This fiasco was followed by something much more serious. At 4.11 p.m. the Inflexible, which had held her place in A line all this time, despite the fire in her foremast and other damage, was seen suddenly to take a heavy list to starboard. She reported that she had struck a mine not far from the spot where the Bouvet had gone down and now she left the battle line. She was observed to be down by the bows and still listing considerably as she steamed for the mouth of the straits, with the cruiser Phaeton attending her. It seemed likely that she would go down at any moment. The explosion of the mine had flooded the fore torpedo flat and besides killing the twenty-seven men stationed there had done other extensive damage. Flames and poisonous fumes began to spread; not only were the ship’s electric lights extinguished but the oil lamps, which had been lit for just such an emergency, failed as well. At the same time the ventilator fans stopped running and the heat below deck was intolerable. In these circumstances Phillimore, the captain, decided that it was not necessary to keep both steaming watches on duty, and he ordered one of the watches up to the comparative safety on deck. All, however, volunteered to stay below. They worked in darkness amid the fumes and the rising water until all the valves and watertight doors were closed. The remainder of the ship’s company stood to attention on the upper deck as they passed back through the rest of the Fleet. It seemed to those who saw them that none of these men had been defeated by the day’s events, or were shaken by the imminent prospect of drowning; and they got the ship back to Tenedos.
Meanwhile the Irresistible had been struck. Not five minutes after Inflexible had left the line, she too flew a green flag on her starboard yard arm, indicating that she believed she had been torpedoed on that side. She was on the extreme right of the Fleet at the time, close to the Asiatic shore, and at once the Turkish gunners began to pour their shells into her. Unable to get any answer to his signals, de Robeck sent off the destroyer Wear to render assistance, and presently the Wear came back with some six hundred of the Irresistible’s crew, several dead and eighteen wounded among them. The senior executive officers of the Irresistible had stayed on board with ten volunteers in order to make the ship ready for towing.
It was now 5 p.m., and three battleships were out of action: the Bouvet sunk, the Inflexible limping back to Tenedos and the Irresistible drifting towards the Asiatic shore under heavy Turkish fire. There was no clear explanation of these three disasters. The area in which the ships had been operating all day had been swept for mines on a number of occasions before the operation began. On the previous day a seaplane had been over and had confirmed that the sea was clear — and some reliance could be placed on this report for it had been demonstrated in tests off Tenedos that aircraft could spot mines as deep as eighteen feet in this limpid water. What then was doing the damage? It was hardly likely to have been torpedoes. The only conclusion that remained was that the Turks were floating mines down with the current. In fact, as we shall see later, this conclusion was not correct, but it was near enough as to make no odds, and de Robeck felt he could do no other than to break off the action for the day. Keyes was instructed to go aboard the Wear and proceed to the salvage of the Irresistible with the aid of two battleships, the Ocean and Swiftsure. In addition, a division of destroyers was ordered forward into the straits and placed under Keyes’s command. The rest of the Fleet retired.
One can do no better now than follow Keyes in his own account of what happened at the end of this extraordinary day. He says that salvo after salvo was hitting the Irresistible, and he could see no sign of life in her when he came alongside at 5.20 p.m. He concluded, therefore, that the captain and the skeleton crew had already been taken off — and rightly so because the ship was in a desperate condition. She had got out of the main current sweeping down the straits and a light southerly breeze was drifting her in towards the shore. With every minute as she drew nearer to them the Turkish gunners were increasing their fire. Nevertheless, Keyes decided that he must attempt to save her and he signalled to the Ocean, ‘The Admiral directs you to take Irresistible in tow.’ The Ocean replied that there was not sufficient depth of water for her to do so.
Keyes then directed the captain of the Wear to get his torpedoes ready for action so that he could sink the helpless ship before she fell into the hands of the enemy; but first he wished to make quite certain that the water was too shallow for the Ocean to come in and take her in tow. The Wear then ran straight into the enemy fire to take soundings — she came so close to the shore that the Turkish gunners could be seen around their batteries, and at that point-blank range the flash of the guns and the arrival of the shells seemed to be simultaneous. The Wear, however, was not hit, and presently Keyes was able to signal to the Ocean that there were fifteen fathoms of water for half a mile inshore of the Irresistible; and he repeated de Robeck’s order that the ship should be taken in tow. To this he got no reply. Both the Ocean and the Swiftsure were now hotly engaged, and the Ocean in particular was steaming back and forth at great speed, blazing away with all her guns at the shore. It seemed to Keyes that she was doing no good whatever with all this activity and was needlessly exposing herself. For some time the heavy guns at the Narrows had been silent, but it was quite possible that they would open up again at any minute. He therefore signalled the Ocean once more: ‘If you do not propose to take the Irresistible in tow the Admiral wishes you to withdraw.’ With the Swiftsure Keyes could afford to be more peremptory — her captain was junior to him — and he ordered her to go at once. She was an old ship and much too lightly armoured to have undertaken the salvage in the present circumstances.
Meanwhile things had begun to improve with the Irresistible; she had lost her list and although she was down by the stern she was still no lower in the water than she had been an hour previously when the Wear first arrived. Keyes now decided to go full speed to de Robeck and suggest that trawlers might be brought back after dark to tow her into the current so that she would drift out through the straits. He was actually on his way and was drawing close to the Ocean so that he could repeat the order for her to withdraw when the next disaster occurred. A violent explosion shook the water and the Ocean took a heavy list. At the same time a shell hit her steering gear and she began to turn in circles instead of escaping down the straits. The destroyers which had been standing by for the last two hours raced in and took off her crew. Now the Turkish gunners had a second helpless target close at hand.
With this bad news Keyes returned to de Robeck in the Queen Elizabeth which was lying just outside the straits. The captains of both the Irresistible and the Ocean had already been taken off their ships and were with the Admiral when Keyes arrived. A sharp discussion ensued. Keyes said exactly what he thought about the loss of the Ocean and her failure to take the Irresistible in tow, and he asked for permission to go back and torpedo the Irresistible. The Ocean, he thought, might be salvaged. De Robeck agreed, and after a quick meal Keyes set off again in one of the Queen Elizabeth’s cutters. It was now dark and he was unable to find the Wear but fell in with the Jed instead, and in this destroyer he steamed back into the straits.