Maritime record MWX4936 - Haytian 1937

Coal Hulk rammed and sank in Portland Harbour by H.M.S. P.C. 74 in February 1937. This was the second time she sank. She was raised in August 1937.

The Coal Hulk Haytian was rammed by H.M.S. P.C. 74 in Portland Harbour in February 1937. She was raised in August 1937. (1)
She had been originally built as a luxury liner for the West Indian run in 1875, by 1910 she had declined in importance and was being used as a coal hulk in Portland Harbour.
Early on the morning of the 18th July 1910 the cargo ship Nymphaea approached the Haytian to take on coal. Two things then went wrong, her engine jammed and could not be put into reverse, and then her anchor cable stuck. Unable to stop the Nymphaea hit the Haytian amidships. She rapidly took on water and sunk two hours later. The crews of the tugs that had gathered to try and tow the Haytian into shallow water, were horrified to see hundreds of rats pour out of her as she settled in the water, ‘like those which followed the Pied Piper of Hamelin”, as one newspaper reported.
A few weeks later the Haytian was raised and continued as a coal hulk for nearly thirty years, until the 18th February 1937 when she was rammed by HMS PC74 and sunk for the second time. This time she was raised several months later by a local salvage expert, George Louis Basso. Fortunately a member of his team took a series of photographs showing the raising of the Haytian.
The Haytian remained in the Harbour for a few more years, before finally being scuttled for the third and final time.(2)

The building date for this vessel is an estimate based on an average age at wrecking of twenty years. This average is derived from those vessels wrecked on the Dorset coast whose age at wrecking is known.

<1> Hinchcliffe, J and V, 1999, Dive Dorset: a diver guide (3rd Edition) (Monograph). SWX1.

<2> Le Pard, G F, 2005, Shipwrecks of the Dorset Coast, Wreck 122 (Monograph). SDO9637.

Record last edited

Oct 1 2008 11:26AM