What we collect

The Royal Navy Submarine Museum relies heavily on donations to continue expanding its collection. We aim to fill in any gaps in the collection thus fully representing the Royal Navy Submarine Service from 1901 to the present day. In general the Museum is only concerned with submarine material in the context of the Royal Navy or British maritime achievement. However, from time to time it may be deemed appropriate to acquire items with a provenance other than that described above in order to illustrate a particularly important aspect of submarine development in general. Key areas are as follows :

1. The development of submarine technology in the UK from the earliest times to the present day. This includes submersible operations in the North sea and also technology used for research (e.g. ocean search vessels, RoVs, diving bells).





2. A limited amount of material relating to submarine warfare from around the world for the purpose of representing the wider context to development in the UK.





3. In order to support National Curriculum linked education programmes the Museum also collects material that would normally fall outside the collecting parameters detailed above e.g. 1940s domestic life material





4. The Museum would like to hear from anyone who is interested in donating an object to the Museum. In particular we would like to hear from anyone who has material relating to "life on board" during the 1980s and 1990s. Click here to send us any information.