The Nationalist troop transport SS Castillo de Olite sent to support the revolt was sunk with 1,476 soldiers being killed, the deadliest in Spanish naval history.

[3] On 3 March, Negrín appointed Francisco Galán, a member of the PCE, to command the main naval base of the Spanish Republican Navy at Cartagena.

[4] Then, the fifth column in the city led by Colonel Arturo Espa, joined the rebellion and seized the coastal batteries of Los Dolores and the radio station, from where they broadcast appeals for help from the Nationalists.

Francisco Franco ordered Nationalist troops to Cartagena to support the uprising, though he was unaware Republican loyalists had since entered the city and were defeating the rebels.

[11] The SS Castillo de Olite, which had a broken radio, continued to enter into Cartagena and mistook the battery firing for the rebels celebrating their arrival.

The Republicans were able to suppress the uprising and restore their control of Cartagena, but the loss of the fleet was a catastrophe as the evacuation of potentially thousands of pro-Republican refugees was now impossible.