The Live Bait Squadron: the sinking of the HMS Aboukir, Hogue and Cressy 22 September 1914
On the 22th of September 1914 three British cruisers, the HMS Aboukir, Hogue and Cressy were patrolling the waters between England and the Netherlands. On board these obsolete warships were 2,300 crewmen who were taken completely by surprise by a new, rather unknown and destructive weapon: the German U-boat.
In effect the three warships were sitting ducks. It took only six torpedoes to kill 1,459 men and boys.
This sinking of the so-called 'live bait squadron' was one of the biggest naval disasters of the war.
For the next hundred years this catastrophic event received hardly any attention. Which is strange, because the number of victims is similar to that of the sinking of the Titanic, which had gone down just two years previously.
Today, three mass graves lie on the bottom of the North Sea only 22 miles off the Dutch coast near Scheveningen.
How did it happen? What has happened since? What is the condition of this naval graveyard nowadays? And how does it look underwater? Questions that will be answered in this intriguing documentary.
More information about this tragic incident is available from The Live Bait Squadron Society www.livebaitsqn-soc.info - membership of this association is free.
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