HMS “Victory”

Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn Excerpts

Wednesday 28th November 2012 Grand Committee

Tabled By

[Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how they will ensure that the wreck of HMS “Victory”, sunk in 1744, is not subjected to inappropriate commercial exploitation.

[Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn]

My Lords, the world’s underwater cultural heritage is today at great risk. Improved deep-water recovery is leading to the discovery and sometimes, I am afraid, to the looting of historic shipwrecks on a wide scale, internationally. The fate of HMS “Victory”, sunk in 1744, then the finest warship in the world, is a test case. Its wreck was discovered in the English Channel in 2008 by an American salvage company. It is one of the first British deep-water wrecks which might now risk commercial exploitation, hence this Question for Short Debate. There are fears that the material recovered will be sold to pay off the salvage costs, with the apparent complicity of the British Government.

It is a significant test case because the UNESCO Convention on the Protection of Underwater Cultural Heritage makes clear that the excavation of historic wrecks should not be financed by selling off the finds recovered, but that may be just what is now being planned for HMS “Victory”. If the Government were to countenance such a practice, it would set a terrible example. It would give the wrong encouragement to other nations faced with similar responsibilities. It would be a tawdry thing to do with this great historic flagship of the Royal Navy.

After consultations in 2010, the Ministry of Defence took the unusual step of gifting the wreck of HMS “Victory” to a newly formed organisation, the Maritime Heritage Foundation. Its qualifications for receiving such a gift are not yet clear to me. How could it pay the salvage costs involved unless by selling the artefacts recovered, including coins and perhaps cannon, which would be in contravention of international standards?

Will the Minister confirm that this is the first time that the Government have ever “gifted” the wreck of a Royal Navy warship to an outside body? Will he indicate what steps the Government took to establish that this foundation had available to it the resources to finance recovery operations in a proper manner, without resorting to the sale of the coins and other artefacts recovered?

The Minister for Culture, Mr Ed Vaizey, when the All-Party Parliamentary Archaeology Group queried this gift, kindly wrote to me on 7 November with encouraging words:

“The Maritime Heritage Foundation is charged with preserving the Victory site in accordance with the archaeological principles set out in the Annex to the UNESCO Convention on the Protection of Underwater Cultural Heritage; and the Museum Code of Ethics will be applied to any artefacts that are recovered. I am very confident therefore that we have robust mechanisms in place to ensure the preservation of this important wreck and its artefacts”.

I wish I could share his confidence.

Odyssey Marine Exploration, an American salvage company, announced in February that it has entered into contract with the Maritime Heritage Foundation for the salvage of HMS “Victory”. The disquieting speech by Odyssey president Mark Gordon is available as a webcast at: http://wsw.com/webcast/ch2/omex/. He made the shocking statement that Odyssey’s contract with the Maritime Heritage Foundation would bring to Odyssey 80% of the value of coins and bullion recovered and, on “monetisation”, 50% of the value of cultural artefacts. Final authorisation, he said, was now expected since the Government’s Scientific Advisory Committee had approved the archaeological project plan. He referred to an estimate in the New York Times that the values involved were of the order of $250 million.

I ask the Minister, are the Government aware of this contract? Surely the foundation should not be signing contracts without the knowledge of the Government? But if the Government are aware, how could this “monetisation” process possibly tally with the Minister’s assurances?

Perhaps significantly, the president of Odyssey also disclosed progress with two other ongoing salvage projects: the SS “Gairsoppa” and the SS “Montola”. These 20th century wrecks are not regarded as historic, and Odyssey Marine Exploration apparently already has contracts for their salvage with the UK Department for Transport. The “monetisation” of the silver recovered has already yielded $26 million in 2012. Will the Minister confirm that under the existing contract for SS “Gairsoppa”, Odyssey retains 90% of the cash received on “monetisation” and the Ministry of Transport just 10%? The “monetisation” process applied to these wrecks is highly interesting.

I fear that this commercial salvage recovery model has been applied by naval officers and officials in Portsmouth to the wreck of HMS “Victory”; by officials who deal with wrecks but who seem not be conversant either with the standards of modern ethical underwater archaeology or with the UNESCO convention. Will the Minister again confirm that the Royal Navy and the Government will apply the highest international ethical standards, as formulated by UNESCO, to this historic flagship of the Channel Fleet, in which Admiral Sir John Balchen and a thousand sailors of the Royal Navy lost their lives on 8 October 1744? Is it not now time that the responsibility for historic wrecks of vessels of the Royal Navy be transferred from the Ministry of Defence to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, like other heritage concerns?

Will the Minister reveal how the Maritime Heritage Foundation will pay for the proposed recovery operations? English Heritage has been unable to cast any light on these matters. The Scientific Advisory Committee’s advice is not made available, even after freedom of information requests. Can the Minister explain to this Grand Committee what on earth is going on? How do the Government imagine that the salvage of historic materials, including coins and bronze cannons, from the wreck of HMS “Victory” can be funded without their “monetisation”, in direct contravention of the assurances that Ministers have given? Can he also confirm the rumour that 17 cannons from HMS “Victory” have already been moved on the wreck site in preparation for recovery, in apparent contravention of the assurances that Ministers have given? It is my personal impression that the Government have not consulted the commissioners of English Heritage about these matters, and I wonder if the Minister can confirm this.

