Gutter Sound was one of the sites of the scuttling of the interned Imperial German High Seas Fleet in 1919, and the scene of a major salvage operation in the 1920s.

12 capital ships and a number of smaller vessels went down in the Sound itself, the remainder in deep water between Cava and the skerry.

With the larger ships he patched all of the holes and then pumped the hulls with compressed air to force out the water and make them float upside down.

During the Second World War the Sound was again used as a Royal Navy anchorage, being the site for HMS Proserpine, the stone frigate ashore base at Lyness;[1] it also served for the anti-submarine patrol forces and their depot ship, HMS Dunluce Castle.

[citation needed] Lyness is now the site of a Naval Cemetery, and a Heritage Centre detailing these events.