The Bandon River Ships: “Hope” and “Thomas”. To place this article in context, first read: The East India Company at Dundaniel Built on the River Bandon The Asian adventures of the East India Company ships: ‘The Hope’ and ‘The Thomas’ built on the river Bandon circa 1610-1614 In 1988 this writer submitted an article to Bandon…
Sibe Gorman & Co by Cormac F Lowth From early in the nineteenth century until the present time, the image of a copper and brass diver’s helmet or hard-hat has been an easily recognisable icon which most people could associate with what has always been referred to as “deep-sea diving”. In the present era when…
Historical Diving in Ireland by Dr. Edward J. Bourke, Shipwreck Historian This article was first published in The International Journal of Diving History Volume 3 Number 1 July 2010 Introduction While there were few diving inventors or innovators in Ireland, it is remarkable that many of the early diving pioneers worked around the Irish coast. Local entrepreneurs…
Italian Salvage Ships at the Galley Head Paddy O’Sullivan traces the history of the Italian salvage company, Sorima, and describes its successful Ludgate operation off the Galley Head in 1934-35 On 19 May 1922, the ageing P&O liner, Egypt, departed from Tilbury, bound for Marseille and Bombay, having on board 294 crew and forty-four passengers. In addition to her…
Moyalla Salvaged The salvage of the valuable cargo of the Moyalla is the tale of triumph of a skilled first time salvor over the might of a large professional salvage company. It is a remarkable story of early scuba diving in Ireland and typical of salvage undertaken in the 1950s. The Moyalla was built in…
A Riddle of Sand – The Kish Bank It is often said that there is too much ‘rubbish’ information on the web. To be sure, there is rubbish but there’s rubbish everywhere. There is certainly not so much that the internet should not be used for research. This would of course be foolish. Like all…
Not Alexandria – The Great South Wall? There were no constructed harbours in this part of Dublin Bay before the early 1800’s. Boats, small ones that is, landed on shale and sandy ground in front of where the wonderful little harbour of Sandycove is now situated. Similarly at Bullock, there was no constructed harbour but…
Concrete Ships Irish shipyards Warrenpoint – Concrete ships Cretefield During the First world war a shortage of steel developed as replacements were being built for the huge tonnage sunk by submarines. Steel was prioritised for construction of warships. Late in the war the USA envisaged a fleet of concrete ships but few were completed before…
Dublin Port Diving Bell by Cormac F. Lowth This article was first published in The International Journal of Diving History, Volume 3, Number 1, July 2010 In the nineteenth century, several factors combined, which both facilitated and necessitated the expansion of the Port of Dublin. The seaward approaches to Dublin Port have always been hazardous…
Diving on the Lusitania Diving on the Lusitania from Shipwrecks of the Irish Coast volume 2 ISBN 0 9523027 2 1 by permission of the author Edward Bourke The Lusitania is probably the most discussed of all shipwrecks in Irish waters. The incident was the worst maritime disaster in the vicinity of Ireland and some…