
HMS Association- Scilly Isles, Cornwall, UK
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N 49° 52.930 W 006° 20.554
29U E 690903 N 5528916
The Scilly Isles an archipelago of The British Isles where many ship wrecks have occurred over time.
HMS Association and his fleet, under the command of Sir Clowdisley Shovell, was returning from Gibraltar to Portsmouth during October 1707.
Waymark Code: WM11016
Location: South West England, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 07/20/2019
Views: 2
Due to a combination of bad weather and the inability of mariners to accurately calculate their position several ships went down
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HMS ASSOCIATION was a 96-gun second-rate ship of the line, launched at Portsmouth dockyard in 1697. She served as the flagship of Sir Clowdisley Shovell in the Mediterranean during the War of the Spanish Succession and was involved in several engagements, including the capture of Gibraltar in 1704. Commanded by Captain Edmund Loades, she was returning from the Mediterranean with Sir Clowdisley on board in late October 1707. Legend has it that on the fateful night of October 22, Sir Clowdisley was repeatedly warned by his fellow officers that his judgement of the ships´ longitudinal position was incorrect. One account even claims that Sir Clowdisley ignored the advice of a seaman with knowledge of the Isles of Scilly who asserted that the fleet must be several miles off course because he could distinctly detect burning kelp in the air - a smell which was at the time so synonymous with the archipelago. The vessel smashed into the Gilstone Rocks, Isles of Scilly and sank. Like HMS ASSOCIATION, Firebrand also smashed into the Gilstone, but unlike the unfortunate flagship she was lifted off by a huge wave. Crippled and leaking, her commanding officer, Captain Francis Piercy, was guided by St Agnes´s blazing light - at the time the only such warning in all of Scilly. Piercy steered Firebrand between St Agnes and Annet, but she sank close to Menglow Rock, losing 28 of her crew of 40. The sole survivor from the other three ships was George Lawrence, who had worked as a butcher before joining the crew of Romney as quartermaster. Sir Clowdisley Shovell´s name has become synonymous with an act of arrogant bloody-mindedness that led not only to his own death, but that of 1,500 other sailors. Whether that view is an accurate portrayal of his role in the 1707 disaster is hardly relevant. The fact is, rightly or wrongly, Sir Clowdisley has gone down in history as the man who lost HMS ASSOCIATION, plus Eagle, Romney and Firebrand. Jan Lettens 06/08/2007 Associacion; 1459 tons; 90-gun man o´ war, built Portsmouth, 1697. 165 x 45 ft. Flagship of Admiral Sir Cloudesley Shovell. A vast treasure in chests of gold and silver coins and plate put on board in Gibraltar by British merchants trading in Spain and Portugal. More chests contained government funds for war with France, Sir Cloudesley´s own wealth and many regimental funds and silverware. Estimated value today: £5 million. Sunk: 22 October, 1707, by navigation error when she ran into the Scilly rocks in the dark. Sir Cloudesley and crew of 650 lost. More than 1000 lost from other ships following flagship.
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This interactive site plan is based upon a model of the seabed collected using multibeam sonar survey undertaken for this project. You will see representations of the larger items located on the seabed relating to the wreck. Many of these items are marked with a number which can be clicked. You can then follow a link to read more detailed information. Clicking “Find out more” will open a new window with further information. Just close that window or browser tab to return to the model.
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