ship photos

[les freathy]

Thought it would be a good idea to start a general album of photos of naval ships, i have a few photos i can put up and maybe others can add comments or history. I expect some members have the same so lets give it a go, my first is the 1950s gun boat Grey Goose i believe she had some claim to fame any ideas what that would have been

[Tony B]

HMS Grey Goose was Steam gun boat, SGB9 built 1942. The rest of the class were Grey Fox SGB4 Grey Owl SGB 5 Grey Seal SGB3 Grey shark SGB 6 Grey Wolf SGB 8. Goose took part in the Dieppe Raid. They then formed the First SGB flottila. You are right she is famous, her first captain, who left her to become Flottila leader, was a certain Lt Cmdr Peter Scott, author of Battle of the Narrow Seas and artist, also founded the Slimbridge Wildfowl trust.

Edited October 14, 2008 by Tony B

[Degsy]

Originally a Steam Gunboat from WW2 she was experimentally fitted with gas turbine engines.

[Tony B]

Any idea what happned to 1 and 2? They aren't mentioned in Scott's book. Details are: The Battle of the Narrow Seas. A history of the Light cosatl Forces in the Channel and North Sea By Lt Cdr Peter Scott MBE DSC & Bar RNVR

London: Country Life Ltd 2-10 Tavistock Street Covent Garden WC2.

A guy at work saw my copy, then told me his Farther had been with Scott and he had known him as a child!! Lucky .......

[Enigma]

Dutch ship, HR.MS. Rotterdam.

It carries assault boats.

 

[chevpol]

RFA Fort Austin. Weymouth 17/7/2008

[AlienFTM]

HMS Grey Goose was Steam gun boat, SGB9 built 1942. The rest of the class were Grey Fox SGB4 Grey Owl SGB 5 Grey Seal SGB3 Grey shark SGB 6 Grey Wolf SGB 8. Goose took part in the Dieppe Raid. They then formed the First SGB flottila. You are right she is famous, her first captain, who left her to become Flottila leader, was a certain Lt Cmdr Peter Scott, author of Battle of the Narrow Seas and artist, also founded the Slimbridge Wildfowl trust.

 

Coincidentally, when I joined Command Troop, 15/19H in 1977, the Regimental Signals Sergeant was Staff Sergeant Peter Scott, who bore a striking resemblance to his namesake, sufficiently so for me to ask him if he were related. Apparently his famous namesake was indeed an uncle or a close cousin.

[Tony B]

The book is quite rare now, I had an old battered copy as a kid that went adrift. Then found one through Amazon, and a rare boook dealear a couple of years ago, cost me £45. Problem is the illustrations, all done by Scott. they are split up and framed. Very much recommended.

[les freathy]

Some interesting facts re Grey Goose, i assume the photo i posted showing two funnels would have been when she had the turbines fitted

[Degsy]

Some interesting facts re Grey Goose, i assume the photo i posted showing two funnels would have been when she had the turbines fitted

 

I think so Les as all the other pics I have seen only show one funnel.

[les freathy]

A couple of rather sad naval pics showing the battleship HMS Nelson at Wards ship breakers yard at Inverkeithing in 1949

[les freathy]

Still at Wards here in 1953 the Carrier HMS Formidable lies at the deep water quay waiting the breakers

[AndyFowler]

Great pictures Les what a shame all of the Royal Navy's great Battleships where scrapped ! End of a glorious Naval period ! :cry:

[les freathy]

How many of you remember those shilling war comics back in the 1950/60s, i had em piled to the ceiling and re read them over and over,one the GMS picture combat library ran a series of cut away drawings on military equipment. for interest here is one on a 1940 Vosper MTB. Whilst on the subject of cut away drawings whilst in Asda ( yes i do have to go there) i picked up a super book on a lot of those illustrations from the Eagle it was reduced to £10.00 and i think a super buy on a nostalgic subject

[les freathy]

A early 1907 photo of H M S Argyle

[antarmike]

Great pictures Les what a shame all of the Royal Navy's great Battleships where scrapped ! End of a glorious Naval period ! :cry:

Not all the R.N's great Battleships were scrapped, Belfast for example is their for all to see

Edited January 27, 2010 by antarmike

[AndyFowler]

Not all the R.N's great Battleships were scrapped, Belfast foe example is their for all to see, and the Belgrano,was a Royal navy ship, thay wasn;t scrapped. Instead it was sold to another country, against which we were destined to go to War. ...

