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Or were they?
One oft mentioned, but little researched incident, occurred at precisely the time that the Titanic was found. The London "Sunday Observer" newspaper had run an article stating that the Titanic had been found. As Dr.Ballard says in his book, "The Discovery of the Titanic";
"[on September 1st], When I called Woods Hole to give them the good news [about the Titanic having been found], I was met with a jolt. The guard who answered the phone informed me that the press had been calling all morning wanting details of our Titanic discovery. Apparently, there'd been a story in the Sunday London Observer. If that was true, then the paper had gone to press at about the time we'd found the ship. Impossible. Or had someone been eavesdropping on our radio conversations between the van [control room] and the bridge?"
And that was it! No word of explanation, and matter was dropped by Ballard. However, that was not the end of the matter....
The first I had heard of the possibility that the wreck was found by a rival team was made by researcher Steve Anderson to the Titanic mailing list c.1995. Although I have been unable to unearth the mailing list archives, he did provide the same information to another forum. This is a partial resume of the salient information:
"TWO WORDS ONLY: "SOLLIS PROJECT" 1977 / ROYAL NAVY
RECORDS OFFICE. This
information will be declassified in 2027. Then we shall all now the truth.
I won't comment any further on this, as you my old friend are now in for a
heap of S***, as the last time I mentioned the SOLLIS PROJECT, The Ballard
lovers and a certian organization flamed me off the boards. The old timers
will remember this.
What was Bill Tataum IV doing in the wreck area with a Deep Sea Underwater
Camera in 1979? Ask your friends about this, and who supplied the camara?
You might find out something really interesting. And then use your brain and
you will find out why certian parties are really mad over this."
(The Late Bill Tantum (sic) was a massive Titanic enthusiast who had teamed up with Dr.Ballard in the late 1970s to finding the wreck: see "The Discovery of the Titanic".)
I had placed the following appeal for information on the Encyclopedia-Titanic message boards:
One of the many posts that [Steve Anderson] wrote was about the discovery of the Titanic before WHOI/IFREMER's 1985 expedition. According to Mr.Anderson, some years before, a group of people, probably US Navy were doing some experiments with a sonar in the wreck site area when they found a large ship in two pieces sitting on the ocean floor. Anderson would also be told by Bill Tantum's widow that Bill had been shown an image of the Titanic's stern many years before the Ballard find. The story is that a camera package was lowered into the sea and managed to get just one picture before breaking down.
I was delighted to received a reply from Steve. This is the main extract from his message:
"In 1977 the British were conducting top-secret tests of new deep-sea
underwater sonar equipment, which was to be used in locating and
detecting Russian nuclear submarines. It is now a known fact that these
Russian nuclear submarines were hiding in the deep waters off the North
Atlantic coast around New Brunswick and Greenland.
During one of these top secret tests in 1977, of the new deep underwater
sonar two very large metallic objects were located in the "general" vicinity
and "depth" were Dr. Ballard located the wreck in 1985.
During the height of the cold war the United States and the British didn't
want the "Russians" to learn how sophisticated our new deep-sea underwater
sonar equipment had become. So information on this possible discovery of
the "Titanic" was keep "Classified".
It is highly suspected that this 1977 classified information became known
to Dr. Ballard and "Cadillac" Jack Grimm. In October 1977, where were
Dr. Ballard and Bill Tantum IV of THS they were trying to raise money
for an expedition to locate the Titanic in this general area.
In October 1977, the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution under the
direction of Dr. Robert Ballard, sent the "Alcoa Seaprobe" to
41 40; N, 50 01"E this so called "Titanic" expedition had to
return due to equipment failure and a shortage of funding.
In 1979 Seawise & Titanic Salvage were conducting an expedition testing
deep-sea underwater photography within the same location of the 1977 British son
ar hit.
In 1979, Robert Gibbons, (one of the original founder's of the
Titanic Historical Society) planed an expedition to search within
the same general location. However Gibbon's isn't able to raise
the necessary funding to complete this expedition.
In 1980 "Cadillac" Jack Grimm (Whom I had the pleasure of talking
with several times over the years prior to his death) mounted his
first expedition and was out in the same location with a magnetometer,
searching for hits. If I remember correctly he located fourteen targets
before having to return from the expedition due to bad weather.
In 1981 "Cadillac" Jack is back on another expedition and checked out
13 of the 14 targets and claimed he had found the "Titanic," and this story
was picked up by the worldwide press as front page news. However, due to
the technology of the early eighties the images from the second Grimm
Expedition had were just to poor to prove this fact.
