Lieutenant-Commander Martin Nasmith was captain of the submarine HMS E11 at the outbreak of WWI. In October 1914 E11 was one of three British submarines that tried to enter the Baltic Sea. The other two succeeded, but E11 was delayed by technical problems. On 19 October she mistook a neutral Danish submarine for a German U-boat, but her torpedo attack fortunately missed. She was spotted by a seaplane whilst recharging her batteries on the surface the next day; destroyers searched for her all day. After trying but failing to get past the Germans patrols again the next day Nasmith headed back to base on 22 October.[1]
On 17 December E11 was at southern end of a patrol line of British submarines in Helgoland Bight. Just after 7:00 am a number of German destroyers appeared, searching at high speed. An hour later large ships, which must have been returning from the German raid on the English north east coast, came into sight. Nasmith approached to 400 yards of one of them and fired a torpedo, but it ran too deep. He tried to get a shot on the third in the German line, but its zigzag course left it 500 yards away and heading straight for E11, forcing Nasmith to dive rapidly. This disturbed the boat’s trim, and she broke the surface when returning to periscope depth. She was able to escape. but the Germans made off at high speed.[2] On Christmas Day 1914 E11 rescued four of the airman who took part in the Cuxhaven Raid.
By May 1915 E11 was in the Dardanelles. On 17 May E14 returned from a successful patrol in the Sea of Marmara that earned her captain, Lieutenant-Commander Edward Boyle, the Victoria Cross and every member of her crew a medal. E11 was to head through the Straits to replace her the next day. The night before Boyle briefed Nasmith on the mines, nets and guns defending the straits.[3]
19 May: E11 set off at 1:10 am on 19 May, passing through the Allied destroyer line at 3:20 am and then diving. At 6:10 am she saw the Ottoman battle ships Targut Reis and Heredin Barbarossa, accompanied by several destroyers. The battleships withdrew and the destroyers fired on E11 whenever her periscope was raised. It was very easy to spot because of the speed that she was making and the light conditions. By 9:45 pm she was through the Straits. At 10:00 pm she surfaced in order to charge her batteries.[4]
20 May: She stayed on the surface, charging her batteries until 4:00 am, apart from 0:30 – 0:40 am, when a destroyer appeared, forcing her to dive. No merchant ships were seen during the day. Generally E11 stayed on the surface at night in order to charge her batteries. During the day she was on the surface if it was safe to do so.
21 May: At 11:30 am E11 stopped a small sailing vessel. Four chickens were taken; the scared but polite skipper declined payment. E11 used the vessel as a screen for the rest of the day: it was then very foggy.
22 May: Only warships were encountered and evaded. Attempts to radio the destroyer HMS Jed failed.
23 May: Course was altered towards Istanbul at 3:00 am. A transport was encountered at 4:50 am, whilst E11 was inspecting a sailing vessel. E11 dived to attack, but the transport spotted her and made off. At 5:50 am the 775 ton Ottoman gunboat Peleng-I Derya was seen anchored off Istanbul.[5] E11 dived, approached her and fired a torpedo into her. The gunboat sank, but first got off rifle fire and shots from her 6 pounder gun; one of the latter put E11’s forward periscope out of action.
24 May: Radio contact was made with Jed. Thereafter E11 and Jed were in regular contact.
At 10:30 am a smaller steamer was spotted heading west. E11 surfaced and ordered her to stop. The steamer tried to flee, but stopped after coming under rifle fire from E11. Her crew panicked and started to abandon ship. The panic was calmed by Silas Q. Swing, the war correspondent of the New York Sun. He said that the steamer was a passenger ship that was heading for Chanak and was not, as far he knew, carrying stores, before just making the last boat.
The steamer was in fact carrying a 6 inch gun, other gun mountings and a large amount of ammunition. After taking some souvenirs E11’s crew set a demolition charge, sinking the ship, which was the 480 ton naval auxiliary Naga.[6]
More smoke had by then been spotted. It was another steamer, similar to the Naga. E11 dived to attack, but was spotted. The target headed for Rodasto, with E11 pursuing on the surface. Large quantities of stores could be seen on the steamer’s deck. She berthed at Rodasto’s pier. E11 dived and approached, but ran aground 2,000 yards away as the water quickly became shallower. She fired a torpedo, which sank the steamer; she was the 512 ton SS Hunkar Iskelesi.[7] E11 then withdrew under rifle fire, which seemed to be aimed at her remaining periscope. It was hit but not damaged.
