New Torness light may have led
Johanna Thorden to tragic end
By Sigurd Towrie
(from The Orcadian dated 13 July 2000)

A Finnish man’s six-year quest ended in Kirkwall last Thursday when he unveiled his findings on the 63-year-old maritime mystery surrounding the wreck of the Johanna Thorden.

Markku Hujala, from Turku, Finland, travelled to Orkney last week to present a half-day seminar in which he aired his theories on the cause of the 1937 wreck that saw 30 people perish.

A nephew of one of the eight survivors, Markku had visited the county a number of times, paying particular attention to South Ronaldsay – the site where the sole survivors of the disaster managed to come ashore. In connection with this, Markku’s latest trip has also allowed him to erect a memorial plaque at St Peter’s Kirk in South Ronaldsay where a few of those who perished are buried.

On the morning of Tuesday, January 12, 1937, the Johanna Thorden, a 5,500 ton vessel laden with a cargo estimated at the time to be worth $2 million, ran aground in the waters south of South Ronaldsay. But until Markku’s extensive investigation an element of uncertainty surrounded the disaster.

Returning from her maiden voyage, the Johanna Thorden had sailed from New York on the evening of January 1, 1937, bound for Gothenburg in Sweden. After six days of fair weather, the ship came through harsh north-westerly gales until at around 5.45 am on January 12, hurricane-force south easterly gales drove the Johanna Thorden aground somewhere in the Pentland Firth.

At the time the survivors claimed the ship had gone aground on the Pentland Skerries – most probably the Outer Skerry – but local opinion was that the vessel had actually struck the Clett of Swona, the bow section of the ship having been observed there by the Longhope lifeboat later on the day of the wreck. Markku, however, is firmly convinced that the Finnish sailors were correct and that the bow section had been blown to its final resting place by a combination of gale force winds and the raging tide.

After interviewing the survivors, Markku has pieced together a picture of the events of that day – a day when Orkney witnessed its worst peacetime maritime disaster.

As the vessel approached the Pentland Firth on the evening of January 11, the crew were looking out for the light of the Dunnet Head lighthouse, which they knew should be kept to the starboard side of the ship. However, to the west of Hoy another light caught their attention and led them to believe they were considerably off course.

Shining out to sea through the darkness, the glow from the recently lit Torness lighthouse on the south western tip of Hoy caused confusion. The captain had no record of this new lighthouse on his navigational charts and therefore believed they had drifted and that this lighthouse had to be Dunnet Head.

Turning the vessel towards the light it soon became apparent from the sheer height of the cliffs of Hoy that they were now certainly heading in the wrong direction. Slowing down, the ship stayed to the west of Hoy for around three hours, waiting for the tide before steaming back towards the Firth.

Making her way through the Pentland Firth all seemed to be well but unknown to the crew, the Johanna Thorden was veering slightly off course. The reason for this is unclear but Markku has theorised that the steel cargo on board the vessel was affecting the behaviour of the compass, possibly by around five or ten degrees.

“At 0520 hours they had gone “full ahead” which, if their course was correct, have taken them straight out into the North Sea,” said Markku.

“But somehow the boat curved to the left because of the tidal bore, the compass error and maybe a little human error. A captain I have spoken to said that ten to twenty degrees is an easy error in those waters.”

As the vessel came out into the less-sheltered waters to the south-west of the Pentland Skerries, the buffeting gales and a fierce northward tidal stream pushed the Johanna Thorden further to the north and she struck the skerries.

At 6.15 am the first of the ship’s lifeboats was launched, holding the two women and the two little boys who were on board as well as 21 members of the crew. The same combinations of tidal current and wind carried the lifeboat’s passengers to their deaths. At 7am on the morning of Wednesday, January 13, watchers in Deerness spotted this lifeboat by the Point of Bisber near Dingieshowe. The boat came ashore later that day along with the bodies of three men. There were no survivors and for days afterwards the bodies of those who had perished were washed ashore, some found in South Ronaldsay, others turning up in Flotta, Copinsay, Deerness and Sanday.

An hour after the first lifeboat had left the stricken vessel, the second lifeboat was launched with the remaining 13 passengers and crewmen on board. After a three-hour battle with the elements only eight exhausted men made it ashore on South Ronaldsay.

With his quest now completed, Markku intends to compile all his findings on a CD-ROM, a copy of which he will supply to the Orkney Archives.

For him some of the the mystery of the Johanna Thorden remains, but he is happy with the results of his work.

“I stop here,” he said. “I’m satisfied now. I’m glad I did it and I feel relief now the job is done. I now have a theory which I believe, but as the people in the East say ‘there might be many things in the world’ and I believe it is the same here.

“These are my personal observations and people think in different ways. Maybe part of the truth is still out there, somewhere."