Malta
HMT Crownsin
A tiny requisitioned trawler, originally German and taken as a prize in 1915, mined off Malta in May 1916 with eleven of her crew. She is catalogued as a wreck but there is no evidence she has ever been dived.
Sea conditions
Good right now
Some chop (0.5 m E)
Forecast for the site, updated 01:47 AM
- Waves
- 0.5 m
- from E
- Wind
- n/a
- Swell
- 0.5 m
- 5 s period
- Sea temp
- 28 °C
Next 7 days
Exposed to wind and swell from: N (0°), NE (45°), E (90°), SE (135°), S (180°). Offshore and unsheltered from almost every direction that matters. Any search or exploratory work here needs a genuinely flat day and a boat with a good sounder. Best season: June to September, purely for the flat water.
The dive
Crownsin is one of those names that appears in wreck databases and then goes quiet. She began life in 1895 as the German steam trawler Varel, built at Geestemunde, and was captured by the cruiser Arethusa in October 1915. The Royal Navy did what it did with every seaworthy fishing boat of the period and put her to work as a hired trawler, which in the Mediterranean of 1916 meant sweeping and patrolling the approaches that German submarines kept seeding with mines.
On 4 May 1916 her luck ran out off Malta. She was mined, with U 73 credited in the same action, and eleven of her small crew were lost. At only 137 tons she was not much of a ship, which is precisely why so little was ever written about her.
For a diver, be blunt about the state of knowledge here: no confirmed depth, no confirmed position, no dive reports, no photographs. Anything below about 70 metres in this part of the channel is a serious trimix undertaking, and anyone chasing her should start with the wreck databases and the Maltese authorities rather than a boat. We have flagged the confidence low on purpose.
- A genuine unknown, catalogued but apparently never dived
- Rare story of a German trawler captured and then sunk under a British flag
- Part of the cluster of 1916 minefield losses off Malta
Typical plan
There is no typical plan because there is no established dive. Treat any attempt as exploration: sonar search first, then a deep mixed gas bounce with full surface support and a conservative bottom time, and expect the profile to be dictated by whatever depth she actually turns out to lie in.
What the bottom looks like
- 1Presumed trawler remains, unconfirmed100 m deep · 35 m out
- 2Open sediment plain101 m deep · 70 m out
Almost certainly soft mud and sand, the usual bottom on this stretch of offshore shelf.
Who you might meet
Getting in and staying safe
Boat only if she is ever located. There is no established mooring, no known charter that runs to her, and no shore option.
- Position and depth both unverified
- Likely deep enough to demand mixed gas and full technical support
- Open water with shipping traffic on the eastern approaches
- Small iron wreck of this age is usually collapsed and snagged with fishing gear
- No local knowledge to fall back on if something goes wrong
A bit of history
Built 1895 by J. C. Tecklenborg at Geestemunde as the German trawler Varel. Captured by HMS Arethusa on 7 October 1915 and taken into Royal Navy service as the hired trawler Crownsin, 137 tons. Lost to a mine off Malta on 4 May 1916 during the same period of submarine minelaying that killed HMS Russell, HMS Nasturtium and HMY Aegusa the previous week. Eleven crew died.
Divers say
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Further reading: uboat.net: navy trawler Crownsin · Wrecksite entry 145751 · Wrecksite entry 145750 · List of shipwrecks in May 1916