In reviewing the Grimm Expedition information and the current wreck
location as found by Dr. Ballard. Jack Grimm's expedition passed right
over the wreck. And the location of the fourteenth sonar target was
within a tenth of a mile of were the ship was actually located.
Keep in mind this basic fact the bow and the stern are a quarter of
a mile apart, and the debris field is over a mile and a half wide in
some spots. In Jack Grimm's opinion he found it in 1981, and in my
opinion he was damm close.
In 1983, Jack Grimm was back in the area again for a third try too
follow up on his prior sonar hits, and prove he had found Titanic as
he claimed however, bad weather and high seas stopped his efforts. If
the weather had been better in my opinion we would be talking about
Jack Grimm and not Dr. Ballard.
Now to go into the expedition conducted by Dr. Ballard this was really
run by the United States Navy. The United States Navy in 1985 during
the height of the cold war wanted to show the Russian's just how good
our new deep-sea sonar and imaging technology really was. So after
Dr. Ballard located and imaged a few of the United States navies lost
Nuclear submarines, he was sent out to "locate" the Titanic and show
the Russian's that we could find any nuclear submarine at any depth that
they might lose.
However, the United States Navy used the location of the "Titanic" and
the reporting of it in the worldwide press to show up the "Russians"
and rub their face in the fact that we have the technology and you don't.
Then to top this fact that we can find anything, the Navy went on step further:
We can take a manned submersible to the location of this wreck and any
depth and recover what ever the hell we want.
Now, if you remember back to August, 1985 many of the major British newspapers
ran a story that Dr. Ballard had found the wreck a whole day before,
Dr. Ballard actually located it and broke the news worldwide. Also the
United States Navy and British Navy just so happened to be
conducting war game maneuvers in the general area were Dr. Ballard
was searching, which in theory was really a front to assist Dr. Ballard
and confuse the hell out of the Russians, as to what was really going on
out there. (We did search for two of our downed nuclear submarines during
this expedition also)
The summary of this theory came to light, and was told to me by a
friend who worked on The Queen Elizabeth 2 with four crewmembers of
the British destroyer who originally conducted this test of the
new deep-sea sonar back in 1977. These four sailors all told the
story, and stated that there is a "classified" sonar image that they
all saw at this time. However, more convincing is the fact that one
of these crewmembers was one of the British sonar technicians that
conducted these tests back in 1977. He stated that this sonar image
was of two large metallic objects on the ocean floor about 1/2 mile
apart in 12,500+- feet of water, within the exact area of the North
Atlantic were Dr. Ballard found the wreck. And that this image is now
classified top secret in the British Navel Archives.
In my tons of paperwork I have, many more details but I
would have to locate it in storage, I have the original
name of the Top Secret Project I want to say SOLARIS or POLARIS
and the name of the British destroyer.
However, individuals other then myself, have contacted the
British government about this "classified" project and the
true mission of the said destroyer and have been told in
writing that this information is "classified".
Under the British Freedom of Information act this information is
subject to be declassified around the year 2027.
So maybe in 2027 we will know who really found the Titanic in 1977."
In ensuing messages, the name of the project was variously spelt "Sollis", "Solaris" or "Polaris". I did receive the following wonderful information from the late Jon Hollis, who had been Steve's source of information on the QE2:
I had heard that Ballard when he was out there in the 70's was testing a new RCA Camera and that they got one picture before the camera froze up. The camera was sent back for a re build and then went to the Galapagos for more testing. Guess who was in charge of that expedition. Seems they lost some equipment like a bargeload including so it is said the camera in question.
Now you may know that I worked closely with Congressman Jones on The Titanic Memorial Act and testified with Ballard and Grimm along with NOAA and the State Department at the hearings. It is interesting to read the transcript of Ballards report about recovery. Not too long after that I had the Consul General of Canada at my place and we arranged for lunch with Ballard at Woods Hole. I told the Consul about the possible 1970's find and told him I would try to get more information. So, at lunch when Ballard was nibbling away I decided to hit him right between the eyes. I Said, "Bob A direct question for you. Was September 1985 the very first time you photographed the Titanic or was it not?" Silence and looks could kill. We finished lunch in a reserved state and when the Consul and I were driving home he said" Well you got him!"
Now when I was working on the QE2 and doing presentations as well one voyage I had at my table a Royal Navy Officer and his wife. The officer was now stationed on QE2 in the medical department. One night at dinner we started discussing shipwreck and TItanic and about Ballard maybe seeing it before 1985. The officer leaned over to his wife and whispered and she nodded yes. This is what he told me.
