Dieppe FE'CAMP COURSEULLES PORT EN BESSIN ST VAAST LA HOGUE CHERBOURGH.
South East of Brighton and on the French side of the English Channel, is the historic fishing town of Dieppe. Like most of the harbours along the French coast this harbour was primarily a fishing port which has been transformed over the years into a major working harbour with large commercial ships which include several daily crossings of the Newhaven – Dieppe cross channel ferry service operated by www.transmancheferries.com.
This service is now a major gateway to Europe for the British and an access point for Europeans who wish to enter the UK, and it operates all year round.
This picturesque harbour of Dieppe has a well protected marina which welcomes visiting boats from all over Europe, and it is situated in the heart of the town which gives great access to all the local Hotels, Restaurants & Bars.
The long promenade & beach front of Dieppe is an amazing sight, the eastern end with the long break water arm which protects the harbour entrance and to the west, the lawns that are over looked by the many Hotels that line the way to the west and at the far end looking down over the town is the Castle of Dieppe.
During WW2 Dieppe saw its fair share of the action, In 1942 during the build up for the liberation of Europe and as a possible trial run for the D Day landings there was the now infamous and disasterous Dieppe Raid as portrayed in Robin Neillands book of the same name “The Dieppe Raid”. Made up from a force of mainly Canadian Highlanders and British Commando’s these troops made an assault on the Beaches of Dieppe, the result was carnage, the beaches turned into killing grounds, with whole regiments decimated. Off shore ships were lost, landing crafts were sunk and the destroyer HMS Berkely destroyed with great loss of life.
Diving Dieppe.
Its amazing, you travel all that way, cross the channel diving enroute and the depth doesn’t get deeper than 40mtrs, your 25 miles offshore and its 33mtrs and as you head for harbour the depth stays between 25 – 30mtrs, close in you can be diving in the 15mtr range, fantastic.
If you have never dived from Dieppe before, then seriously think about it. It is a fairly new area for us at Channel Diving and it gets better every year we go there.
Here are a few of the wrecks that we dive, some are known and some are unidentified but every year we are looking for new ones and there are a lot of targets out there to research.
AF13 – German Coastal Patrol Boat
There are 2 of these German patrol boats sunk
between Dieppe and Fe’Camp, AF13 located in just
20mtrs of water, One is upside down and very
broken, the other is on its side, her armaments
buried in the sand and depth charges scattered around. They make interesting second dives.
HMS Berkeley – The Royal Navy escort destroyer
HMS Berkeley formed part of the attack force for the
raid on Dieppe on the 19th August 1942 she was
272x28x8 and had 4x4”guns & 8 smaller guns.
At approx 12.50pm HMS Berkeley received a direct
hit from German aircraft bombs which broke her
back and she sank with the loss of 15 lives.
Today she rests in 20mtrs of water and she is broken into 2 main sections which stand 4mtrs high in places.
HMS Daffodil - During World War Two, three train ferry ships (TF1, TF2 & TF3) which had been built during World War One were requisitioned by the Royal Navy. In 1940 TF1 and TF3 were renamed HMS Princess Iris & HMS Daffodil. They were renamed and named after the ex-Mersey ferries which were used in the famous World War One Zeebrugge raid.
In 1941 HMS Princess Iris and HMS Daffodil were 
converted into Landing Ship Sternchute (LSS) and used as locomotive transports. HMS Daffodil (ex- TF3) was lost off Dieppe on March 17th 1945 after striking a mine. HMS Princess Iris survived the war only to be broken up for scrap. The fait of TF2 was not so lucky, she was also sunk near Dieppe after coming under fire from German shore batteries and sank close to shore in only 15mtrs of water, today the wreck off TF2 is quite broken up.
HMS Daffodil is a big old wreck she was 107m long with a beam of 18m, she was powered by 2 6 cylinder triple expansion engines giving her a speed of 13knots. Today the wreck of HMS Daffodil wrests in only 24mtrs of water, she sits upright and is pretty intact giving good swim throughs wreck penetration. The marine life on her is superb with large shoals of Bass and Black Bream in the wreckage.
