Renown Class Battlecruiser

The Renown class battlecruiser was one of two British, heavily-armed capital ships used by the Royal Navy during the First and Second World War. Laid down in 1915, they both joined the Fleet in 1916, after the Battle of Jutland had raised serious doubts about the role of the battlecruiser. Nevertheless, HMS Renown and HMS Repulse were retained in service after the Great War mainly because of their speed and the fact that they had proved to be a reliable and steady gun platform. Thus, in the interwar period, their armor protection was increased. Aside from their six 381-mm (15-in) main guns, they were equipped with seventeen 102-mm (4-in) guns as secondary armament.

The British Admiralty decision to build two more battlecruisers had been made after the Royal Navy's battlecruisers HMS Invincible and Inflexible had defeated a German flotilla during the Battle of the Falkland Islands in the South Atlantic on December 8, 1914, sinking three German armored cruisers. As a result, the War Cabinet ordered the construction of two more battlecruisers; these were HMS Renown (72) and Repulse (34). Despite their complexity, the two capital ships were built with remarkable speed by the firm John Brown & Company on the north bank of the River Clyde as they had both been laid down on January 25, 1915, and commissioned in August and September 1916.

Having survived the First World War, the Renown class battlecruisers were given additional armor in the early 1920s. Between 1936 and 1939, they were rebuilt for their new role as fast aircraft carrier's escorts as they were fitted with new turbines and boilers. At the beginning of the Second World War, HMS Repulse was assigned to the Far East, where she would be sunk, along with HMS Prince of Wales battleship, by Japanese dive-bombers on December 10, 1941. Meanwhile, HMS Renown served in the Atlantic and Mediterranean Theater. She was decommissioned after the war and struck in 1948.

Specifications

Type: Battlecruiser

Displacement: 27,650 metric tons (standard); 30,835 tons (full load)

Length: 242 m (794 feet)

Beam: 27.4 m (90 feet)

Draft: 7.8 m (25 feet)

Propulsion System: Brown-Curtis steam turbines, with 4 shafts, and 42 boilers, delivering a total of 112,000 SHP.

Maximum Speed: 30 knots

Range: 9,000 nautical miles (16,677 km)

Armament: six 381-mm (15 inches) and seventeen 102-mm (4 inches) guns.

Compliment: 1,260 sailors and officers

Above, HMS Renown (72) sailing off the English coast at the end of the war.

HMS Repulse (34) in 1927.

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HMS Hood (51)

HMS Hood (51) was a British battlecruiser used by the Royal Navy during the first two years of World War II. She was sunk during the Battle of Denmark Strait on May 24, 1941. Before this armed conflict broke out, she had represented the ultimate in British sea power in the interwar period as she had been the largest and the most heavily armed capital ship in the world. She had a long and attractive profile, drawing people's attention at every port she anchored at.

Laid down in 1916, HMS Hood was built by John Brown & Company in the shipyards on the Clyde River. She would be launched in 1918 and commissioned in 1920. Her original design dated from before the Battle of Jutland (1916), when a class of four ships was conceived to counter the German Mackensen class battlecruisers, which were already under construction in those days. However, only one was built, HMS Hood, which was equipped with eight 381-mm (15-inch) naval guns. She followed the lines laid down by Adm. Fisher, with heavy gun armament and high speed, but with relative light armor protection.

As originally built, HMS Hood (51) introduced a number of novel features. For example, she was the first ship in the Royal Navy to incorporate an AC electrical supply from an installed generator, and 140-mm (5-inch) guns, which constituted her secondary armament, strengthened by the addition of twin 102mm (4-inch) AA mountings. Major reconstruction had been planned to start of 1938, including the addition of better armored protection and new machinery for the propulsion system. However, the threat of war following the Austrian annexation to Germany and the urgent need for every capital ship made the British government cancel this major upgrade.

At the outbreak of World War II, HMS Hood was attached to the Home Fleet. She was very busy from the very moment war was declared, taking part in the hunt for the German pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee and the bombardment of the French fleet in Mers-el-Kebir, a port in Oran, Algeria. She would be part of the force sent to intercept the heavily armed German battleship Bismarck and her escort the cruiser Prinz Eugen. Thus, HMS Hood and the battleship Prince of Wales met these German warships in the Denmark Strait on May 24, 1941. There, sailing broadside along the British battlecruiser, the Bismarck quickly opened fire right before HMS Hood had a chance to use her guns. The British ship was seriously damaged as fire broke out, leading to an explosion that blew the ship apart.

Specifications

Type: battlecruiser

Displacement: 42,750 tons (48,300 tons full-load)

Length: 262.8 m (860 feet)

Beam: 31.8 m (104 feet)

Draft: 9.7 m (32 feet)

Propulsion: four Brown Curtis geared steam turbines, with four shafts, and twenty four Yarrow boilers, delivering 144,000 SHP.

Maximum Speed: 30 knots

Range: 6,300 nautical miles (11,673 km) at 12 knots.

Armament: eight 381-mm naval guns set up in four twin turrets; twelve 140mm guns.

Compliment: 1,397 sailors and officers.

Below, the HMS Hood approaching home port in 1937.

The British battlecruiser moored to a wharf at Gibraltar port in 1934.

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IJN Tsukuba

The IJN Tsukuba was a battlecruiser used by Japan in World War I. Along with her sisters of her class, Ikoma, Ibuki, and Kurama, she had originally been designed as a battleship and her construction had been ordered in 1904. All four of them belonged to the Ibuki-class of battlecruisers. Launched in 1911, Tsukuba would be re-designated 'battlecruiser' when it entered service with the Imperial Japanese Navy in 1912. However, after only five years of duties, it would be sunk in an explosion in 1917, during the Great War.

Technical Descriptions

The Tsukuba was well armored, with 178-mm-thick armor on the belt, and 76-mm-thick plate on the deck. it was powered by vertical, triple-expansion steam engines, with two shafts, delivering 24,000 HP. Her main weapons were four 305-mm-caliber naval guns, which were set up in two twin turrets. At the time it was launched, it was a powerful, impressive, and advanced battlecruisers. However, it would not survive to be used in World War II. The other three ships of her class would be scrapped between 1924 and 1925.

Specifications

Type: battlecruiser

Length: 137.2 m (485 ft)

Beam: 23 m (75 ft, 3 in)

Displacement: 15,580 tons (full loaded)

Draft: 8 m (26 ft)

Maximum Speed: 23 knots

Armament: four 305mm naval guns; eight 203mm guns; fourteen 120mm guns;

Crew: 844 officers and sailors.

Below, the IJN Tsukuba in 1914.

 

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