Another vessel was then observed. It was a small paddle steamer, which initially tried to flee. It stopped after coming under rifle fire, but then tried to ram E11 after realising that the submarine did not have any guns other than rifles. The paddle steamer, which was carrying horses, finally ran ashore. E11 approached, but came under fire from 50-100 cavalrymen. She fired a torpedo, but it missed; only the stern could be targeted and the shallow water made it impossible to close the range.
At 10:30 pm E11 headed towards Istanbul.
25 May: On the same day as U21 sank the battleship HMS Triumph E11 arrived at the Golden Horn. At 12:30 pm she fired torpedoes at two transports moored at the Arsenal Wharf. One hit and damaged the 3,559 ton SS Istanbul, which beached herself in shallow water, while the other, aimed at SS Kismet, circled back, forcing E11 to take evasive action, before escaping back to the Sea of Marmara.[8] The action was observed by the USS Scorpion, guard ship to the US Embassy. Her log noted that four torpedo boats fired on E11.[9]
26 May: The spare torpedoes were made ready. The rest of the day was spent bathing, repairing and mending clothes and resting.
27 May: An Ottoman battleship and two destroyers were seen at 1:30 am, but one of the destroyers forced E11 to dive as she was about to fire. A small steamer was observed at 5:00 pm, but not attacked after she fired on E11.
28 May: Smoke was spotted at 6:00 am. Half an hour later a convoy of one large and four small transports, escorted by a destroyer became visible. At 7:30 am a torpedo was fired at the largest transport, hitting and sinking the 474 ton SS Bandirma. Nasmith, conscious of the risk to E11’s periscope from Ottoman fire, dived his boat. He brought her back to periscope depth once safely clear, observing the destroyer searching for the submarine and the other transports continuing on their course.
At noon a steamship was seen approaching. A torpedo was fired, but no explosion was heard, although the target was seen to stop briefly. The torpedo was later found floating and hoisted back on board after Lieutenant Robert Browne had removed the firing pistol. Damage to the torpedo’s head showed that it had struck the ship, the 216 ton SS Dogan, without exploding.[10]
A small sailing vessel was stopped at 4:30 pm. She was not carrying any cargo and was allowed to continue after being relieved of various delicacies.
29 May: An attack on a store vessel at 7:00 am failed, with E11 breaking surface. Only two or three destroyers were seen during the rest of the day.
30 May: Day spent mainly in clearing the foul air in E11, cleaning her as far as possible and washing and bathing by the crew.
31 May: At 8:00 am a large ship of the German Rickmers Line was seen embarking troops at Panderma. At 9:20 am a torpedo was fired that hit her. She listed heavily to port, but her crew managed to beach her. The ship, the 3,431 ton SS Madeline Rickmers, was wrecked.[11]
1 June: A quiet day.
2 June: A destroyer was spotted at 8:10 am but E11 evaded her by diving. At 9:00 am E11 surfaced and headed to intercept a ship whose smoke had been observed just before diving. At 9:20 am E11 dived. She fired a torpedo 20 minutes later and the target, which was the 390 ton store SS Tecielli, sank in 3 minutes.[12]
At 12:30 pm the smoke of a small ship escorted by two destroyers was spotted. E11 dived at 1:15 pm. She fired a torpedo at the merchant ship at 2:15pm , but it passed under the target, which was the 400 ton SS Basangic.[13] The torpedo was found and floated back in to E11 via the stern torpedo tube after the firing pistol had been removed.
3 June: Smoke was seen at 3:00 pm. E11 dived and approached the vessel, which resembled a steam yacht. She was not closing the range quickly enough, so surfaced. When the range was down to 2,000 yards the enemy vessel turned and headed straight towards E11, which dived. The enemy had disappeared when E11 surfaced. A destroyer forced her to dive at 4:00 pm and remain submerged until midnight.