This large merchantman some 232x36x14m was taken over by the German navy and used for escort duties.On the 11th of December 1942 she was attacked and sunk by British warships 8 miles to the north of Dieppe, there were only ten survivors from the sinking.
Today this wreck sits on an even keel with the bows being the highest point, she rests in only 25mtrs of water and is very intact, a large gun sits on the bow as if ready for action, with the magazine store below full of ammunition. As you work your way back along the wreck you can explore the large hold area which gives good access for penetration, before you get to the engine room and then on to the rear and the stern accommodation. Debris litters the seabed and on one of our visits, all around the stern were dozens of cuttle fish, a fabulous sight
Sperrbrecher 144 / Le Beijerland.
The Beijerland was a Dutch cargo ship launched in 1939 near Rotterdam. She was nearly 200ft in length & had a beam of almost 30ft and she weighed in at 387 tons. She was powered by a large 12 cylinder engine producing 640 horse power.
The Beijerland was seized by the germans during the invasion of the Netherlands and converted into a armed merchantman & re-named Sperrbrecher 144.
The Sperrbrecher 144 now rests in less than 20mtrs of water and is quite broken open, her large diesel engine sits upright in the middle of the wreckage, as you move to the stern you come across one of her large deck guns with munitions scattered around. Her large rear stearing gear is openly visable and as you make your way back towards the bows you see masses of fish and sand eels all around. The seabed is a mixture of shell, shingle & white sand this gives great visability.
Yatagan – This is the wreck of a small French
Destroyer, 185x21x9, She had a top speed of
26knots and her armaments consisted of 1x9 pdr
gun, 6x3pdr guns & 2 Torpedo tubes. She was lost
due to a collision with the British steamship Teviot,
north of Dieppe on December 3rd 1916, she carried
a complement of 62 crew.
4,035 gross tons, length 386.5ft x beam 41ft, one funnel, three masts, iron hull, single screw, speed 12 knots. Accommodation for 50-1st and 1,200-3rd class passengers. Built 1884 by Chantiers & Ateliers de la Gironde, Bordeaux for the Bordeaux Line, she started her maiden voyage from Bordeaux on 26th Feb.1884 but her rudder was disabled and she arrived at Halifax under tow by the Anchor Line ship CALEDONIA and eventually reached New York on 27th May. Her last Bordeaux - New York voyage was made in July 1888 and she was then chartered to the French Line for their Bordeaux - Havana - Vera Cruz service. On 28th Apr.1889 she was sunk in the English Channel in collision with British ship MANORA.
The Chateau Margaux lies 24miles north from Dieppe in 41mtrs at high water & rests on her starboard side, the bow and stern are the highest points with the middle of the ship collapsed down to the seabed but still quite open and exposing her 4 large boilers. The fish life on this wreck is incredible but strangely no congers The seabed is a fine white shingle shell giving good visability.
Braga 1938 – The Norwegian ship Braga built in 1938, she was 7mtrs long 13mtrs wide and had a draft of 6mtrs, departed Dieppe harbour on 7th Febuary 1961 and headed out to sea, but whilst she was leaving she struck the harbour wall and un be known to her, she had made a hole in her hull. The ingress of water must have been quite slow as she managed to get some 20 miles offshore before she sank.
This wreck today lies in 34mtrs of water at an angle of 45 degrees & is on her port side, still pretty together and ship shape you can access the accommodation areas and swim through.
There are lots of unknown targets that we have still to look at and groups willing to be adventurous diving guinea pigs the results can be rewarding
There are lots of wrecks to choose from when diving over in Normandie, many unidentified and most very rarely dived. The marine life is absolutely incredible, teaming with fish, crabs, lobsters, and free swimming congers. The only thing is, the reason that there is so much to see and look at, is because the French have a strict law which states, that no one shall, whilst diving with aqualung remove anything from the seabed or especially from any ship wreck, be it metal or edible. And this is a strict rule which applies to everyone, so please
look don't touch.