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Most Viewed Navy Pictures
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HMS Agincourt 1913952 viewsHMS Agincourt was a Dreadnought battleship of the Royal Navy.
She was a unique vessel, laid down by Armstrongs at Newcastle upon Tyne as the Brazilian Rio de Janeiro in September 1911. The chief designer of Armstrongs, Eustace d'Eyncourt, produced her outline design in his hotel bedroom in Brazil during the negotiations. Brazil cancelled the order in 1912, but sold the subsequently modified vessel to the Turkish navy for £2,750,000 in January 1914. Renamed the Sultan Osman I, she underwent trials in July 1914 and was completed in August, just as the First World War began.
Agincourt was an unusual ship in having seven main turrets. She had poor armour in comparison with her armament, having just 9 inches (229 mm) maximum belt thickness compared with the 12 inches (305 mm) or more appropriate for her armament. She would have ranked as a battlecruiser but for her low speed. By her completion, her 12-inch (305 mm) guns had started to become obsolete - most capital ships under construction having larger calibres.
The Royal Navy made modifications before commissioning its prize: in particular they removed a flying-off deck for seaplanes. HMS Agincourt formed part of the First Battle Squadron at the Battle of Jutland, which she survived unscathed. She was reallocated to the Second Battle Squadron in 1918 and decommissioned in 1919. After unsuccessful attempts to sell her to the Brazilian Government she was recommissioned as a depot ship before being decommissioned again in 1921 and scrapped in 1924.
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1909 HMS Indefatigable Battlecruiser 947 viewsHMS Indefatigable was a battlecruiser of the Royal Navy, the lead ship of her class, and served in the 2nd Battlecruiser Squadron in the Mediterranean and in August 1914 took part in the chase of the Goeben and Breslau. In 1915 she joined the Grand Fleet based at Scapa Flow. At the battle of Jutland on 31 May 1916 she was hit by 11-inch shells from Von der Tann. The official report states that she was hit by two shells in the "X" magazine causing her to fall out of formation sinking by the stern.
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IJN Ibuki 1904934 viewsThe Japanese cruiser Ibuki was a late-generation that was almost a Dreadnought-type battleship in stature, it was the lead ship in the Ibuki class of 1st class heavy cruisers of the Imperial Japanese Navy.
The Ibuki had one sister ship, the IJN Kurama. The Ibuki is named after Mount Ibuki located between Gifu prefecture and Shiga prefecture in Honshu. The class was planned during the Russo-Japanese War and was authorized under the 1904 Supplemental Naval Budget, at the same time has the IJN Tsukuba, but with heavier guns and with the new geared turbine engines which promised more power and hence, more speed. However, problems with the turbine engines delayed the construction of the Ibuki, and in the end, construction began almost two years later than her sister ship, the Kurama, which used standard reciprocating engines.
Shortly after commissioning, the Ibuki was sent on a voyage to Thailand for the coronation ceremony of the Thai king Rama VI.
On 28 August 1912, the Tsukuba was re-classified as a battlecruiser by the Japanese navy.
It subsequently played an important role in World War I, in protecting British merchant shipping in the South Pacific and in the Indian Ocean, and participating in the hunt for the German East Asiatic Squadron and the SMS Emden. After the war, it felt victim to the Washington Naval Treaty and was scrapped after a short service life of only 15 years.
Afterwards, its guns were salvaged, and used in the shore batteries at Hakodate in Hokkaido and along the Tsugaru Strait separating Honshu and Hokkaido..
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Gneisenau in 1939911 viewsThe Gneisenau was the second of the two 'Scharnhorst' class battle-cruisers completed in Germany in the late 1930s as highly impressive ships with a full-load displacement of 34,900 tons, length of 754ft Oin (229.8m), armament of nine I I inch (280mm) guns in three triple turrets, twelve 5.6inch (150mm) guns in six twin turrets, fourteen 4.1 inch (105mm) anti-aircraft guns in seven twin mountings and sixteen 37mm anti-aircraft guns in eight twin mountings.
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1906 HMS Dreadnought875 viewsThis was the sixth HMS Dreadnought of the British Royal Navy and was the first battleship to have a uniform main battery, rather than having secondary smaller guns. She was also the first large warship to be powered by steam turbines, making her the fastest warship of her size. So advanced was Dreadnought that her name became a generic term for modern battleships; whilst the ships she made obsolete were known as "pre-dreadnoughts".
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Japanese battleship Hatsuse863 viewsThe Japanese battleship Hatsuse (14,967 tons) was built by Armstrong Whitworth at the Elswick Yard. It was launched on the River Tyne, north east England, on June 27 of 1899 and capsized May 15, 1904.
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1912 HMS Iron Duke850 viewsHMS Iron Duke was a battleship of the Royal Navy, the lead ship of her class, named in honour of Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington. She served as the flagship of the Grand Fleet during World War I. She was the flagship of the Grand Fleet at the battle of Jutland. For the majority of the Great War she was based with the rest of the Grand Fleet at Scapa Flow.
