The Vanishing Frogman - A Cold War Mystery - 5 Minute History

Added: 2026-05-06

[00:00:00]I'm starting to think you're all picking topics with names that I have absolutely no chance of pronouncing. Either way, today we're going to be talking about the disappearance of Lionel Crab, a British naval officer who disappeared in Portsouth at the young age of 47 during a dive. But here's what makes it interesting. He dived into the water that night to spy on a Soviet cruiser, and he never was seen again.

[00:00:23]Welcome back to 5minute History, the weekly series where patrons choose the topic. This week we're talking about the disappearance of Buster Crab, courtesy of, and I'm not making this username up.

[00:00:31]Patron member JD Vance.

[00:00:35]Obviously, that's not the real one. Move on.

[00:00:40]There really are two main characters in our story today. Of course, there's, you know, Lionel Buster Crab and also a Soviet cruiser that I cannot pronounce, but if you can, good luck to you. I will put the name on screen. Crab, though, wasn't every sense the phrase a hell of a man. He was born in 1909 in southwest London to a poor family and he joined the merchant navy in the interwar years struggling to build a stable career.

[00:01:02]Shortly before the second world war he transferred to the Royal Navy reserve becoming a gunner in the army as well at the start of the war. In 41 Lionel Buster Crab officially joined the Royal Navy though and he deployed in 1942 to Jibralta where it was his job to disarm and dispose of mines specifically the kind that Italian frogman would attach to ships and harbors known as limpant mines. On December 8th, 1942, two Italian frogmen would actually be killed while attacking the harbor of Gibralta after patrol craft dropped small charges above their position, kind of like depth charges. And allegedly, this was Buster's idea. He pioneered it. After the war, he made his way to mandatory Palestine and ran a team clearing the harbor of mines, particularly those laid by Zionist paramilitary groups such as the Haga. After this period, he would work as a civilian diver for a time, diving the wrecks of Royal Navy submarines Frey and Trulant, two submarines that went down after the war ended and took tremendous loss of life with them along with the wreck of a Spanish gallion and mapping the seafloor for the British atomic weapons program.

[00:02:07]Buster would also marry and divorce during this period too and meet another woman and start a relationship. So, it's very clear here that he's got a lot of experience when it comes to, you know, being aquatic and being underwater.

[00:02:18]In 1955, Buster and his colleague Sydney Nolles actually a former comrade from the Second World War under the employee of the British government dived the Soviet cruiser Serdov to study its hull.

[00:02:30]During this dive, they actually discovered that the ship had a bow thruster, allowing Western naval planners to map out its capabilities better. It's worth knowing at this point he wasn't the healthiest nor the fittest man anymore, given he drank like a fish and smoke like a chimney. This Ferdl love for you know your knowledge it was a large Soviet technically light cruiser armed with 12 6-in guns very much an all gun design and it was the last big gun cruiser in the Soviet Navy a follow on from the early chapay class it was intended that these furlobs would form the basis of the new Soviet battle fleet being planned as part of Stalin's what I have called before as his plan zed where the Soviets were going to field large battleships carriers and lots and lots and lots of cruisers to guard them.

[00:03:14]However, after the war, priorities obviously changed with missiles and such, and a few spurred loss were built, but nowhere near the amount that were totally planned. They were still, however, incredibly powerful gun cruisers. Anyway, in 1956, Crab was employed by MI6 to dive on the Soviet cruiser um that which was docked in Portsmouth and carrying none other than Nikita Kruev and Nikolai Bulanan on a diplomatic trip to the UK.

[00:03:44]On the 19th of April that year, Crab and an MI6 handler would actually travel down to Portsmouth, and Crab would enter the water where he would never ever be seen again.

[00:03:54]14 months later, a body would be found on the 9th of June 1957 in a diving suit near Chinester Harbor. The body was bought ashore, and it was noted that it was missing both hands and the head was gone, meaning identification was next to impossible at the time. No was contacted and brought to examine the body, having been a colleague and friend of Crab for decades. Now, crucially, he did not identify the body as that of Crabs, pointing out the lack of scars on the leg that Nolles knew were there.

[00:04:24]Interestingly, although the diver was wearing the correct uniform and kit for a Royal Navy diver, Crab's ex- spouse and girlfriend could also not identify the body.

[00:04:33]A pathologist did claim there was a scar during the inquest and that it was the body of Crab. So yeah, bit of conspiracy going on there. There were also some other can't really say this on YouTube hairy parts of his body that matched up to being crabs. However, again, it is an interesting, you know, back and forth that the people who knew him couldn't identify the body. But saying that no hands and no head.