Seem back in the 70;s he was on the H.M.S. Hecate and they were testing very sophisticated submarine detection equipment of the Grand Banks. At about 50' X 41' the got an image of a large shipwreck at about 12,300 feet broken in 2 parts separated by a little over a third of a mile or just under a quarter mile.Of course the mission and testing was all very hush hush so it never went public. He did tell me he would try through his contacts to purloin a copy of the image for me but alas was not able to do so. So,,did perhaps Ballard as a Navy man get wind of this and have the position back in the 70's after all and know where the Titanic was all the time and just used the French to waste time and use up all the allocated time and funds that the Government allowed him. According to Jean-Lui Michael of Ifremer it was Ballard that told them in which direction to do their scanning. "
A fascinating story, and one that begs to be researched. A picture of the HMS Hecate is presented at the top of this piece.
However, meandering back to the Observer story...:
To many Titanic enthusiasts, the matter of the Observer newspaper and its wreck discovery precognition had been a tantalising niggle, and new information was finally proffered by a 1999 documentary. "The Battle for Titanic". Although the main thrust of the documentary was the legal and moral battle over the salvage rights to the wreck, a few tantalising scraps of information were offered by the TV programme.
The author of the piece was a journalist for the Observer newspaper called Alan Road. He said that his main source of information was a salvage engineer called John Pierce, who told him that the Titanic had been found and to call a number in the Admiralty to confirm this story, which Alan did. The Observer then ran the story.
If this story was true, it meant that the British Admiralty knew well in advance that the Titanic had been found! Preposterous, surely?
Alan offered a few other nuggets: he said that he had since learned (presumably from Mr. Pierce) that an Oberon class submarine had been trailing the Knorr since she left the Azores a few weeks previously. He also told the show that, when the wreck was found, there were multiple Gin and Tonics drunk in the Admiralty that night.
Dr.Ballard confessed to still being perplexed by the incident, joking that maybe psychics were employed by the Admiralty. However, the matter stood. The Observer, and Alan Road knew well in advance that the Titanic had been found. Or was just about to be. How could this be...unless they knew in advance where it was all along, and had indeed been trailing the French-American team?
Thanks to John Gau Productions, who had made "The Battle for Titanic", I managed to trace Alan Road. Now retired, he was very knowledgeable and friendly, and told me what he knew. He said that an impending house move had forced a lot of his papers (including those relating to the Titanic) to be placed into storage, but that they would be unearthed one day.
This is what he told me (from memory):
The source of most of Alan's story was Mr.Pierce. He was described as a "jack of all trades", and a keen inventor, and had made a lot of money by allowing the coal board to remove coal from a seam under his farm in Wales. John had previous experience of salvage - he possessed the Lusitania's bell, for instance, and had raised the Greenpeace ship "Rainbow Warrior" after it was sunk by French secret service agents in New Zealand in 1985. Mr.Pierce had (it was said) delivered "a torpedo" (sonar device?) to New York at some point in the past.
John had a fascination with the Titanic and had performed water tank experiments with a large model. Furthermore, he had salvage plans for the Titanic; in the same way as the Rainbow Warrior was raised, Mr.Pierce planned to rivet large bags around the ship's hull, which housed special crystals. Upon contact with water, the crystals would somehow form enough lift to raise the Titanic's hulk.
Alan's first contact with Mr.Pierce was a few years previously (before 1985). The Observer newspaper had just acquired its first computer which was being used for pensions etc., and John wanted to use it to determine the location of the wreck. This was for an expedition run by ...someone... Anyway, John, who had, and still has close links to the Admiralty, got a position, which turned out to be within "walking distance" of the actual wrecksite.
Between then and 1985, the Royal Navy had been incensed by a comment from the US Navy that Britain "had a third rate Navy". This led, allegedly, to the covert trailing of the Knorr expedition, to humiliate the Americans to show that "anything you do, we can do"; the choice of British newspaper was no accident: it was to let the US know that they had been observed. That explains why many Gin and Tonics were drunk that night (!)
John Pierce has, apparently, given the Admiralty his information regarding the Titanic's location, something that doesn't quite fit in with other assertions. He did, according to Alan, have connections with the Admiralty. Anyway, I digress...
