Most military vessels lost during combat operations are protected as war graves out of respect for the deceased; divers are often prohibited from entering the vessels, and in cases where penetration is permitted, souvenirs may never be taken. Due to a loophole in Ireland’s laws governing submerged war graves, some opportunistic divers have been looting the site of the SM UC-42, a sunken WWI German submarine, even though the team that discovered it tried to keep it a protected secret.
The Story of SM UC-42
SM UC-42 was a minelaying U-boat and part of the German Imperial Navy during the First World War. Built in 1915 and commissioned in 1916, she was 162 feet long and had a 17 foot beam. The UC-42 undertook just six patrols during her short career; her last patrol was undertaken on September 1st of 1917.
On October 31st of 1917, Torpedo Boat TB 055 was working with minesweepers near the entrance to Cork Harbor. An oil slick was seen, and the torpedo boat’s crew used a hydrophone to attempt to detect a submarine. They heard loud hammering and turbine noise, so they dropped a marker buoy and a depth charge, after which they noticed the oil slick had grown ; in addition, there were bubbles floating to the surface. After a series of attempts to communicate and locate the submarine which was believed to be in trouble below, the TB 055 sent for assistance. On November 2nd, dockyard divers arrived; they reported finding a German U-boat lying on the bottom with her stern blown apart. A brass plate on the sub’s conning tower read “C42, 1916.” No survivors were located, though hatches were open. It is assumed that the UC-42 met with an untimely end when one of her own mines was accidentally detonated beneath her stern.
The wreck of the UC-42 lay peacefully on the seabed until her rediscovery by a team of Irish divers in November of 2010. A serial number stamped on one of the sub’s propellers allowed them to positively identify the wreck. Though the discoverers tried to keep the wreck’s location a secret to protect it from looting, others soon discovered its position and news of the wreck and its easy accessibility in just 27 meters of water spread like wildfire.
Though the original discoverers placed a memorial plaque on the wreck, complete with the German Imperial Navy’s insignia, souvenir hunters visited anyway, even going so far as to enter the shattered hull in search of memorabilia.
Shortly after news that the wreck had been pillaged made its way into the hands of the media, Ireland and Germany began working together to create plans to provide protection for UC-42. In addition, the Naval Service expressed concern that some mines could still be intact and posed a danger to divers who might decide to poke and prod the wreck’s structure. Ian Kelleher and Niall O’Regan, the divers who originally located the UC-42 wreck, are hoping to find surviving relatives of UC-42’s crew. Says Eoin McGarry, who helped film and photograph the wreck, “With centenaries coming up, the U-boat crew deserves to have their stories told.” It is hoped that plans for protection will endow this war grave the dignity it deserves.