1703-2005

Seeking Resolution

Wrecked, burnt and forgotten the remains of Resolution were left to the sea until the 1980's.

 The Nautical Museums Trust in Hastings, purchased the rights to the yet-to-be-found vessel from the MoD in 1985.

In 1989 a team consisting of Mike Laycock, Mike Woolstenhume, Earnest Perry, Alaric Smith, Jason Smith, Ann Smith and Bryan Smith started to search for the Resolution.  Below are excerpts from an article entitled The Search for HMS Resolution (1667 -1703) written by Bryan Smith and published in the Mensun Bound book Excavating Ships of War 

The position of HMS Resolution

Throughout the journey from Bembridge to Pevensey (fig 3), some 56.3 nautical miles, there are only four recorded positions for the Resolution and most of these are of doubtful accuracy. The first, the anchorage, in St Hellen's Road (Bembridge Point bearing WSW, about 3 miles from land; (OLS 1, 17, 18, 19) should be reasonably dependable. When her anchors parted the tide was ebbing and the wind blowing a gale from the SW (OLS 18). It was the middle of the night and there would have been a delay before the crew was able to impose some measure of control over her motion and then get underway (OLS 17, 18, 21), by which time she would have set into Hayling Bay. The tidal current was then setting to the west at about a knot, keeping her off the reef, but the wind would have been the main factor. The sails then blew out (OLS 17, 18, 21), however, I would suggest they lasted long enough for the ship to clear the westward edges of Pullar Bank. She probably scraped along the southern edge and touched the eastern end (the Outer Owers) but if she had gone over the main part of the bank, I suspect she would have been totally wrecked. There is a discrepancy in the officers statements (OLS 17, 18, 19); three of them say she hit at 02:00, but the Master states that it occurred between 02:00 and 04:00 (OLS 21) which seems more plausible. The tide turned about 03:30 first driving her to the north then to the east. If this is the case, then, between 00:30 and 04:00, she made about 3.5 knots, which I believe would have put her, by 04:00, as far out as the Outer Owers. This lines up with her next known position, off Shoreham, at 07:00 (OLS 17) which puts her on course to pass between 1 and 2 miles off Beachy Head. The officers do not say how they recognized Shoreham or how they obtained their distance from this place (3 leagues, or, 9 miles). Their bearing at this point was N by E (011°) but they do not say if it was 'magnetic' or 'true'. Having hit the shoals several times (OLS 17, I8, 19, 21) she was by that time leaking badly. At daybreak on 27 November a sail was set and after the 07:00 position they made up for Beachy Head (OLS I8), some 18 miles to the east. After passing Beachy Head and with the water inside the vessel rising over the orlop deck, Captain Liell ordered the vessel to be beached. The distance from Beachy Head, which she would have rounded at about 09:30, to Pevensey is about 7.6 nautical miles which she could have covered easily even allowing from the tidal current to change from flood to ebb at about 11:00.

The problem is to determine exactly where she was grounded. Possibly the most accurate position is that given by the master who wrote ' ... she was put ashore against

Pemsey at 11:30’ (OLS 21). The first lieutenant agreed (OLS 18). Later, in a letter to the Admiralty, the Captain gives the position between Willingdon and Pemsey. None of them mention Pevensey Haven or the Castle at Pevensey. The former had been surveyed in I698 and though silted up was probably still visible; the latter has been a prominent landmark since Norman times.

Several maps of the period have been studied to see whether the beach has changed. There are three reliable reference points, the churches at Westham and Pevensey and the Castle between them. The present O/S map puts the beach at about 1500 metres (0.93 miles) from the castle. So do the plans of the Haven surveyed by a Navy/Trinity House team in 1698 (on which the two churches and castle are also situated with reasonable accuracy). A map by William Booth in the PRO (MR915), dated 1764, sites the Castle about 0.65 geometrical miles (probably nautical miles) from the beach. It also shows Langney Point which appears to be about three-quarters of a mile farther seaward than on the present day O/S map. In addition it shows the entrance (breakwaters?) to the Haven extending a quarter of a mile out to sea. It is, however, likely that these features have been distorted, but the western part of the map which shows Selsey and gives soundings about the Owers, appears to be quite accurate. Other maps of the period do not show Langney Point so far out. Greenville Collins' Great Britain Coasting Pilot of 1693, shows the point as it is today, as does Samson's (of Paris) Atlas of 1692 and a French chart by Bellin of 1763. Norden's map of 1610 and Speeds of 1666, show the Point well out into the Channel. So does Budgen's of 1724, Herman Moll's of the same year, and Overton and Bowels' of 1740, but none of them, including Booth's, put the Castle and two churches in their correct positions.The ordnance survey map of 1813 shows Langney (called Langley) Point and the beach to Pevensey (old Pemsey, now Pevensey Bay), as they are today. The beach today extends from the bottom of a ridge of pebbles (about 6 metres high) to about 250m seaward at low water spring tides; it is constantly changing, especially during periods of strong winds. It shoals slowly at an irregular rate of about 5m in 350m. The Haven is now called Salt Haven and its exit to the sea is enclosed by three culverts under the Pebble Ridge; the end of the western culvert is marked by a beacon.

