“It takes years to get to know the German shipwrecks properly, to become familiar with these amazing shipwrecks, and to understand the sense of history that still pervades Scapa Flow both beneath and above the waves.”

Rod Macdonald, author of Dive Scapa Flow (Whittles Publishing)

This deep, formidable, cold, natural harbour has served the warring nations’ fleets since the time of the Vikings, the Knights of St. John, the Spanish Armada and the American War of Independence. Scapa Bay was also the rendezvous point for merchant ships en route to the Baltic Sea during the Napoleonic Wars from 1789 to 1815.

Dawn broke on the longest day of the year in the Orkney Islands of Scotland. In reality, at this latitude, the summer evenings are almost endless as nights do not exactly get as black as pitch this time of the year. As the islands and inhabitants slept, the charcoal smudge of dusk had gradually darkened during the wee small hours.

Twilight broke early, with first light at 2:32 a.m. As the heavens brightened, a faint molten golden ribbon began to grow, glimmer and glow in the sky, eventually illuminating the mountains surrounding Scapa Flow.

The 74 German warships had not been surrendered—they had been interned at Scapa Flow under British guard seven months earlier as a condition of the Armistice, which had halted the hostilities of the Great War in November 1918.