Next Sunday, the 8th December 2024, the Falkland Islands commemorate the 110th anniversary of the first great victory of the Royal Navy in the First World War. The Falklands naval engagement took place to the south east of the Islands, chasing and sinking the pride of the German Imperial Navy, the East Asia squadron led by Admiral Graf von Spee.
The Falklands Maritime Heritage Trust is pleased to announce that the wreck of SMS Scharnhorst has been located off the Falkland Islands. The Scharnhorst, an armoured battle-cruiser and the flagship of Admiral Maximilian Graf von Spee’s East Asia Squadron, was sunk on 8 December 1914 during the Battle of the Falkland Islands, a crucial naval battle in the early days of the First World War.
Mensun Bound, the leader of the mission which discovered the flagship of Admiral Graf von Spee's squadron, was born in the Falkland Islands and since a child has been obsessed with the sea, its mysteries, myths and the great Battle of the Falkland Islands, a decisive naval action at the start of the Great War of 1914.