This section brings together the approximately 700 objects and photographs used in Canada's Naval History. Use this section to directly access objects and photographs grouped by type, as shown below, or use the search function above to search through them by title.

Life Ring, SS Brussels

This life ring is from the SS Brussels, a British ferry captured by German destroyers in June 1916.

In March 1915, when the German submarine U-33 attempted to capture the Brussels, Captain Charles Fryatt turned his ship and tried to ram the submarine. U-33 dived to avoid a collision and the Brussels escaped. Fryatt had followed British Admiralty instructions that ships' masters should resist surrendering their vessels. The German navy saw Fryatt as a civilian attempting to attack a vessel of war and, after his capture in 1916, tried and executed him as an unlawful combatant.

Life Ring, British
CWM 19390002-677