[00:05:03]And what's really interesting though is that the inquest found that the head and the hands were not removed in what was deemed to be a suspicious manner.

[00:05:11]Plausible.

[00:05:13]Whether or not it's likely, I'll leave that up to you. This all of course was swept under the rug with MI6 attempting to hide the mission's existence and the Navy claiming on the 29th of April after his disappearance that Crab had simply just vanished while testing new equipment. But the Soviets did respond here saying they spotted a frogman near the cruiser. Radio Moscow actually initially reported that the central committee had sent the UK an official telegram complaining and I quote about shameful espionage. The British then changed their tune at this point, stating, "Commander Crab carried out frogman tests, and it's assumed he lost his life in these tests. His presence in the vicinity of the destroyers occurred without any permission whatsoever."

[00:05:55]And her majesty's government expressed their regret at the incident. So clearly, something was going on here, and it was very typical of the Cold War that, well, the side that got caught started to deny it. This isn't uncommon.

[00:06:08]And the Soviets did the exact same thing when they got caught, as did the Americans, as did the Chinese. It's very, very common. There was a speculation that Crab had been captured by the Soviets, though, and he was tortured until his death. Allegedly, former spy turned writer Harry Hton said that his Russian handler told him the Soviets had heard about the impending mission over a conversation in a pub and had sent six divers down to act as a sentry below the cruiser.

[00:06:37]The six men then allegedly captured Crab by cutting off his air supply and then dragging him aboard when he'd passed out before interrogating him for hours until he died and then dumping his body overboard once they left the harbor in an elaborate sort of scheme where they tied him to the bottom of the boat and waited for the cruiser to pick up speed so it would sort of fling off is a bit too James Bond for me. In the 90s, a former Soviet naval intelligence officer though claimed that the Soviets had sent divers down in caught crab setting a limpet mine on the hull and that a sniper had shot him. I tend to not believe this one given that a gunshot in Portsmouth Harbor would be kind of hard to hide. And also the science of a bullet hitting water is well, yeah, it it's different. It a bullet when it hits water loses its ability to actually strike and kill a target very quickly. Another theory is that Soviet divers had actually slit his throat and as he arrived under the cruiser and this in my opinion is probably the one that is quite likely and then the harbor current likely took the body out of the harbor that night.

[00:07:38]Portsouth Harbor does have a pretty vicious current as anyone who's been there would be able to tell you. One theory that is quite comical is that Crab defected and became Commander Leonid Krabov in the Soviet Navy which yeah, sure. Okay. Of course, it is also likely that he could have died due to the fact his lungs were shot and that he was not a healthy man at this point with his disfigurement being caused by marine life and propellers, which is plausible.

[00:08:06]There is some support here, too, given that his equipment had actually failed on his first attempt to dive the Soviet cruiser. And his MI6 officer, Nicholas Elliot, maintained that he always believed this was the cause. But again, he's a spy. Elliot could have just lied.

[00:08:19]Nolles, though, Crab's friend, always held the opinion that Crab did not die alone and that he was murdered by his own government due to his suspected intention to defect the USSR and that this whole mission was a setup to kill him. Look, no matter which theory you go for here, they all have holes. But we will know more one day. See, in 207, the British government is set to release the official government documents about this event, the things that have been deeply deeply classified for decades. So, you know, only 20 or so years to go. What I think is most likely is that Crab probably had an equipment failure and got him captured or killed straight up by the Soviets and he was a spy. By all definition, he was a spy. So, the Soviets would have dealt with him like he was a spy. That's my theory at least.

[00:09:06]As for the Soviet cruiser, though, it would actually have a bit of an interesting future. It would go on to be sold to Indonesia in 1962 after initially being looked at being sold to China, but talks would fall through after the Sino Soviet split. The Indonesians would rename the cruiser Iran, where it would largely become a port after the Indonesian government, friendly to the Soviets, fell out of power. There were still some spare parts for it, but the Indonesians didn't really want to operate a really expensive cruiser anymore, and instead they sold it for scrapping in the Philippines in 1972.

[00:09:37]Let me know what you think in the comments below about what actually happened to Buster Crab. But yeah, it's one of those enduring cold war mysteries that sort of will stick around at least until 57 when uh when we find out finally when the documents are declassified. And hey, maybe everything I've said here is wrong. We'll find out then. Thank you all for watching. Like, comment, subscribe, shout out to the patrons, and I'll catch you all next time.