HMS Hermes: Shipwreck Map, Location & Facts

Name	HMS Hermes	Wikidata label
Ship type	protected cruiser	Wikidata P31 instance of
Cause of loss	War action	Keyword match in English Wikipedia lead sentence
Nationality / flag	United Kingdom	Wikidata P137 operator → P17 country
Operator	Royal Navy	Wikidata P137 operator
Conflict	World War I	Wikidata P607 conflict
Sea / ocean	North Sea	Natural Earth marine areas (public domain), point-in-polygon
Nearest coast	France	Natural Earth (public domain); approx. 20 km from land
Position	51.1056, 1.8389	Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0)

About the wreck

HMS Hermes was a Highflyer-class protected cruiser built for the Royal Navy in the 1890s. She spent much of her early career as flagship for various foreign stations before returning home in 1913 to be assigned to the reserve Third Fleet. The ship was modified later that year as the first experimental seaplane carrier in the Royal Navy. In that year's annual fleet manoeuvers, she was used to evaluate how aircraft could cooperate with the fleet and if aircraft could be operated successfully at sea for an extended time. The trials were a success and Hermes was paid off in December at their conclusion. She was recommissioned at the beginning of World War I in August 1914 for service as an aircraft ferry and depot ship for the Royal Naval Air Service. She was torpedoed and sunk by a German submarine in the Straits of Dover that October, with the loss of 21 lives.

Location

Recorded position: 51.1056, 1.8389 (Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0); may be approximate)
Sea / ocean: North Sea
Nearest coast: France

Wreck positions on this site are for interest only and are not for navigation. Many wrecks are war graves or legally protected: never disturb human remains or remove artefacts, and check local law before diving.

OpenStreetMap

Text adapted from the Wikipedia article HMS Hermes (1898) (revision 1378728184), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section; condensed by selecting paragraphs; citations and formatting removed. No text added. This excerpt is available under the same licence.