It took a very big scandal to produce this very small book.

In 1893, Vice Admiral George Tryon commanded the British fleet in the Mediterranean. That summer, during a series of maneuvers, he issued an order to the fleet which resulted in his flagship, the Victoria, being hit and sunk by the Camperdown, the flagship of his second-in-command. In addition to destroying a new, expensive ship, the collision cost the lives of about 350 of her crew.

Why? That was the issue that consumed the Royal Navy that summer. Why had Tryon issued an order that almost inevitably led to the collision of his two biggest ships -- which, indeed, potentially would have led to every other pair of ships in the two parallel lines of ships colliding.

No one knows the answer, because Tryon was one of those who died in the wreck. The inquiry and trial of the ship's captain couldn't figure out much, either; all it could do was honorably acquit Captain Bourke and cast a very jaundiced eye on Admiral Markham, the second-in-command who had allowed the Camperdown to sail on her collision course.

This book sets out the bare facts fairly well, but I couldn't help but wish it had told us more. For instance, a plan and detailed description of Victoria would have been nice. Instead, we get descriptions of her big guns -- but nothing about her secondary armaments, the construction of her watertight compartments, her seakeeping characteristics. We get descriptions of Admirals Tryon and Markham (the former much more favorable than the latter -- given that his subordinates seem frankly to have feared Tryon, I wonder if the description isn't overly flattering), but little about what it meant to lead a late nineteenth century fleet, or what the role of the Royal Navy was in the Mediterranean. Author Hough admits that he is left with a puzzle he can't solve. I'm sure he's right, but I wish he'd given me a few more pieces than this thin little 144-page un-indexed volume allows.

[Correction 8/3/2020: changed "un-indeed" in the last sentence to "un-indexed."] ( )

A concise, cogent but balanced portrayal of the collision of two British squadron flagships in the Mediterranean on a clear day with calm seas. The HMS Victoria, very new, sank with its admiral and almost 400 crew members in less than 15 minutes. The subsequent court martial provides interesting insights to the thinking that made the most powerful navy in the world in being quite vulnerable in practice. ( )

1123 Admirals in Collision, by Richard Hough (read 1 Aug 1971) (Book of the Year) I found this a very intriguing book. It is about the sinking on June 22, 1893, of the British battleship Victoria off the coast of Syria. I had never heard of this event till I read the book and found the book a veritable classic. At the end of 1971, in reviewing my reading for the year, I found it was the best book I read in 1971--a year in which I read 45 books. ( )

Fascinating account of the loss of HMS Victoria. Hough is perhaps not critical enough of Markham and Tyron, but his description of the disaster is entertaining nonetheless ( )