On Friday evening, August 30th, 1985, just as the Sunday Observer was being completed, Alan received a call from Mr.Pierce saying that "they had found it" and gave Alan a telephone number at the Admiralty in Bath to call. The news was confirmed by codeword that John had provided; something like "The Weather is Clear" or some such Cold-War style mumbo jumbo. Alan rang Woods Hole to see if the news was true, and was told something along the lines of "No, heard nothing [from the expedition], but funny you should be ringing now." What that means is unknown!
Anyway, by 6pm on Saturday, August 31st, there had been no official word, and the paper was due to go to the printers for the delivery the next day. A make or break decision was made: to run with the story, or ditch? Bravely, the editors decided to run it, but opted to use slightly conservative, non-committal language. The London Times remonstrated with the Observer, denouncing it as untrue - until the story was confirmed later on.
I must backtrack slightly. The 1985 American led portion of the Titanic discovery expedition had performed its search operation in a style akin to "mowing the lane". You trailed the sensors above the sea bed in east-west stretches that were about 1 mile apart. The Titanic was found towards the end of line no.9 at about 1am (approx. 4am London time) on 1st September 1985. When Alan first heard the news, it was evening on August 30th, or afternoon in the North Atlantic, the expedition was still performing line 5, or 2.5 miles south of the wreck site. This is still some distance from the wreck, and there was no guarantee that Titanic would be found that weekend. Perhaps someone wanted to break the news on Sunday, when there was no regular newspaper service, "just in case". If so, they were extremely lucky to get the timing right. As we now know, the expedition was due to end four days later, wreck or no wreck, and the weather was detiorating....
Sometime after that (although Alan was not sure of the exact date), he had been rung up by an ex-Naval rating from Portsmouth, who was a cook (he believes!) on a ship a few years previously. His story was that the radar (sic- presumably sonar) operator on the ship was ill and Alan's source took over the console when an enormous wreck appeared on the scope. "What was that?" Alan's source asked and the captain replied nonchalantly," Oh, its probably the Titanic". Alan's contact had seen a fellow ship-mate a few years later in Portsmouth and the two made eye contact and nodded to each other, but never spoke, something that the contact is kicking himself about now!
A few other bits of information: when I mentioned the Hecate, Alan reacted immediately "Yes, thats it!" The name had stuck in his mind too, because, like myself, he was unsure about its pronounciation - Hecate or Heca-tee? Also, Alan feels that his person is the same one that Jon Hollis mentioned. The name sounded familiar anyway.
We jump forward in time to the popular Artefact Exhibition at Greenwich in 1994. The exhibition had a blow-up of Alan's original observer story on the wall, and Alan took the opportunity to ask the National Maritime Museum's curator about this curious Titanic episode. The curator (Dr.Kentley?) was extremely interested and established contact with Lord Lewin of the Admiralty, who had opened the exhibition with Titanic survivor Milvina Dean, but was told that the story was untrue. Alan noted that Lord Lewin has since died.
To summarise, I believe Alan 100%. I believe he did get an advance tip off from the Royal Navy, and that he spoke to someone who claimed to have seen the wreck pre-1985. But a journalist is only as good as his sources...
One last point. I registered on the ServicePals website (to reunite old members of the military) and asked for personnel on the Hecate in 1977 to get in touch. One did - John McDonald, Radar and Navigators Yeomen at that time. He says:
In response, Jon's mate, who I was now in contact with (and who the Hecate person above remembers very well), says this story is simply untrue: he had served for two years aboard Hecate, and all the charts of the survey were taken to to Naval Survey Department at Taunton. The Hecate had apparently spent a few weeks survey in the region of the Titanic in 1977/8 (the time when Jon's mate, a member of the medical staff, was on board). Jon's friend said that he "had the oportunity of surveying the wreck on the chart recording paper."
Sadly, Naval Records have served to completely dismiss this whole story: not only, according to them, was the Hecate NOT in the North Atlantic in 1977 and 78, but, in their words, "Royal Navy and Royal Marine Operations 1964 - 1996, published by the Maritime Strategic Studies Institute as their Paper No 1 (published 1999) makes no reference to any RN Ship or Submarine operation in the North Atlantic in either 1977/78 or 1985." Presumably this did not include the 1985 NATO exercise "Ocean Safari" that was seen by the Knorr team on September 1st 1985, as it was probably just "passing over" the wreck area.
Also, there was no record of an operation or project called "Sollis" or "Solaris" (the latter name did crop up a few times, but in an IT context). Recent queries about "Sollis" in Parliament revealed nothing at all (see here). But was the date of 1977 correct? An article published here suggests that the Hecate passed over the Titanic wreck in 1980. This is ripe for further research, but of most interest is that the fact that John Bibby's account confirms that all the staff had to take shifts manning the PDR Sonar - tying in nicely with Jon Hollis' friend who was a doctor and had to perform a shift on the device!
