seamanship could be applied to avoid them indefinitely.

Of the 56 submarines included, 40 are German, and 16 British.

Forty-seven were First World War losses, seven from WW2, and two the result of peacetime collision accidents.

All of the German losses were the result of enemy action of one sort or another, (mostly British mines), while only four of the British losses were due to that cause - (striking German mines). The others were lost through collisions, or inadvertently sunk by British mines. One was sunk by "friendly fire", and one ran aground.

The research that has gone into this book has obviously been meticulous in the extreme.

The amount of detail given about each of the lost submarines is unprecedented. It includes not only technical details of the boats and descriptions of the events leading to the loss of the boat, with, in many cases, statements by survivors, or witnesses, as evidence, but also a history of each submarine, along with the names of every crew member. In most cases up-to-date details of the wrecks and their precise positions are also included.

The information, gleaned from both British and German sources, is presented by the authors in a very readable format.

This book will be invaluable to naval historians and divers alike.

There are more than 150 submarine wrecks around the British Isles, and the authors are planning to produce a series of books describing all of them.

I can hardly wait for the next edition in this series of submarine losses.

R N Baird

Maritime Historian

This is an excellent book and has been wonderfully put together. Another find addition to my collection of the Ron Young series. Highly recommended to anyone who is researching submarines and their history.