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For my part, I consider that it will be found much better by all parties to leave the past to history, especially as I propose to write that history myself. Winston Churchill in speech to the House of Commons, 23 January 1948.[1] In October 1941 Britain’s new armoured carrier HMS Indomitable sailed to the [ ] The post History by influence: Winston Churchill, HMS Indomitable and Force Z appeared…
Britain’s naval relationship with the United States during the First World War was surprisingly complex. On the one hand the US began constructing naval forces of scale to rival Britain’s, a process that gained diplomatic import and has been referred to by historians as the ‘struggle for Neptune’s trident’.[1] But on the other hand the [ ] The post Kick-starting USN anti-submarine technology: the…
One of the stories that circulated in the Royal Navy after HMS Rodney was involved in sinking the German battleship Bismarck in May 1941 was that the British vessel had reached 25 knots during the pursuit, about two knots over her design capability of 23. The crew pointed to the extraordinary efforts they had made [ ] The post HMS Rodney’s actual speed during the Bismarck pursuit appeared first on…
The recent announcement from the United States that it would resume building battleships – not the classic big-gun variety of the twentieth century, but a modern concept with advanced technology[1] – came as a surprise at a time when the largest surface combatants under serious consideration by any navy were guided missile destroyers.[2] One result [ ] The post Bringing back battleships? A…
One of the major challenges faced by the combatants of both sides during the First World War was finding submarines underwater. The issue was particularly important for the Allies because Germany turned to U-boats as an equaliser. If they could whittle down British naval superiority – in particular – then other naval options became available [ ] The post The origins of ASDIC and underwater…
One day in January 1879 a 25-year old physics instructor at the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis began experiments with a curious apparatus set up along the north sea-wall of the academy grounds. This consisted of a rapidly spinning mirror, set up some 2000 feet away from an observing post inside a darkened building. [ ] The post The United States Navy, Albert Michelson, and the ‘aether’…
The events surrounding the brief Atlantic sortie of the German battleship Bismarck in May 1941, have been told many times. Analysis often focuses on engineering and combat performance,[1] or on the tactical issues associated with finding a lone warship in the North Atlantic. It is often seen in isolation – an ‘episode’, according to Russell [ ] The post A decisive episode: the strategic stakes of…
One of the most poignant human stories to come out of the Battle of Jutland was that of sixteen year old John Travers Cornwell, J/42563. He was a Boy, 1st Class, aboard HMS Chester during that clash of fleets at the end of May 1916, and he became one of the youngest recipients of a [ ] The post Naval heroism, politics and Jutland: the story of Jack Cornwell VC appeared first on Navy General Board…
Based on popular perception, the Yamato class battleships might be associated with a sledgehammer. A tool conveying power, weight, size, and simplicity. Today, the Yamato class are remembered for their large naval guns, tremendous size, and singular purpose of surpassing any battleship then in service. While the Yamato class certainly lived up to these opinions, [ ] The post Yamato Class Armor…
During my years at school, (sadly now too many years ago to be comforting), Idiscovered the fascination of a naval world before the onset of submersibles and airmachines complicated it. Those brief months of 1914, when the war at sea had a setof rules the ‘gentleman’ officers stood to. I also discovered that Germany briefly [ ] The post What drove the Flight of the East Asia Squadron appeared…
In 1919 an embittered Admiral Sir John Fisher published a trenchant criticism of the British Admiralty’s latest heavy warship. He did not name her, but he didn’t have to: there was only one. To Fisher, HMS Hood had too much weight devoted to armour. ‘And so bang went the speed,’ he declared. ‘They couldn’t understand [ ] The post Eggshells and hammers: Fisher’s last battlecruisers appeared first…
It is not often that previously unknown photos of HMS Hood are discovered. A set were found recently in a New Zealand archive, and are reproduced here for the first time on a naval website. The quality is typical of the day: the slightly blurred imagery typical of the Box Brownie cameras owned by a [ ] The post New photos of HMS Hood in 1924 appeared first on Navy General Board .
In 1919 the embittered Admiral Sir John Fisher, former First Sea Lord and the long-standing champion of naval technology, summed up his recent thinking about heavy warships in three words: ‘speed is armour’.[1] The phrase has since been inextricably associated with his ideas throughout the dreadnought era, skewing the way we see the evolution of [ ] The post Speed and armour: Fisher’s…
Chuck Veit(www.chuckveitbooks.com) excerpted from the author’s bookNatural Genius:Brutus de Villeroi and the U. S. Navy’s First Submarine We are taught that USS Holland (SS-1) in 1900 was the first modern submarine in the U.S. Navy. This is true—but this was not the first boat to interest that service. There was, in fact, a submarine active [ ] The post The First Submarine of the Civil War:The…
At the end of 1904 Britain’s First Sea Lord, Admiral Sir John Fisher, set up a committee that met over a period of several months into early 1905 and produced two new types of vessel: an all big-gun battleship and its armoured cruiser homologue. The latter subsequently evolved into a type the British officially called [ ] The post Admiral Sir John Fisher and the first fast battleships appeared…