Maritime record MWX1953 - LCT A2454

Owner: US Navy Propulsion: 2 Screw driven engines Crew: 12 Crew Lost: 9 Date of Loss Qualifier: A Late that afternoon this landing craft, manned by Royal Navy personnel, got into difficulties off Chesil in a heavy south-westerly gale with rough seas. An Admiralty tug was sent for, but conditions were such that it was unable to round the Bill due to the weather. The Weymouth lifeboat WILLIAM AND CLARA RYLAND managed to reach the scene and was about to go alongside the vessel, now well and truly ashore, when the naval party on the beach signalled them to stand off again, thinking that the lifeboat would itself be wrecked. The coastguard set up their rocket apparatus and managed to save some of the crew, but then a huge sea swept away the apparatus, also taking to their deaths Cdr J P Penington-Legh DSC RN, and Coastguard R H Treadwell. The remainder of the LCTs crew drowned in the wreck. (1)(3(5)

2 shell cases recovered from this wreck, position 50 34.41N 002 28.22W. (Droit A/2288).(4)

gross tonnage

Wreck site and archaeological remains:

Half of the wreck lies in 50 34.41N, 02 28.22W, approximately 100 yards off the beach. Her other half in now broken into relatively small pieces which are 75 yards to the north-west and although above the high water mark are buried under tons of pebbles beneath the beach. The main half of the craft, containing her twin engines and other machinery, now lies 12m down, and is covered in short weed and mussels. She stands upright, rises 6ft high off the seabed, and makes a splendid dive. <6>

<1> Larn, Richard, 1992, United Kingdom shipwreck index, Extracted 23 November 1992 (Index). SWX5030.

<2> 1988, British Vessels Lost at Sea 1914-18 and 1939-45, p59 (Monograph). SWX4538.

<3> Larn, R, and Larn, B, 1995, Shipwreck index of the British Isles, volume 1 : Isles of Scilly, Cornwall, Devon, Dorset Section 6, Dorset (AJ) Vol 1 (Monograph). SWX4541.

<4> 2001, Maritime and Coastguard Agency: Receiver of Wreck Amnesty (Index). SWX4542.

<5> Farr, Grahame, 1971, Wreck and rescue on the Dorset coast, p58 (Monograph). SWX1056.

<6> Hinchcliffe, J and V, 1999, Dive Dorset: a diver guide (3rd Edition), 75-76 No 75 (Monograph). SWX1.

<7> National Record of the Historic Environment, 900925 (Digital archive). SDO14739.

Record last edited

Mar 8 2024 12:34PM