The Mary Rosebuilt five centuries ago and named after the favourite sister of Henry VIII, was a forerunner of today’s battleships. A team of experts from the fields of shipbuilding, science, history and archaeology gather to study the evidence and try to pin down the reason for the disaster. Using a scaled down model of the Mary Rose, forensic scientists reconstruct the ship’s last voyage, and a tragic picture emerges of her final moments.In a cellar under a naval dockyard are some of the remains of an English warship that mysteriously sank in 1545 taking over 400 with her the reason the ship sank has never been fully explained over the centuries the french the crew and even the shipwrights have all been blamed for the catastrophe only now are archeologist and scientist beginning to come up with new evidence to explain one of the great disasters of sea warfare The sinking of the Mary Rose. The day that the Mary Rose sank England was in crisis a large french force lay on the aisle of white ready to invade Portsmouth. among the English ships was the kings own Mary Rose, for years she had been the pride of fleet and had recently been fitted with the latest weapons technology on board she was carrying over 90 guns and hundreds of soldiers and archers that day Henry VIII had appointed a new captain to the Mary Rose and as the ships went into battle the king and the captain’s wife stood together on the shore to watch what happened next has remained a mystery for over 450 years. the loss of the Mary Rose was so shocking because wooden ships normally didn’t sink. the biggest danger in wooden ships in battles at sea was fire, explosions and not sinking and this was dramatic it was different and it was terrifying as sailors didn’t learn to swim the chances of survival was poor this was unusually shocking so unusual and so shocking that it entered the national consciousness and was remembered this was a real disaster as the English ships bore down on the french all seemed well the Mary Rose fired her cannon from the port side and then she set her sails to come about in order to fire from her starboard side but without warning she keeled right over, capsized and sank taking practically everyone on board with her. From his vantage point at south sea castle all the king could do was watch.
