Archaeology Notes

Event ID 766416

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/766416

NM62SW 8001c. 602 205

N56 19 W5 52.7

NLO: Lord Lovat's Bay [name: NM 602 205]

Loch Buie [name: NM 59 22]

Torran Rocks [name centred NM 28 13]

Firth of Lorn [name centred NM 69 19].

Location formerly cited as NM 6048 2026 [N56 18.8 W5 52.4].

See also NM62SE 8001.

The 750 ton boom defence vessel BARCOME [Barcombe] was found on the west side of Loch Buie shortly after 6.opm on Tuesday by an Oban-bound seine net fishing vessel.

This ended a 21 hour search by naval vessels, aircraft, and the Islay lifeboat. BARCOME had been badly holed and flooded. One casualty was later brought to Oban. The air and sea rescue operations were hampered by thick mist and also by a series of conflicting reports as to the area in which the vessel had been grounded. For over 21 hours, the Islay lifeboat CHARLOTTE ELIZABETH and the submarine rescue vessel Kingfisher, the Admiralty tug SAUCY, and other ships and RAF Shackleton aircraft from Northern Ireland searched the area. Shortly after 9.00pm on Monday the BARCOME signalled that she was aground near Oronsay Island. The Islay lifeboat searched the Oronsay area all through the night and early morning of Tuesday. Later on Tuesday she was ordered north to search in the area of the Torran Rocks, off the south west of Mull, more than 15 miles from Oronsay. The remains of the BARCOME are lying broadside at the foot of a 300ft cliff. The lifeboat and the Kingfisher took off the BARCOME's crew.

At the court martial of the boom defence vessel BARCOME's commander, Lt.Cdr. Derek Charles Godfrey, the court recorded that there was a local magnetic anomaly in the Loch Buie area, and extra care should have been taken by the accused.

Source: Oban Times, 18 January 1958.

(Classified as boom defence vessel: date of loss cited as 13 January 1958). HMS Barcombe: this vessel was wrecked just E of Loch Buie. Commander Godfrey.

Registration: london. Built 1938. 750grt. Length: 45m. Beam: 10m.

(Location of loss cited as N56 18.85 W5 52.33).

I G Whittaker 1998.

Material reported under RoW amnesty (2001):

A1956 2 letters (B and M), 1 boiler plate, 1 propellor: from seabed.

NMRS, MS/829/35.

Neither plans nor photographs of this vessel are held in the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich.

Information from Ms G Fabri (NMM), 7 November 2003.

Loch Buie is a broad but deep inlet set into the S coast of Mull. The village of Lochbuie itself is situated at the head (NE end) of the loch.

Information from RCAHMS (RJCM), 9 May 2008.