Admiralty: Underwater Countermeasures and Weapons Establishment and predecessors:...

ADM 258

1920-1968

Papers of the Underwater Countermeasures and Weapons Establishment, the successor of the Admiralty Mining Establishment, and like it concerned with mines, torpedoes and other underwater weapons.

Public Record(s)

English

• Admiralty Mining Establishment, 1946-1951
• Admiralty Underwater Countermeasures and Weapons Establishment, 1951-1959

345 files and volumes

Subject to 30 year closure

The Admiralty Underwater Countermeasures and Weapons Establishment originated in the Mining Department formed in the Admiralty in 1915. In 1919 it became the Mine Design Department at HMS Vernon, where it remained until 1939. The Department was dispersed during the Second World War, and reconstituted in 1946 as the Admiralty Mining Establishment at Leigh Park, Havant. In 1951 it became the Admiralty Underwater Countermeasures and Weapons Establishment. It closed in 1959 when underwater research was concentrated at Portland. It undertook research into the design, location and neutralisation of mines, and into torpedoes and other underwater weapons.