In conclusion, it is possible that in some circumstances a case can be made for selling bullion from an historic wreck, but it would be against the terms of the UNESCO annex to which the Government have announced their adherence. These matters should not be dealt with clandestinely on the basis of confidential and supposedly “scientific” advice to the Ministry of Defence. There are major ethical issues involved here, and it is difficult to avoid the impression that the Government are giving a poor and ill-informed lead internationally in their dealings with Britain’s underwater heritage and with this historic warship of the Royal Navy. I wish that my noble friend might give us some reassurance.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Lingfield]

My Lords, I must at once declare an interest as the chairman of the Maritime Heritage Foundation, the owners of the wreck of HMS “Victory”. I hasten to add that neither I, nor any of the charity’s trustees or their families, have any pecuniary interest in HMS “Victory” or in Odyssey Marine Exploration, which, as we have heard, discovered the wreck site in 2008.

As a result of a lengthy government consultation ending in 2010, the MoD gifted the wreck to the foundation. The foundation’s was the only offer made archaeologically to recover the artefacts. It is important to realise that the MoD could gift only such items on the site that clearly belonged to the state in 1744; any private goods there could not be so gifted, and should any be found they must be by law declared to the Receiver of Wreck.

I first heard of this ship—the HMS “Victory” before Nelson’s—when I was a small boy and my grandfather took me to Westminster Abbey to see the large memorial to Admiral Sir John Balchen, who we have heard went down with her. Sir John had no Balchen descendants, and I am delighted to meet today my noble kinsman, undiscovered previously. As the head of the remaining branch of the family, I paid personally for the considerable repair needed to his monument, which features HMS “Victory”, in the 1970s.

Odyssey has, without doubt, the world’s most experienced deep-ocean archaeology team and an exceptional record of research publications. My foundation had no hesitation in contracting with it for archaeological services for the HMS “Victory” site. Indeed, I made it clear in my submission to the government consultation that we were minded to do so. Odyssey is an entirely reputable company, which is currently contracted, after due diligence, with the Department for Transport to remove silver from two merchant ships that were sunk by enemy action in the two world wars. Odyssey is likely to pay some £10 million to the department, of which a quarter has already been passed over, within the next 12 months, and is likely to make a profit itself of approaching £100 million, so I am told. However, it has undertaken to do HMS “Victory” work ultimately at its own risk. The wreck was gifted to the Maritime Heritage Foundation by the MoD on the strict condition that no artefacts that have been state property would be deaccessioned without the permission of the Secretary of State for Defence—that permission not to be unreasonably denied.

The foundation has been fortunate to appoint as chairman of its scientific advisory committee perhaps the greatest of UK marine archaeologists, Dr Margaret Rule CBE, who supervised the recovery of the “Mary Rose” and who approves, with a group of eminent marine archaeologists, our every step. We and our contractors, Odyssey, can take no action without the permission of the MoD, which—as we have heard—has its own advisory panel.

There are three other important aspects to this. First, as we have heard, at only 300 feet down, the wreck is not preserved in some watery aspic. It is constantly shifting with the tides and changing daily. Secondly, this is one of the most trawled over sites in the English Channel and artefacts on the site show the most clear drag damage from heavy trawler bottom gear, as the noble Lord, Lord Greenway, said. Thirdly, and most worrying of all, is theft. Clearly visible on the site are dozens of bronze cannon bearing the arms of King George II. The 42-pounders are quite unique. Already, at least one cannon has been confirmed as stolen and is in the hands of the Dutch police. It has already suffered damage from lack of any preservation care. Another is missing, probably lifted with a simple crane.

While we are speaking of inappropriate exploitation, I have no need to remind your Lordships that hundreds of this country’s bronze war memorials have been stolen for melting recently. A Tudor bell in the church of St Lawrence, Faversham, was stolen last week. On the wreck are hundreds of tonnes of bronze, there for the taking. The wreck is no longer sovereign immune. As the noble Baroness, Lady Andrews, pointed out, being in international waters there is no legal mechanism by which it can now be protected. Only Odyssey’s regular presence on and monitoring of the site, at its own expense, has so far protected it.

In May this year, the MoD’s advisory panel, on which sits an English Heritage representative, unanimously agreed that there was a serious threat to many of the artefacts and requested that the foundation produce an urgent archaeological project design to lift those items that are visibly in danger of theft or damage. After consultation with Dr Margaret Rule and her team, the foundation submitted that design in June and pledged itself to do this work using the highest quality archaeological techniques, recording, and research.

The foundation’s aim is to recover, conserve and exhibit all cultural artefacts from the site in UK museums, if that proves possible. The foundation has a deaccession protocol similar to that of the British Museum but I repeat that no items may be deaccessioned without the permission of the Defence Secretary. No trenching has begun and no artefacts have so far been removed from the sea’s bottom, nor will be until the project design is approved. These are the protections that my foundation and the MoD have built in and I trust that your Lordships will be reassured by them. These important and highly valuable artefacts have much to tell us about HMS “Victory” and why it sank, and the history of the Royal Navy in the mid-18th century. This is why we shall recover and conserve them as soon as possible.

[Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn]

How does the Maritime Heritage Foundation propose to pay for the recovery of artefacts without selling them?

[Lord Lingfield]

The Maritime Heritage Foundation is a charity and it will make an appropriate report about its finances to the Charity Commission at the end of its financial year and then, presumably, such things will be revealed.