Archaeology Notes

Event ID 758557

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/758557

ND49NE 8017 4818 9976

N58 52.95 W2 53.9333

NLO: Stromness [name: HY 253 090]

Glimps Holm [name: ND 472 991]

Glimpsholm Skerry [name: ND 482 995]

Scapa Flow [name centred HY 36 00].

Formerly entered as Site no. 8906.

For adjacent (and successor) Churchill Barrier No. 2, see ND49NE 15.

For other blockships in this group, see HY40SE 8002, and ND49NE 8014-16, 8018-21 and ND49NE 8023-4.

For plan indicating the relative locations and orientations of blockships in this group, see Macdonald 1990, 125.

Horizontal Datum = OGB

Circumstances of Loss Details

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The steel single-screw steamship RHEINFIELD was built in 1893, and sunk as a blockship beside the ELTON.

Sources: Ferguson 1985; MacDonald 1990

Surveying Details

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9 July 1926. 58 52 57N, 002 53 51W is given as the wreck's position TEESWOOD, ALMERIA and ELTON are in the same position.

14 March 1972. A position of 58 52 57.01N, 002 53 56W, or bearing 221.5 degrees and 670 metres from Lamb Holm trig station (61) is given. This is a fairly small ship resting on a reef which mostly dries. It is smashed and spread, but the mast is still standing.

Report by Undermarine Operations 5 March 1972.

27 August 1992. The wreck's name is given as RHEINFIELD. It lies beside the ELTON and is well broken up.

Sources: Ferguson 1985; MacDonald 1990

Hydrographic Office, 1995.

(Classified as steamship: former name cited as Rheinfield or Reinfield, and date of loss cited as 2 October 1914). Rheinfield (Reinfield?): this vessel was scuttled as a blockship.

Registration: British. 3634 tons [unspecified].

(Location of loss cited as N58 52.95 W2 53.93).

I G Whittaker 1998.

Skerry Sound is not noted as such on the 1998 edition of the OS 1:50,000 map, but it lies between Lamb Holm [name: HY 485 005] and Glimps Holm [name: HY 473 993].

Information from RCAHMS (RJCM), 8 October 2002.

(Name cited as Reinfeld).

Length: 340 ft (103.7m): date of sinking 2 October 1914.

'Unballasted. Condition good. Standing well and likely to last. Forecastle awash at H.W.' (Report dated 28 June 1915 and accompanying panoramic sketch dated 8 December 1915).

The accompanying panoramic drawing (of Skerry Sound, looking E from close to the location of the Rosewood) depicts a flush-decked cargo ship with a minimal superstructure amidships. The vessel is depicted from aft of the port beam and is obscured by the Almeria; the masts and funnel remain erect. The vessel is erect in the water, the level of the water being approximately that in service.

The accompanying map depicts this vessel in hatched outline, and as lying NE-SW in the centre of the channel, and to the E of the Almeria (ND49NE 8024). It is the most easterly blockship in the group.

Information from RCAHMS (RJCM), 30 January 2004.

PRO [Kew] ADM116/2073A: dated 17 December 1919.

Skerry Sound is not noted as such on the 1998 edition of the OS 1:50,000 map. The name apparently applies to the ill-defined sound leading E from St Mary's Bay {name centred ND 473 002] into Holm Sound [name centred ND 500 992] between Lamb Holm [name: HY 485 003] to the N and Glimps Holm [name: ND 473 992] to the S. It is now closed by Churchill Barrier No. 2 (ND49NE 15: ND 4822 9999 to ND 4785 9952).

Information from RCAHMS (RJCM), 18 August 2005.

Skerry Sound is not noted as such on the 1998 edition of the OS 1:50,000 map, but the current edition of the OS (GIS) notes the name around ND 4814 9995, between Glimps Holm and Glimpsholm Skerry.

Information from RCAHMS (RJCM), 28 March 2007.