The UK Admiralty admitted mining the area but the United Kingdom denied responsibility and rejected a Spanish claim for liability.

Sir Raylton Dixon and Company built Léopoldville at the Cleveland Dockyard in Middlesbrough on the River Tees, launching her on 5 December 1903 and completing her in 1904.

[8] On the evening of 25 May Carlos de Eizaguirre was off the Atlantic coast of South Africa, steaming at a reduced speed of 5 knots (9 km/h) because there was a heavy sea[4] as her Master, Fermín Luzárraga, did not want to reach Cape Town before morning.

[12] Led by the Second Officer, Luis Lazaga Gómez, the crew rowed toward the light of Robben Island lighthouse and kept baling the boat as she shipped water.

[12] Fernández jumped into the sea and swam for about two hours until he found a large piece of wooden wreckage from one of the ship's coal bunkers.

Privately CTE's management admitted that a mine was the most likely cause, but the company did not publish the news because it lacked insurance against acts of war, and was not sure it could meet potential claims of loss and damage.

In an internal company memo it was stated that "given the press censorship regime of the government, we can abstain of publishing details of the probable cause of the accident".

In general, it is believed that the Eizaguirre must have found itself in one of those storms that are currently occurring at the Cape of Good Hope, foundering or striking against something underwater".

On 2 June CTE representatives met the Spanish Prime Minister, Manuel García Prieto, in Madrid, privately admitted to him that they suspected the ship had been mined, and asked him to make a claim against the UK government.

The UK Admiralty denied it, and alleged that the German merchant raider SMS Wolf, which had been in the area four months earlier, must have laid the mine.