A dedicated team of volunteers at the Portsmouth Naval Base Property Trust have constructed a replica of a historically famous Coastal Motor Boat
As Royal Navy officer Lieutenant Augustus Agar counted down the minutes until his Coastal Motor Boat (CMB) was repaired in June 1919, thought must have been given to his predicament. For 15 minutes, CMB4 had been laying motionless in full view of several Russian warships.
Acting under the jurisdiction of the British Secret Intelligence Service, Agar and his flotilla of CMB’s believed they could make a difference in keeping the Baltic Sea lanes free of Lenin’s influence during the height of the Russian Civil War. CMB4 and one other craft departed in the small hours of June 17, 1919, making headway for a Bolshevik fleet bombarding White Russian positions at Krasnaya Gorka, a fort on the southern shore of the Gulf of Finland. Although CMB7 was forced to turn back, CMB4 pressed on alone the following night and soon found the fleet.
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