4 June: The only ship observed was a destroyer in the afternoon and evening, which was thought to be the one that had been hunting for E11 the day before.
5 June: The day was spent ventilating the boat, charging the batteries and bathing. Problems were found in one of the main motors and the intermediate shaft was cracked, so Jed was asked to give E11 permission to return to base.
6 June: A quiet Sunday of bathing, prayers, exercise and battery charging. A destroyer an some sailing vessels were seen in the afternoon. At 9:30 pm E11 headed slowly on the surface towards the north entrance to the Dardanelles.
7 June: E11 dived at 3:40 am and entered the Straits. At 6:30 am she passed Gallipoli at 90 feet. She examined all the anchorages, but found no battleships. A few small vessels and sailing ships were seen. The nest target was a troopship anchored off Moussa Bank. At noon a torpedo was fired at her. It struck, and the ship, which was the 3,590 ton SS Ceyhan, sank.[14]
E11 passed Nagara Point at 1:30 pm and Chanak 30 minutes later. A large mine became attached to the port foremost hydroplane at Chanak. At 4:00 pm E11 cleared the mine by surfacing stern first and heading astern at full speed. She was then met by the destroyer HMS Grampus, which escorted her to Port Mudros.
On 25 June the London Gazette printed the citation for the award of the Victoria Cross to Nasmith. Lieutenant Guy D’Oyly Hughes, his second in command, and Browne both received the Distinguished Service Cross and every petty officer and rating was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal. Nasmith’s citation, reproduced on Naval-History.net, said that:
29206 – 25 JUNE 1915
Admiralty, 24th June, 1915.
The KING (is) pleased to approve of the grant of the Victoria Cross to Lieutenant-Commander Martin Eric Nasmith, Royal Navy, for the conspicuous bravery specified below:
For most conspicuous bravery in command of one of His Majesty’s Submarines while operating in the Sea of Marmora. In the face of great danger he succeeded in destroying one large Turkish gunboat, two transports, one ammunition ship and three storeships, in addition to driving one storeship ashore. When he had safely passed the most difficult part of his homeward journey he returned again to torpedo a Turkish transport.
The number of ships that E11 was credited with sinking ties in with the ships named by Nicholas Lambert in his footnotes to the Navy Records Society’s reprint of the report of E11’s patrol on which the above is based. Their total tonnage was 13,211 tons.
This was only the first of three patrols that Nasmith and the crew of E11 made in the Dardanelles. The other two will be the subject of later posts.
[1] J. S. Corbett, H. Newbolt, Naval Operations, 5 vols. (London: HMSO, 1938). vol. i, pp. 237-38.
[2] Ibid. vol. ii, pp. 45-46.
[3] Ibid. vol. iii, 32.
[4] This account of E11’s patrol is based on [142] ‘The First Sea of Marmora Patrol’ by HM Submarine E11, 19 May to 7 Hune 1915 by Lieutenant-Cammander Martin Nasmith, Lieutenant Guy d’Oyly Hughes and Lieutenant Robert Browne, document no. 142 in N. A. Lambert, ed. The Submarine Service, 1900-1918 (Aldershot: Ashgate for the Navy Records Society, 2001), pp. 301-13. Additional comments made by the editor are footnoted.
[5] Ibid. Footnote 1, p. 303.
[6] Ibid. Footnote 1, p. 305.
[7] Ibid. Footnote 2, p. 305.
[8] Ibid. Footnotes 1-3, p. 306.
[9] Ibid., p. 307.
[10] Ibid., pp. footnote 1, p. 309.
[11] Ibid. Footnote 1, p. 310.
[12] Ibid. Footnote 1, p. 311.
[13] Ibid. Footnote 2, p. 311.
[14] Ibid. Footnote 1, p. 313.
War and Security 
What an incredible record for Nasmith and this vessel. Not being expert in the field I hadn’t realised submarine technology was so advanced so soon. The only RN WW1 connection I have is an ancestor whose service was pretty varied – joined the RNAS, then attached to the Machine Gun Corps, and later ‘Locker Lampson’s armoured car service’ as Wikipedia calls it, I look forward to your next two posts on Nasmith and the E11. Thanks.