Iron Duke was launched on 12 October 1912 at Portsmouth, England, the first of her class. After commissioning, she joined the Home Fleet as the flagship of Admiral Sir George Callaghan. Shortly before the beginning of hostilities, Callaghan was relieved by Admiral Sir John Jellicoe, who made Iron Duke the flagship of the newly organized Grand Fleet. Her only major combat service during World War I came in the battle of Jutland, 31 May 1916, where she served in the 2nd Battle Squadron. She later became the flagship of Admiral Sir David Beatty when he assumed command of the Grand Fleet in late 1916.
After the war, she was transferred to the Mediterranean Fleet, where she again served as flagship, this time for Admiral Sir John de Robeck. She served with the Mediterranean and Atlantic Fleets until she was paid off in 1929. In the remainder of the inter-war years she served as a training vessel. During World War II she was used as a base ship at Scapa Flow, where she was forced to beach during an air attack in 1939. She was refloated and saw continued service until the conclusion of hostilities. She was sold in 1946 as scrap, and broken up in Glasgow in 1948.
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Japanese Battleship HIJMS Kirishima849 viewsKirishima was the Imperial Japanese Navy's fourth Kongo class battlecruiser, and was laid down by Mitsubishi in Nagasaki on March 17, 1912, launched on December 1, 1913 and commissioned on April 19, 1915. From 1933 to 1934, she was reconstructed at Kure, Japan, emerging from her reconstruction as a "fast battleship," 4,000 tons heavier than her original incarnation.
On November 15, 1942, Kirishima engaged American vessels in the Battle of Guadalcanal, and while inflicting some damage on USS South Dako
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HMS Invincible 1907833 viewsThe fifth Invincible was a battlecruiser, the lead ship of her class of three, and the first ship of her type to be built in the world.
The ship was built at Sir W. G. Armstrong, Whitworth & Co., Ltd on Tyneside. She was laid down in April 1906, and launched a year later on April 13th 1907, before being commissioned into the fleet on March 20th 1908.
The ship's primary armament consisted of eight 12in guns in four twin turrets, with, in addition, sixteen 4in guns also fitted.
Invincible initially served with the 1st Cruiser Squadron until 1913, when she was assigned to the 1st Battlecruiser Squadron. At the beginning of the First World War, she took part in the action at Heligoland Bight, before being sent along with her sister Inflexible to the South Atlantic where she fought in the Battle of the Falkland Islands. At the Battle of Jutland, she was the flagship of the 1st Battlecruiser Squadron. She was hit in her 'Q' turret and blew up, breaking in two and sinking with the loss of all but five of her crew.
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Tirpitz in c1941829 viewsThe Tirpitz was the sister-ship of the Bismarck, from which it differed only in details such as a full-load displacement of 52,600 tons, length of 823ft 6in (25 1,0m) and the addition of eight 21 in (533mm) torpedo tubes. The ship was launched in April 1939 and completed in February 1941, and its sole success in World War II (apart from tying down large numbers of British capital ships) was a bombardment of Spitsbergen in September 1943.The ship was damaged by British midget submarine attack later in that month, damaged by aircraft attack in April 1944 (with the loss of 122 men after being hit by 14 bombs), rendered unseaworthy by-further aircraft bombs in September I943 and finally sunk in November 1944 when the ship capsized with the loss of 902 men after being hit by ‘Tallboy’ bombs.
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SMS Blucher 1909803 viewsSMS Blücher was the last armoured cruiser of the German Kaiserliche Marine and was considered an intermediate stage toward the future German battlecruiser.
This ship was constructed in the Kiel dockyard, between 1907 and 1909, being completed in October of that year.
During World War I, on January 24, 1915, the obsolete SMS Blücher was sunk during the Battle of Dogger Bank (1915) by more modern British battlecruisers.
The World War II German heavy cruiser Blucher was named after her.
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SMS Westfalen 1908801 viewsSMS Westfalen, launched 1908 at AG Weser in Bremen was one of the first dreadnought battleships (ship of the line) built for the Imperial German Navy. There were three other ships in her class: SMS Nassau (launched in 1908 at the Imperial shipyards in Wilhelmshaven), SMS Posen (launched in 1908 at Germania shipyards in Kiel) and SMS Rheinland (launched 1908 at Vulcan in Stettin). The ships were armed with twelve 28 cm guns in double turrets -- one forward, one aft, and two on each side. In addition, they carried twelve 15 cm guns, sixteen 8.8 cm guns and six torpedo tubes. SMS Nassau was 146 m long, displaced 18,873 tons, carried a crew of 1008, and had a top speed of 20 knots. All four ships took part in the Battle of Jutland on 31 May–1 June 1916.
Following the end of World War I, the ships were surrendered to the victorious powers as war booty. Westfalen was surrendered in 1920 to Great Britain and scrapped in 1924. The other three ships were surrendered to Japan, which sold them to a British wrecking firm which then scrapped them in Dordrecht (Netherlands).
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