Meanwhile, Commander Paul-Henri (PH) Nargolet (who used to work for Ifremer, and is a veteran of dozens of salvage trips to the wreck) is in no doubt about this story. He told his story to the French journalist Frank Jubelin for an article in "Sciences et Avenir" in 2001. In the article, it is alledged that, in 1978, an English oceanographic ship detected a large boat in two pieces, on the Atlantic ocean floor. It was the time of the cold war and the British and American navies were using the Atlantic to help detect Soviet nuclear submarines. The wreck which had been located in a future patrol corridor which left the American coasts and went on the side of Mourmansk (error in translation ?). This wreck, whose site from now on was clearly identified, was reproduced consequently on the secret charts of Royal Navy. Its co-ordinates and the fact that it was in two pieces, meant that it could be only that of one ship: Titanic. The British navy maintained the secrecy: Titanic constituted an ideal hiding-place for the strategic submarines. Such a metal mass could, indeed, hinder the enemies' means of detection. During the preparation phase of the search, Robert Ballard knew this information and the secret charts where the wreck appeared. Did Robert Ballard let the French team be misled at the beginning of the search, before giving instructions influencing the discovery of the wreck by the American team? Did he want to gain sole merit for the discovery?"
I managed to trace PH and this is what he said: "I spoke to Franck Jubelin who is a brother of one of my best friend; He was writing an article for Science et vie Junior... In 1978 an oceanographic ship from the British Navy was mapping south of Grand Banks (Newfoundland) for the nuclear submersibles. They found a "big ship in two part". They didn't mention directly the Titanic name. I had this information from the doctor who was on board the ship, unfortunately I don't remember the name of the ship, but I have a fax some where. This information (the big ship) went of course to the US Navy. The US navy and the British Navy exchange information about the nuclear sub road mapping. I think Ballard who is a US Navy reserve Officer got this information from his friend Admiral ??, he was the head of the Navy in 1984. When Ifremer, which was in charge of drawing the research area (Patrick Lardeau), proposed to Ballard this area in which the "big ship in two part" was, Ballard said ok. Something very strange, when I was with George in London in 1994 for the opening of the Titanic exhibition in the Maritime Museum of Greenwich we meet a journalist who wrote an article about the discovery of the Titanic. He agree with us Ballard knew the position of the wreck because he receive the information the Friday before the day of the discovery, the Titanic was found early on Sunday morning September 1. The journalist (??) had to give his article in the late Friday to be published on Sunday. It was a big newspaper, Sunday time of the time. I think in archive it is not very hard to find this article and the name of the reporter. I have also this article some where! An other detail about Ballard, he ordered an helicopter for the Sunday morning to transport the picture to Newfoundland. There is no way he ordered an helicopter the same day (the trip was very long and the helicopter had to make a stop over for refueling on a gas platform). He ordered the helicopter one or two days before, why? if he didn't know where was the wreck. He never said anything about that to Ifremer. When they started the research they started exactly where was the wreck, with the golf stream the Suroit drifted and they wait before to put down at the right altitude (180 meters) the SAR and the magnetometer. The magnetometer detected a huge anomaly during this time. Only the two engineers in charge of the magnetometer believe it was something big, all the other people thought it was too early and the equipment not enough deep t was right for the sonar but not for a magnetometer. I talk to this two guy and they knew it was the wreck. Two months later when they come back with the Knoor at this place they found the wreck.
I never heard about a submarine trailing the team in 1985. If I was a sub Captain I would never do that. It is very dangerous for a sub to be close from a ship who trail equipment in deep water. It is against all the safety rules. Even with the Nautile we have to dive very far and up the stream with any cable going down from a ship, like an ROV or a sonar. May be a sub crossed the zone by mistake, it is their road. That happened to me in 1994, Ifremer forgot to alert the French Navy about the expedition and a US Navy nuclear sub cross the diving zone. After this incident I always inform myself directly the US Navy of any deep diving expedition.
Interesting that his source of his information was the ships' doctor; it seems that he is the source of all the information about this alledged discovery of the Titanic. I was unable to trace M.Lardeau via IFREMER.
