Hi Colin, I understand the morbid curiosity of wrecks, the bigger and greater the loss of life increases the curiosity. The most interesting insight to this sad sinking was some time ago on t/v when they went through her build, it was suggested that as her rivets were made off caste iron, that when the bow hit the berg the rivets snapped allowing the plates to open up and allow water in. Also when a section of her plate was tested with a hammer blow at the cold temperature then it shattered. As most of the forward underwater hull is below the seabed, everything is conjecture, though the Captain probably committed suicide by walking back into his wheelhouse because he knew he would stand trial for gross negligence and go to prison. Talking of the Defence at Jutland she suffered the same fate as most sunk that day because off an Admirals insistence off loading twice their designed ammunition stores, consequence the shells were easily stowed below, but the more dangerous Cordite was stowed where ever they found space, on the battle cruisers the anti flash doors were fixed open and they had spare bags lying about the barbet. It was reputed by some that the Defence and the others of her class attached to the former even had them stowed on deck, which would explain that huge flash and she was gone. There was a t/v programme not so long ago about this overloading and consequences, Admirals can course more problems than most and usually Jack Tar suffers.
