UNEXPLODED · public companion
A calm morning. A ship breaking in two.
There was no howling gale. In the grey light of an estuary morning, a fully laden Liberty ship touched the sand and began a race against its own failing hull.
Chapter 01 · 20 August 1944 · the last anchorage
A calm morning. A ship breaking in two.
There was no howling gale. In the grey light of an estuary morning, a fully laden Liberty ship touched the sand and began a race against its own failing hull.
Four quiet days
Richard Montgomery reached the Southend area on 15 August. She waited at anchor while convoys, pilots and wartime traffic moved through the Thames. The master's signed report records the place with bearings and a nine-fathom sounding.
05:55
Captain F. Willecke was told that his ship was aground. He tried engine and helm. The weather was calm. By 07:50 he was being told that the hull was breaking. In less than two hours, an Atlantic voyage had become an emergency in sight of two shores.
The race inside the holds
The cargo was judged salvageable and immediate discharge was called for. Then the hours began to matter. Men, barges, winches and thousands of separate cases had to be brought together before the forward holds flooded. The surviving timings form one of the book's most gripping investigations.
Evidence records
Chapters 3 and 4 reconstruct the grounding and the crucial sixty-four hours that followed.