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One was or another , a lot of this forum's time will be spent on Ship classes, weapons systems, Units and commanders that had a real or perceived major impact on historiy and historical struggles.


This thread will cover many miles if all.


The King George V Class of battleships included the "Prince of Wales and The "King George V"

Prince of Wales was a ship whose days were numbered. Her Guns were first fired in anger against the redoubtable Bismarck and her consort Prinz Eugen.

To the best of my knowlegde, she scored a 14" hit against Bismarck's forward fuel tank, enabling her to be tracked much more easily.

Prince of Wales left port to confront Bismarck will her ship builders still on board. It was battered quickly and Hood was Blown up.

Hood was a class of one, and deserves much more space than I am allotting to it today.


The "Nihon Kaigun" site (if it is still around) hsa much detail on most WWII
Battleships.

The Class all were armed with 10 14" guns in two quadruple turretts and one twin turrett.

Obviously this saved weight which British shipbuilders wished to use for addttionall armor protection.

Mors on this class soon.


J

Five KG V's were completed during WWII: King George V, Duke Of York, Prince of Wales, Anson and Howe. Construction of the class actully commenced in 1937.

Prince of Wales, in its fated sortie from Singapore with the Battle Cruiser Repulse, taught the the warring world a lesson which was that not even well armored, 'fast" battleships could survive determined aerial attacks (in this case from the Japanese)

Prince of Wales' AA was state of the art. Of battleship casualties the loss of Prince of Wase and Repulse, veterans both, fully operational, at sea, close to their base, but without air cover finally exposed the Battleship's vulnerability to other than other battleships. It is to be noted that Prince of Wales took 5 aerial torpedo hits before going down.

An officer of the USS Augusta, the heavy cruiser that took Roosvelt to meet Churchill aboard Prince of Wales before the Price was sent to the Far East, noted that the crew of the Prince looked war weary ( having already acquired what we would later call the 1000 yard stare) before the US had even entered the war.

I say this partially to bring perspective to our present engagement in Iraq and past engagements in Korea and Vietnam.

J