The ship was beached an hour after high water, one day before spring tide. She must have been low in the sea with internal water up to the orlop beams. The volume, of the hull, below the orlop beams was 778 tons by calculation (Simpson's rules) using Dean's drawings. She would have been carrying about 100 tons of ballast and some stores in this space. So, allowing 650 tons for the excess water, her draught would be increased by about 5ft. Her normal draught, from Deane, was 14 ½ft forward and 17 ¼ ft aft, giving a mean of  15⅞ft. Adding the sinkage, this would give her a mean draught of 20⅞ ft and a maximum draught aft of 22¼ft, i.e. 6.97m. Using the Shoreham tide diagram, which is similar to that of Pevensey, with a range of 6.61m and a factor of 0.92, gives a height above low water of 6.08m and a height above datum of 7.12m, at the time that she grounded. Assuming these figures are roughly correct, the Resolution probably took the beach just above the low water level. The Captain's letter to the Admiralty (3) suggests that the vessel was accessible at low tide. For these reasons the search has been confined to an area of beach 1½ nautical miles from the modern town of Pevensey Bay.

Unfortunately the Officer's dispositions at the Court Martial (OLS 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23) do not tell where the ship went ashore, nor do letters to the Admiralty from the Captain or the Customs Officer at Hastings, William Boswell, who was appointed to assist Captain Liell.

The question also arises regarding what was left and for what we should be searching. Most of the loose stores were taken off. A contractor (OLS 28) appears to suggest that he careened her in order to salvage the masts and yards. This seems to contradict a letter from Boswell to the Admiralty (OLS 13) in which he wrote that the French burnt the ship down to the ballast. It also seems that the guns were not salvaged because the same contractor requested permission (and payment) to dig them out of the sand into which they were fretted. There are, however, no surviving records permitting him to do so. Boswell also talks about selling off the ironwork, by which he appears to mean the rudder fastenings and the like (OLS 13). Liell and Boswell tried to arrange for vessels to come from Hastings to load stores and guns, but they refused to go around the coast because of the danger posed by French privateers (OLS 3).

So what we are seeking is a mound of ballast with up to 70 guns around it, buried under the sand of Pevensey beach, somewhere between Beachlands and Martello Tower No. 65, a shoreline distance of about 3,000 metres with a width of about 450 metres.

The search for the Resolution

Our first attempts to find the Resolution (in early 1989) involved no more than haphazard beach-walking with a hand-held metal detector. We found small items of ferrous metal close to the surface, but these were mainly pieces of scaffold pole, probably from World War II defences. The metal detector had a penetrating depth of about three feet.

In June of the same year we made a dive off the car park at Pevensey Bay. Nothing of significance was seen, but it did prove that, because of the poor visibility and high-energy nature of the sea at this point, it would be impossible to cover the area underwater in a systematic and methodical manner. On 10 August 1989 we were loaned a proton magnetometer for one month. Its meter, which measured to nanoteslas, was set on an average reading; any fluctuations as the result of magnetic anomalies were displayed on a digital panel. This instrument proved to be very accurate. To systematize its use we divided the beach into search zones. This was done by establishing transits with lines of poles orientated to accord with the Royal Sovereign Light Tower, which was visible most days on a bearing of 144 degrees magnetic.

Although our efforts have so far failed we have continued our archive work as well as our searches of the inter-tidal zone and foreshore. When conditions allowed, we have also pursued our survey of the seabed. A ship of this size cannot disappear without trace and we feel certain that if we are persistent in our endeavours we will eventually find the final resting place of the Resolution.

 Much of what we currently know about Resolution is from the archive research carried out by the above 1989 Team, further excerpts from Bryan Smiths article can be found on the 1665-1703 page by kind permission of Mensun Bound.