On Saturday, April 3rd, I spoke to salvage expert John Pierce, still involved with the Royal Navy, and having his finger in many pies (!). He possesses an encyclopedic knowlegde of all thing related to the Navy, the military, the sea, the cold war, Titanic, etc. Indeed, John, despite being in his 60s, has just finished a stint in the Foreign Office. He is also a keen inventor and has taken out patents on some very intriguing items. On an unrelated sideline, to show how well connected he was, he even gave me Vladimir Putin's direct FAX number (!!!)
This is John's story:
Many years ago (and the date wasn't specified), the Royal Navy wanted to know if it were possible to find lost submarines, and were performing lots of tests on the Lusitania wreck on such matters as cutting into the hull, attaching items to the hull, electrolysis of seawater etc. to test the feasiblity of various ideas. Jack told me that, at some point (and he didn't mention the year), proof had been found of munitions (shells etc.) on the Lusitania and they were removed.
This plan to find and lift submarines ultimately went by the wayside following the end of the cold war c. 1993 (that John was instrumental in assisting with), as it wasn't felt that it wasn't necessary anymore.
However, with this interest in deep salvage, and successful tests on the Lusitania, interest turned to the Titanic c.1980. John was treated with a mild amount of derision, one of his colleagues saying "Its gone forever".
Jack was allowed access to the Observer Newspaper's new computer, which he determined was useless for the task and instead opted to find out the Titanic's position by hand - using dead reckoning. He used information such as Boxhall's CQD position, how far the lifeboats could have rowed, the direction of currents (knowing that the wreck site was likely on the border of the Gulf Stream and the Labrador Current), how much the clocks had been retarded during the westward passage and the location of nearby ships. He obtained a lot of useful information from Wyn Craig Wade's book "Titanic: End of a Dream". When the location of the wreck site was finally revealed (officially), John said that he was only 50 yards off. John wrote this information down in a letter to Alan Road c.1983, which is now in storage, pending Alan's house move.
John told Dr.Marty Klein and Terry Snyder, of the USAF (their expertise was locating downed aircraft with sonar) c.1983, and in January 1985, Marty contacted John to tell him that a French/American expedition to locate the wreck would be underway that year - the calculated wrecksite was kept hidden from the French, presumably to make them waste their time in the search. However, in conversation with me, Marty dismisses this story, and is suspicious of John's claims and his story (amongst others): incidentally, the two have met, but many years before.
One of Johns' colleagues, Ferris Morton, in the Admiralty was a bit unsure about the calculated wreck location: he asked "Have you got it right?", to which John replied in the affirmative. Ferris replied, "If you haven't, I've never heard of you". It was Ferris that was Alan Road's 1985 Admiralty source in 1985 that confirmed that the wreck "had" been found before it had been done so. Seemingly sure of John's calculated wreck site, they knew that the ship would be found in the next few days.
John also said something about the Oberon class submarine that was trailing the US portion of the expedition: apparently he had a hand in setting it up. Although John can't remember the name of the sub, he knows that it had been specially outfitted for totally silent running, using a pump rather than a screw for propulsion and fitted with transducers, so no-one knew it was there. The French were apparently incensed when they found out they were being trailed, but it all comes down to the US dismissal of the Royal Navy years beforehand (remember the "third rate navy" quote?). The British wanted to show the US up, and their response to this covert shadowing was "If this was World War 3, you've just lost it!"
This mission is still regarded as classified.
John also dismissed the story that Titanic had been found by the British before the 1985 find. He said that he would certainly have heard about it, being involved in many different intelligence and salvage areas, and having access to Naval Records. John was also dismissive on the grounds that sonar technology was incapable of performing such an operation c.1977, although I have heard differently.
Oddly, John makes no mention of any of these facts in an interview for the Smithsonian magazine, conducted by reporter Joy Waldron in 1986.
Whilst talking about Titanic, we also debated other matters. For instance, he says that one way that the ship could have been saved was visible from the bridge - the tarpaulins over the Cargo Hatches. They could have been weighted, draped over the side and hence over the damaged areas in the hull, and the water pressure would have sealed up the damage. Before this idea is dismissed, please remember that John has decades of salvage experience. Indeed, he is still in communication with balloonist Per Lindstrand to develop lift bags for submarines. The tests are going very well so far. And John still has dreams of raising the Titanic.
Also, John is certain that the Titanic went down at 20 miles per hour and that the bows are still facing the way that they were when she went down - North Westerly in his statement. This is due to a concept called "the sinking cone". He also intimated that the sub surface current was probably about 1.5 knots.