Thanks. I want to cover all aspects of the RN during WWI in my series, including the RNAS, its armoured cars and Locker-Lampson. It’s a bit harder to fit land and air warfare into my ‘on this day 100 years ago’ format, but I’ll find a reason, possibly the date that Locker-Lampson was awarded the DSO or perhaps even two posts: one on the 100th anniversary of them leaving Belgium in late 1915; the other on the anniversary of their departure from Russia after the October Revolution.
My wife’s grandfather CERA Jupp DSM served with Naismith on the E11 until he fell foul of D’oyle Hughes who as they say went onto other things.
Thanks for that. I intend to post more about E11, which sank an Ottoman battleship on 8 August 1915, but I am about 5 weeks behind schedule in my RN in WWI 100th Anniversary series because of a holiday and another writing commitment.
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My grandfather was an AB on E11 (HMS Adamant) from 1st Dec 1916 to 16th January 1919, so he was not on the famous 1915 attack. I’d like to know more about E11’s adventures during my grandfathers service.
Thanks for the post. I did intend to write more about E11 in 1915, but have been neglecting this blog recently because I have been writing a book titled Britain’s Quest for Oil: The First World War and the Peace Conferences, which is based on my PhD. It should be out soon, so I hope to resume blogging regularly.
I have not been able to find much on E11 after 1915. The website Naval-History.net lists the location of all British warships at various dates throughout the war, and she appears to have spent the rest of the war in the Mediterranean.
http://www.naval-history.net/WW1NavyBritishShips-Locations2PL1811.htm
The last mention of her in Naval Operations, the British official history of WWI at sea, is about a patrol that ended in December 1915.
Other places that you might ask include The Great War Forum, which is the best web forum on WWI, although it has far more on the war on land than that at sea. If posting a query about your grandfather there people will ask what you already know about his service.
http://1914-1918.invisionzone.com/forums/index.php?act=idx
The best on submarines is U Boat net. It is unsurprisingly orientated towards Germany and WWII, but it does have a WWI section in its forum and have seen threads on British WWI boats there.
http://uboat.net/forums/list.php?23
Sorry that I could not help more.
Forgot when writing the reply above that I did in fact cover E11’s second and third patrols in the post linked below on Allied Submarines in the Dardanelles:
Even if E11 was not involved in any adventures like those of 1915 during the rest of the war, being a submariner in those days was very risky even in peacetime. The RN lost several subs accidentally before WWI, between the world wars and in the first 10 or so years after WWII.
Hi
Thank you very much for that, and good luck with the book.
Regards
John
According to this
http://www.canakkaledebugun.org/once-elenora-ardindan-da-rehber-vapuru/
E-11 [ Nasmith] sunk two vessels [“Elenora” in the harbour of Kemer and the Bosphorus Ferry, “Rehber” returning from Gallipoli]
Neither of these names appear in your account.
I am relying on Bing translator for my understanding.
Have I got it right?
Cheers
Sank
Thanks.
If Google translate is correct then I think that the website that you have linked says that E11 sank those two ships on 5 December. That would be during her third patrol of the Dardanelles, which lasted from 6 November to 23 December. I wrote a paragraph about it in the post linked below, but could not find enough information to write as much as the account above of her first patrol. She did sink three steamers and a destroyer during it and was the only Allied submarine operating in the Dardanelles for most of that time, so she almost certainly did sink these two ships.
Norman Wikinson’s painting of E11 in his book of sketches from the Dardanelles p106 shows her with a dazzle-paint design. I can find no written mention of this being carried out. Can you help, please? Glyn L Evans, author “Dazzle-Painted Ships of World War I”
I am surprised by that as I thought that dazzle painting came in later in the war and was Wilkinson’s idea, although a different scheme had been proposed by John Kerr earlier in the war. No source that I consulted in writing this blog mentioned E11 being camouflaged, except that she used a small sailing ship as a screen for a day early in her patrol.
Wilkinson’s book is available free online from Project Gutenberg at the link below and his picture of E11 does show her to be painted with a camouflage scheme, although arguably a more subdued one than introduced in 1917.
Sorry that I cannot be of more help
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/48754/48754-h/48754-h.htm#Page_106