Promoting and Preserving Our Diving Heritage
Welcome to the
Historical Diving Society
Our members come from a wide range of backgrounds with a shared passion for exploring, preserving and recording our diving heritage. Our members are encouraged to meet and exchange information through our various functions and activities. Our specialist interest groups include film and book groups and we have an active ‘Working Equipment Group’ which maintains and demonstrates vintage diving equipment. We maintain close relations with our international Societies and enjoy regular exchange visits. The Society publishes a journal, magazine, facsimiles and newsletters and has an extensive reference library. We also have the only museum in the UK which is dedicated solely to diving.
The world’s first Historical Diving Society
Visits to historical diving sites in the UK and abroad
Museum and reference library
Working equipment displays
Annual conference
Artefact and data source for TV and film industry
Friendly, active special interest groups
Genealogical data base of helmet divers
Events
Check and Test Day for Members
FROM Saturday 6 May 2023
TO Saturday 6 May 2023
Our 2023 pre-season Check and Test day for members only at Cromhall Quarry
read more
Try Dives for Non Members
FROM Saturday 24 June 2023
TO Saturday 24 June 2023
Experience a dive in vintage Standard Dress at Cromhall Quarry, Gloucestershire.
read moreJoin Us
Annual Conference
10.00am on Saturday 19th November 2022.
Our conference will be held at Subsea7 in Sutton on Saturday 19th November.
Full details can be found here
Annual General Meeting
10.00am on Sunday 27 November 2022.
This year our AGM this year will be held via Zoom.
Our Zoom AGM meeting will be held at 10.00am on Sunday 27th November.
Zoom password: 884215
We anticipate the meeting lasting 2 hours: ie. 10am to 12 noon.
Latest News
Commemorating Cdr. Lionel ‘Buster’ Crabb
On 28 January 2023, on what would have been Commander Lionel 'Buster' Crabb's 114th Birthday, a small celebration was held at Durrants Cottage in Rowlands Castle where Crabb lived with for a short time with his wife Margaret in the last few years before his famous...
Peter Kreeft dives again!
In 2018, Franz Rothbrust of Historische Tauchergesellschaft e.V. (HDS Germany) gave a lecture at our Conference on a project to reconstruct a Kreeft diving suit. (A transcript can be found in our 2018 Conference Proceedings.) Around 1799/1800 Peter Kreeft lost a ship...
Subsea to Summit – 3 days on Snowdon
Having successfully climbed Ben Nevis in Standard Dress two years ago, the Working Equipment Group repeated the challenge on Mount Snowdon, the highest point in Wales. This year the team were raising funds not only for the Society but also for a little girl in Wales...