 

Belfast is a Light Cruiser Mike ! No British Battleships preserved I'm afraid ! :-D

[antarmike]

Fair enough, engage brain before pressing "post"

[Snapper]

That's a lovely snap of the Argyll. I love warship pix. Sadly I don't have many of the ships my ancestors worked on and none I do have are free to use. They were mostly small ships anyway, although I undesrtand my uncle Edward did serve on the Barham before WW2 and I have no idea which ships my grandfather served on during WW1. There is another cruiser restored in Belfast isn't there? One of the much older models, or am I imagining it. Other than that there is HMS Cavalier at Chatham. I think it's a bloody shame we have no tradition of saving grey funnel ships for heritage. Imagine if they'd kept just one of the battlecruisers like the Yanks have with the Missouri. MB

[CanadianScottish]

HMS Caroline, a C class light cruiser of 1914 is still in commission in Belfast as an RNR headquarters ship. She is the second oldest warship still in commission in the Royal Navy after HMS Victory and is likely to remain in commission until at least 2011. HMS Caroline is the last survivor of the Battle of Jutland still afloat.

[les freathy]

Here are a couple more to enjot HMS Dreadnought and HMS Sheldrake out of interest these photos were published in 1907

[steveo578]

Snapper

Imagine if they'd kept just one of the battlecruisers like the Yanks have with the Missouri.

 

 

Missouri is a Battleship not a Battlecruiser the U.S. Navy never had any Battlecruisers, one battlecruiser class the Lexiington class was laid down in WW1 but only two were completed and they were aircraft carriers Lexington CV1 and Saratoga CV2. Also the U.S. still have the WW1 battleship USS Texas.

 

While it is true the British have a lamentable record in save historic vessels from WW1 or 2, there is still Warrior which is an Ironclad Battleship and one British built Battleship of great importance still exists in IJN Mikasa which is a memorial to Admiral Togo, Mikasa was built at Barrow in Furness in 1900-02 and is very similar to the British Formidable and Canopus Classes.

[Bystander]

Navy never had any Battlecruisers, .

 

What about the two units of the Alaska Class? Despite the "large cruiser" nomenculture they were plainly battlecruisers in my view and are commonly described as such. After all looking back HMS Inflexible was seen by Fisher as a replacement for cruisers...

[Tony B]

Battle cruisers, Batle ships, Pocket Battleships. Remember the Washington Naval treaty. each side played games with words to comply.

[steveo578]

Bystander

What about the two units of the Alaska Class

 

 

Alaska and Guam despite having 9 x 12inch guns were heavy cruisers, the standard US battleship armament was the 16inch gun and had been since 1921. If CB1 & 2 been armed with 6 x 16guns in 3 barbettes then they could be classed as battlecruisers, although I most conceed that as a cruiser hunter, in concept they could be regarded as doing the same duties as that carried out by British battlecruisers at the Falklands in 1914.

 

By defination (by Adrimal Fisher concept) a battle cruiser was an intermediate between heavy cruiser and battleship. The first battle cruisers the Invincibles 1906-08 were a modern (1906) equivelent of the traditional heavy or armoured cruiser with a main armament equivelent in calibre to contemporary capital ship, in the Invicibles case the Dreadnought, Bellerophon and St Vincent battleships. brief details 8 x 12inch, 41000Hp, 6inch belt armour as opposed 10 x 12inch, 23000hp 10inch belt average for the Battleships.

 

Again the Spelidid Cats were equivelent to the Orion and KG V and Iron Duke class battleship in the same way as previous described.

 

The final class of (Fisher style) battleruiser was Renown and Respulse which again were equivelent to the 15inch gun battleships of the Revenge class.

 

The final comisioned battlecruiser HMS Hood was a hybrid. With Mad Jack out of favour Hood was a fast version of the Queen Elizabeth Class (which in its own right was designed as a fast equivelent of the Revenge Class) with obviously comprimised armour ie neither one thing or the other, as to some extent was HMS Vanguard which had more akin to Hood rather than a proper capital ship.

 

The only other battlecruisers commisioned were the 3 "light" battle cruisers of the Courageous class and they are really well outside the classic Battlecruiser cocept and were without purpose until converted to aircraft carriers- a fate which nearly befell the U.S. territories class cruisers CB1-6 in 1942 and would probably be a better bang for the buck than the 2 (Alaska and Guam) which were completed.

 

The German Battlecruiser were slightly at variance with British policy in that gun calibres failed to keep up with improvements in capital ship gun calibre and this was apparent policy again in WW2 with 11inch battlecruiser and pocket battleships which are more in keeping with the Alaskas but none of these vessels could carry out the primary requirement of a battlecruiser- matching an contemporary battleship in fire power long enough to take evasive action, which was apparent in the last big gun action at North Cape where Scharnhorst was completely overwhelmed by British capital ships.

 

Finally the only other nation that had battlecruisers was Japan the Kongo class being a stable mate with the Fuso-Hyuga class (14inch guns) although the Kongos with benefit of British know how were completed first. Russia failed to complete its ambitious programme which included a class of battlecruisers.

 

Steve