FOLLOWING hard on the heels of last week’s reports of the great maritime victory scored by Royal Navy warships off the Falkland Islands, the Daily Echo’s main headlines 100 years ago today reported on the striking and brilliant exploits performed by a British submarine.

The Royal Navy’s submarine B-11 had become the focus of the nation after she had forced her way up the Dardanelles through a minefield before blowing up the Turkish battleship Mesudiye and returning to safety.

The commanding officer at the centre of this latest victory was a Hampshire man, Lieutenant Norman Douglas Holbrook.

The Secretary of the Admiralty made a statement, which appeared in the Southern Daily Echo on Monday, December 14, 1914, and read: “Yesterday submarine B-11 (Lieutenant Commander Norman D Holbrook, RN) entered the Dardanelles, and in spite of the difficult currents dived under five rows of mines, and torpedoed the Turkish battleship Mesudiye, which was guarding the minefield.

“Although pursued by gun-fire and torpedo boats, the B-11 returned safely after being submerged on one occasion for nine hours.

“When last seen the Mesudiye was sinking by the stern.”

After negotiating the tricky course from Tenedos, which forced the B-11 to pass under five rows of mines and through uncharted currents, it entered the Dardanelles to commence its attack on the Mesudiye at exactly noon on December 13.

Lookouts on board the Mesudiye sounded the alarm after sighting the torpedo and the B-11’s periscope and immediately opened fire on the water where the submarine had been spotted.

The impact of the torpedo caused the Mesudiye to heel severely before eventually capsizing ten minutes later, trapping most of her crew inside the broken hulk.

Fortunately for them, as the Mesudiye was lying in a shoal of water, a large proportion of the hull was above the surface, enabling most of her crew to escape by cutting through the hull, although the incident claimed the lives of 37 Turkish crewmen.

Daily Echo:

Lt Norman Douglas Holbrook 

After striking the Mesudiye, the B-11 had to remain submerged for a further eight hours while she affected her escape, with any attempts to use the periscope likely to result in her attracting heavy gunfire.

Lieutenant Holbrook’s bravery was rewarded with the Victoria Cross – the first for service in a submarine – while his First Lieutenant, Sydney Winn, w a s awarded the Distinguished Service Order, and every member of the crew was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal.

Holbrook’s gallantry beneath the waves was the latest example of how Hampshire’s sons were showing the sterling stuff that they were made of in the weeks since the outbreak of war.

The other most notable of Hampshire’s military figures in the war so far included Flt Lt Charles Collett in the air, who delivered a devastating attack on a Zeppelin shed at Dusseldorf in September 1914; and Vice Admiral Sir Frederick Sturdee on the sea, who enjoyed success the previous week when his fleet sunk several German battleships off the Falklands Islands.