With regards to the Lusitania, John stated that the HMS Reclaim (later renamed the Bonaventure) was involved in depth charging the hull, and also used a "ripping machine". This is in connection with Prime Minister Winston Churchill's last order in 1955 to "make sure the truth (about the Lusitania) was not found out". Remember that Chruchill was in charge of the Admiralty in 1915 when the Lusitania sank and there have been acres of speculation - confirmed by John, that the Lusitania was sacrificed to bring America into the War.
I queried John about the finding of pock-marks in the hull of the Lusitania, and he says this is due to depth charging, a fair amount being done during World War 2, as the wreck would be a good hiding place for U-Boats etc.
The conversation drifted towards the ship's bell, which Alan Road had mentioned. HMS Reclaim had found the main bell - and this was now somewhere in the Admiralty. John found "his" elsewhere on the wreck and was eventually sold at Sotheby's some years ago, after a court case over its ownership finally finished (on 15th November 1985 in the law courts in the Strand, London, under Mr.Justice Sheen.); this was due to the various claimaints on the wreck. This court case had been dragging on since John had been to the wreck, in August 1962.
Update: July 23rd, 2005
This whole matter rested until May, 2005 when I started receiving correspondence from Mr.Douglas Faulkner-Woolley, via Bob Pryor. Mr.Faulkner-Woolley who has plans to salvage the Titanic wreck, provided me with a copy of his book "Titanic - One Man's Dream". There were a few sections in the book that relate to this "early" Titanic discovery. On page 42, Mr.C.H.Betts relates his impressions of Mr.Faulkner-Woolley:
"I asked [Douglas] what was his opinion of Dr.Ballard stating that he was the first to locate where the Titanic was resting, and his reply to that was that Doug had found the location years before it was ever reported by Dr.Ballard ... this information was used for their own gain and they made plenty of it."
On page 87, under the heading "Commander Grattan R.N. Story", a few further details were provided. The salient sections are below:
"Commander Grattan claims to know the exact position of the Titanic." [Incidentally, Grattan believes that the Titanic is in one piece - Paul ].
"By going back to the information collected soon after the disaster and by checking bits of evidence against each other, he has produced a 'search area', a short distance from the official position of the wreck."
"Then [Commander Grattan] says, he obtained 'a certain piece of information' which proved that a large hull is present in the area. He gives no more details ... but it is possible that he has been given advice by military sources."
It should be noted that these two sections are undated, but Mr.Betts account is clearly after the discovery of the wreck, whereas Commander Grattan's must be before; indeed, if the article is true, this was even before Jack Grimm's Titanic searches. The article goes on to say that Commander Grattan's team were planning to use unmanned, remote controlled submarines to photograph the vessel, inside and out.
[Postscript: thanks to Doug Faulkner-Woolley, who sent me a photocopy from the "Khaleej Times" magazine, I was able to obtain the above quotation in full, although the photocopy did not include a date. The article discusses Grattan's approach to determining the wreck's location; arguing for a retardation of the Titanic's clocks by about half an hour, and certain other factors such as differing speed estimates of the ship, he comes up a new position of 41o40' N, 50o 3'W. The magazine continues:
"Grattan was, therefore, already proposing that the search area should be based on his new position. However, during his odyssey, [collating data and interviewing experts to determine a new location - Paul] he received a stunning piece of information which not only confirmed that his calculations were basically correct but also that there was a large wreck next to his reassessed position. "Being that there are no other known wrecks in the area," he says, "it is a reasonable hypothesis that it is the Titanic." It is a peace [sic] of good luck that the major convoy battles of World War II took place to the north and east of the position and the wrecks that litter the American coast from the slaughter by the U-Boats of inshore shipping all lie far to the west. The Titanic is the only karge wreck known to lie in that area.
Grattan, a graduate of "The Silent Service," refuses to reveal precisely how he came back his information but he makes teasing reference in his study to "press reports which have indicated that a sonar screen to detect submarines approaching the eastern sea-board of the US had been constructed the whole length of the continent. Furthermore, the loss of two US nuclear submarines and a Russian G class nuclear submarine attracted considerable publicity over the last 15 years.
