British wreck divers fined for retrieving artifacts

[Jared0425]

For example, the salvage rights to the Aboukir, Cressy and Hogue were sold by the Admiralty to a German scrap company in the 1920's.

I thought that modern military wrecks/war grave (post WWII) were protected from salvage in British law? I know there was a large fit over the USS Murphy, a few liberty vessels, and U-Boats on our side of the pond. NOAA raised hell over the USS Monitor that sank 130 years ago and it took numerous court cases just to let divers with "special" permission to dive her.

 

[Ste Wart]

I thought that modern military wrecks/war grave (post WWII) were protected from salvage in British law? I know there was a large fit over the USS Murphy, a few liberty vessels, and U-Boats on our side of the pond. NOAA raised hell over the USS Monitor that sank 130 years ago and it took numerous court cases just to let divers with "special" permission to dive her.

Every country likes to think that. We assign the name 'War Grave' to ships without questions, however it, more often than not, tends not to be back up in law, just our own morality.

For example the Protection of Military Remains Act (PMRA) in the UK didn't come in until the Mid-80s. Retrospectively it included all wrecks dating from the 1st World War, and in some exceptions further.

The Protection of Wrecks Act came in 1973 and only 50 or so wrecks are on it.

The full list can be found here:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/receiver-of-wreck-protected-wrecks


Hickdive's example were for wrecks sold before the Acts were put into place.

Also the Crown owns all Military Wrecks. Technically the Queen can do whatever she likes with them!

 

[Hickdive]

I thought that modern military wrecks/war grave (post WWII) were protected from salvage in British law? I know there was a large fit over the USS Murphy, a few liberty vessels, and U-Boats on our side of the pond. NOAA raised hell over the USS Monitor that sank 130 years ago and it took numerous court cases just to let divers with "special" permission to dive her.

Only post 4 August 1914 ships and only if they have been declared protected places or controlled sites.

Everything else is covered under normal salvage laws.*

That said, if you lift anything from HMS Whatever and declare it to the Receiver of Wreck then they will not have too much trouble in finding the owner and the MOD are highly unlikely to let you keep anything you find.

*There is also the now the The Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009 which imposes controls on commercial salvors and is debatable whether it affects recreational diving.

 

[FinnMom]

The sad thing is also that the vast majority of these "treasures" are dragged home for just one person to enjoy (and very likely for their spouse to equally much NOT enjoy) for 10-30 yrs before they no longer have the interest or space to keep the item. Most kids wouldn't want these things -reasonably enough too since everything loses 70% of its memory value when it's not your memory. The kids also have spouses with all sorts of things they would rather have in their bookcase or garage than Grandpa's rusty treasures. Probably an average 15 yrs from treasure to junk. If the item had just been left where it belonged hundreds of people who did care & were interested would have also had a chance to enjoy it.

And the wife would have been happier too.

 

[Searcaigh]

When I was working with a salvage company back in the 80s we were diving on wrecks that had been torpedoed during WWI containing tin ore heading to UK. We used airlifts to bring the tin ore up to skips on the aft deck. All the diving was done using a sat system at a depth of 120M.

The owner of the salvage company had purchased these wrecks from Lloyds the insurance company who owned the wrecks, after some intensive research and final location of the wrecks using sidescan sonar etc., so I am just wondering as to what legislation covers wrecks like these. In fact they were off the south coast of Ireland and presumably in international waters, I don't recall exactly, but we were boarded by the Irish navy at one point and charged with piracy until it was proven that we were diving on our own property.

It appears that a week previously there had been some article about plundering some historic wrecks off the coast of Ireland that contained gold etc., from the Spanish Armada, and our DSV was implicated in this.

Fun days

 

[Jared0425]

I wonder what the Spanish Armada was doing off of Ireland?

Some of the wrecks that we have found, no other divers will dive them. We do not give out the numbers to the public and we rarely take artifacts because of the in fighting that it would cause on our team. Now of we find capstan covers or bells, we can make copies of them so everyone who wants to pay for one can have one and the original can stay on the wreck.

 

[PeterNBiddle]

Probably an average 15 yrs from treasure to junk. If the item had just been left where it belonged hundreds of people who did care & were interested would have also had a chance to enjoy it.

This is one of the smartest and clearest summaries of the perils of collecting I've ever read.

My father died a few years ago and while I always found his collecting kind of charming while he was alive, the half-life of the perceived value of his collections after his death could be measured in days.

I miss the man every day. I don't miss his axe collection.

 

[DaleC]

The sad thing is also that the vast majority of these "treasures" are dragged home for just one person to enjoy (and very likely for their spouse to equally much NOT enjoy) for 10-30 yrs before they no longer have the interest or space to keep the item. Most kids wouldn't want these things -reasonably enough too since everything loses 70% of its memory value when it's not your memory. The kids also have spouses with all sorts of things they would rather have in their bookcase or garage than Grandpa's rusty treasures. Probably an average 15 yrs from treasure to junk. If the item had just been left where it belonged hundreds of people who did care & were interested would have also had a chance to enjoy it.

And the wife would have been happier too.

Are we talking about ship parts or the 30 or so mismatched china tea cups in the cupboard? Or all those damn doilies in the closet, or all those shoes. How many Hummel figurines do we need???

 

[Searcaigh]

I wonder what the Spanish Armada was doing off of Ireland?

Spanish Armada in Ireland - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Oldbear]

I wonder what the Spanish Armada was doing off of Ireland?

I would say, "Sinking!" Hence the term "Ship Wreck". :d