SINKING ON THE SOLENT The Cowdray Engraving (a copy of a 1540s painting) shows the Mary Rose just before sinking while Henry VIII, mounted on his horse, looks on
A blustery wind began blowing around Portsmouth Harbour on the afternoon of 19 July 1545, which was good news for Henry VIII’s fleet. Having been becalmed during preparations to attack the approaching French navy, crews took advantage of the breeze and sped towards the enemy. But then the luck changed. As the Mary Rose, one of the large warships leading the English fleet, turned so that she could fire her guns, the wind turned against her. Water poured in through her open gunports, and the ship quickly sank. In just a matter of minutes, nearly all of the crew had been lost to the unmerciful waves of the Solent.
Such was the tragic fate of the Mary Rose, the favourite of Henry. But more than four centuries later, she would once again see the light of day when the Mary Rose Trust miraculously raised her from the seabed in 1982. Now housed in a state-of-the-art museum in Portsmouth Historic Dockyard, the preserved ship is on display for visitors as a time capsule of the Tudor era.