HMS Urge
HMS "Urge" was a British U-class submarine, of the second group of that class, built by Vickers Armstrong, Barrow-in-Furness. She was laid down on 30 October 1939, and was commissioned on 12 December 1940. From 1941–1942 she formed part of the 10th Submarine Flotilla based in Malta and is the only Royal Navy ship to have borne the name. "Urge" spent most of her career operating in the Mediterranean, where she damaged or sank a number of Italian warships and merchant vessels and took part in special operations. She was commanded by Lieutenant-Commander Edward  Philip Tomkinson, DSO, RN. She was lost with all hands and a number of passengers on 27 April 1942 after striking a German mine off Malta. "Urge" had an intensive 20-patrol career lasting around a year before her loss. In 1941, Lieutenant-Commander Tomkinson, received the DSO and bar, was mentioned in dispatches, and at his request, received two years' seniority in lieu of a second bar to the DSO; in 1942, he was being awarded a further bar to the DSO for the sinking of the Italian cruiser "Giovanni dalle Bande Nere" but was lost before it was  gazetted. Vice-Admiral Sir Ian McGeogh, a post-war Flag Officer Submarines who served briefly on "Urge" in 1941, wrote that Tomkinson "should in my view have been awarded the Victoria Cross - preferably before he was lost." HMS "Urge"s crew were awarded a number of Distinguished Service Crosses and Distinguished Service Medals. The first lieutenant was Lieutenant JMS Poole, DSC and Bar, RN. The Chief Petty Officer, CJJ Jackman, was awarded the DSM and Bar and mentioned in despatches three times. At the time of her loss, the commander-in-chief Mediterranean reported to the Admiralty that the "loss of  this outstanding submarine and commanding officer is much to be regretted." "Urge" was adopted and partially funded by the people of the Welsh town Bridgend, as a result of the national "warship week" in 1941. In 1975, a building at HMS "Dolphin" in Gosport, was named after Lieutenant-Commander Tomkinson, alongside others named after other leading Royal Navy World War II submarine captains. In late October 2019, it was announced that a maritime archeology project (Project Spur) had discovered the wreck of the submarine off the coast of Malta. The project was led by Timmy Gambin of the Archeology and  Classics Department of the University of Malta, Francis Dickinson, a grandson of Lieutenant-Commander Tomkinson, and Platon Alexiades, a naval researcher from Canada. The search was conducted by a team led by Professor Gambin. Career. Prior to deployment to the Mediterranean, "Urge" sank the Italian tanker "Franco Martelli" in April 1941, whilst in the Bay of Biscay, on passage from the UK to Gibraltar. "Urge" also damaged the Italian passenger ship "Aquitania" and the Italian merchant ship "Marigola" which had already been grounded after being torpedoed by aircraft on 24 September 1941. Then on 14 December, "Urge" torpedoed and damaged  the during operations around the First Battle of Sirte. In the same attack, the narrowly avoided being hit by "Urge"s torpedoes through taking evasive action. One of the crew on "Urge" at that time was Lieutenant Godfrey Place, who would later become famous as one of the leaders of the Operation Source attack on the . On 1 April 1942, "Urge" torpedoed and sank the . "Urge" was one of the first British submarines to land commandos by canoe (or folding kayak), and a number of successful commando raids were launched from her. These raids targeted enemy infrastructure such as railways and  pioneered techniques used in later Special Boat Service work. However, special operations were hazardous, and in October 1941, a member of "Urge"s crew was lost to enemy fire when attempting to rescue an Allied agent from shore. "Urge"s torpedoes were sighted and avoided, suffered gyro failures, or otherwise failed to hit the target on a number of occasions including attacks on the Italian merchant vessel "Capo Orso", the Italian tankers "Superga" and "Pozarica", the German merchant ship "Ingo", the , and the Italian troop transport "Victoria". "Urge" also unsuccessfully attacked an unidentified armed merchant cruiser south of the Strait of Messina , subsequently attacking it with gunfire on the surface, but breaking off the attack due to accurate return fire. A number of other possible successes remain unclear. In October 1941, a technical failure in a torpedo which "Urge" fired at a U-boat caused the weapon to miss the enemy and explode dangerously near "Urge" herself. On 27 April 1942, "Urge" set sail from Malta for Alexandria, with 29 crew and 10 passengers. She failed to arrive at Alexandria, on 6 May 1942, and was reported overdue on that day. Until the discovery of her wreck in 2019, her final fate  was not completely certain. She had struck a mine, while she was still on the surface, soon after exiting the Grand Harbour. The explosion was so violent that the bow of the submarine became detached and she sunk suddenly, with no survivors. Among those lost, and onboard unofficially, was war correspondent Bernard Gray. Discovery of wreck. Official sources had long attributed her loss to a mine outside Malta, although there was some speculation that "Urge" had in fact been sunk by an Italian air attack at Marsa el Hilal, Libya. On 16 April 2015, Belgian diver Jean-Pierre Misson claimed  to have found the wreck of "Urge" on sonar recordings taken off the coast of Libya, at Marsa el Hilal. The wreck lies to the east of which foundered at Ras Hilal, while being towed by the corvette after her capture on 17 February 1943. On 26 February 1943, it was visited by British divers led by Cdr. Bartlett. In 2003, a hydrographic survey of Ras Hilal located only one wreck, that of "U-205", in almost the exact position reported in 1943 documents. No other wrecks were located there, despite other assertions made by Misson. On 30 October 2019, it  was announced that the wreck of "Urge" had been found in of water off the coast of Malta. The search was conducted by staff from the University of Malta, in an area that had been heavily mined during the war. The wreck has heavy damage to the bow consistent with striking a mine. The rest of the wreck is said to be in "fantastic condition." The wreck had been discovered a few months earlier, but no announcement was made until the UK Ministry of Defence confirmed that the remains were indeed those of the missing "Urge". Correspondence from the Ministry  of Defence confirms the video footage is probably "Urge", and the site is the officially recognised war grave of those lost aboard the submarine. In May 2021, it was announced that a dive team led by Professor Timmy Gambin of the University of Malta, who discovered the wreck in 2019, had provided final certainty of the identity of the wreck as that of HMS "Urge", with clear images of the letters URGE on the port side of the conning tower. On the 29th April 2022, the Royal Navy unveiled a memorial to "HMS Urge" and the sailors lost as a  result of the sinking.