"It would have been a happy coincidence indeed if the subsequent search for these vehicles and others, or any ocean floor surveys had been conducted in the area associated with the Titanic. In the event some significant supporting evidence has been found." ]
In further information provided to me, Mr.Faulkner-Woolley has provided a "Titanic Salvage Timeline". The entries for 1978 and 1979 say:
"Now" magazine's reporter Christopher Dobson reported in the above mentioned article that Commander Grattan, then 44, was the Royal Navy's senior divign expert, and that he had scientifically determined the wreck's location, and that this information would be kept secret by "Now" until after the proposed expedition by the Seawise and Titanic Salvage company. mooted for early Summer 1980. The article didn't mention the 'certain piece of information' mentioned in Douglas's book. Commander Grattan seems to have still been alive to write about the raising of "The Big Piece" from the wrecksite by RMS Titanic, Inc; indeed, "Gratten" [sic?] writes about this in a piece about Titanic's steel for the Seawise Salvors International and Monetary Investments "Proposal of Salvage", seemingly written in 2000.
With thanks to the Royal Navy, who agreed to forward a letter to Commander Grattan, I managed to establish contact. Sadly, the flow of information was not very forthcoming. In fact, Commander John Grattan comes across as very pompous; someone who thinks that the Titanic story can provide glory, but when he is not to be the focus of that glory, he loses interest. He also dismisses the quote above as hype.
Grattan, during his time with The Seawise and Titanic Salvage Co Ltd, also claims to have "established an accurate position [for the Titanic] some 22 miles [sic] from her accepted watery grave"; he also indicates that this study "was passed over to Bob Ballard who did a brilliant job, as the world now knows, in finding and photographing her." I should remind the reader of similar claims made by Mr.Pearce, above.
Commander Grattan refused to discuss details about a possible pre-1985 Titanic discovery.
Talking of Mr.Pearce, Commander Grattan had had some sort of prior contact with him before; Seawise and Titanic Salvage directors' minutes taken on 21st April, 1980 reports that "Mr.Grattan had also been approached by Mr.Pearce and his recommendation was to steer clear of [Mr.Pearce]". This was after Pearce had propositioned the group with a plan to raise the Titanic and wished to find backing. Following this initial contact, a check had been done on Mr.Pearce but the impression was people were not particularly "impressed" by him.
Interestingly, the minutes of the same date also discussed one Jack Grimm and his imminent expedition to find the Titanic; the group are under the opinion that although Grimm had funds, he had little knowledge of the location of the wreck. There was a discussion that Seawise approach Grimm and that a letter offering their knowledge of the location of the Titanic be sent. Whether this done or not, I don't know. Even if it was done, I am not sure if the advice was ever followed and the "location" explored.
A possible new lead came to light in an exhibit created by Southampton University students for the 2007 95th anniversary of the disaster. One small snippet noted that, in 1980, the RV Hudson had unearthed a 180 metre long object in the general area of the wrecksite. This information had been printed in a St.Johns (Newfoundland) newspaper in 1985. Needless to say, I was determined to find out more.
Thanks to the public library of Newfoundland, I was provided with the following information, from the Evening Telegram newspaper September 4, 1985 (Volume 106, No. 129) on page 2: Click here. I managed to trace Dr.Gordon Fader, as mentioned in the article, and this is his story:
"In 1983, Gordon Fader, P. Geo., a marine geologist with the Geological Survey of Canada at the Bedford Institute of Oceanography and a member of the Undersea Feature Naming Committee that later approved the naming of Titanic Canyon (the location where the ship lies) was testing a new piece of deep water survey equipment.
A year earlier, he had been given information from the Canadian Navy on areas of seabed to avoid in order to prevent equipment being lost during equipment trials. During this research, the (civilian) naval keeper of wrecks, the late Joe May, gave Gordon Fader the coordinates of a large wreck on the Grand Banks that Joe thought could be the Titanic, which he though might have drifted into the shallower water of the Grand Banks. The information had been uncovered by an oil company doing survey work a few months earlier.
The equipment was tested on the 1983 cruise from the Research Vessel CCGS Hudson, but did not go to the area where the Titanic was later found. On a following cruise Fader went back to the area on the Grand Banks to check the feature on the seabed, having obtained a sidescan image of the sonar trace collected by the oil survey vessel. This trace was well to the north of the Titanic's eventual location and couldn't be found; Gordon Fader thinks it was a Russian submarine on the Grand Banks at the time of the sonar scan.
The French IFREMER team came to visit the Bedford Institute’s team shortly afterwards and asked to borrow the cable from the deep tow piece of gear to assist in their own search for the Titanic. "
It seems that the mention of the Pisces submersible was a red herring as it could not dive to the reported depth of the Titanic; it could only reach 1000 feet.
Where all this will lead is anyone's guess. As usual, any information or leads will be gratefully received.
I intend this page to be a living document, updating it as and when new information comes to light. Hopefully this matter will one day be resolved, but until then, who knows?
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