1.
Firth of Forth
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The Firth of Forth is the estuary of the River Forth in Scotland, where it flows into the North Sea, between Fife to the north and Lothian to the south. It was known as Bodotria in Roman times, in the Norse sagas it was known as the Myrkvifiörd. Geologically, the Firth of Forth is a fjord, formed by the Forth Glacier in the last glacial period, the Kincardine Bridge, the Clackmannanshire Bridge, the Forth Road Bridge and the Forth Bridge carry traffic across the firth. Queensferry Crossing, alongside the Forth Road Bridge, was expected to open in 2016 but has since been delayed until May 2017. From 1964 to 1982, a tunnel existed under the Firth of Forth, the shafts leading into the tunnel were filled and capped with concrete when the tunnel was closed, and it is believed to have filled with water or collapsed in places. In July,2007, a passenger service completed a two-week trial between Portobello, Edinburgh and Kirkcaldy, Fife. The trial of the service was hailed as an operational success. It was estimated the service would decrease congestion for commuters on the Forth road, despite the initial success, the project was cancelled in December,2011. Historic villages line the Fife shoreline, Limekilns, Charlestown and Culross, established in the 6th century, the firth is important for nature conservation and is a Site of Special Scientific Interest. The Firth of Forth Islands SPA is home to more than 90,000 breeding seabirds every year, there is a bird observatory on the Isle of May. The youngest person to swim across the Firth of Forth was 13-year-old Joseph Feeney, in 2008, a controversial bid to allow oil transfer between ships in the firth was refused by Forth Ports. SPT Marine Services had asked permission to transfer 7.8 million tonnes of oil per year between tankers, but the proposals were met with determined opposition from conservation groups
2.
United Kingdom
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The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom or Britain, is a sovereign country in western Europe. Lying off the north-western coast of the European mainland, the United Kingdom includes the island of Great Britain, Northern Ireland is the only part of the United Kingdom that shares a land border with another sovereign state—the Republic of Ireland. The Irish Sea lies between Great Britain and Ireland, with an area of 242,500 square kilometres, the United Kingdom is the 78th-largest sovereign state in the world and the 11th-largest in Europe. It is also the 21st-most populous country, with an estimated 65.1 million inhabitants, together, this makes it the fourth-most densely populated country in the European Union. The United Kingdom is a monarchy with a parliamentary system of governance. The monarch is Queen Elizabeth II, who has reigned since 6 February 1952, other major urban areas in the United Kingdom include the regions of Birmingham, Leeds, Glasgow, Liverpool and Manchester. The United Kingdom consists of four countries—England, Scotland, Wales, the last three have devolved administrations, each with varying powers, based in their capitals, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast, respectively. The relationships among the countries of the UK have changed over time, Wales was annexed by the Kingdom of England under the Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542. A treaty between England and Scotland resulted in 1707 in a unified Kingdom of Great Britain, which merged in 1801 with the Kingdom of Ireland to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Five-sixths of Ireland seceded from the UK in 1922, leaving the present formulation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain, there are fourteen British Overseas Territories. These are the remnants of the British Empire which, at its height in the 1920s, British influence can be observed in the language, culture and legal systems of many of its former colonies. The United Kingdom is a country and has the worlds fifth-largest economy by nominal GDP. The UK is considered to have an economy and is categorised as very high in the Human Development Index. It was the worlds first industrialised country and the worlds foremost power during the 19th, the UK remains a great power with considerable economic, cultural, military, scientific and political influence internationally. It is a nuclear weapons state and its military expenditure ranks fourth or fifth in the world. The UK has been a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council since its first session in 1946 and it has been a leading member state of the EU and its predecessor, the European Economic Community, since 1973. However, on 23 June 2016, a referendum on the UKs membership of the EU resulted in a decision to leave. The Acts of Union 1800 united the Kingdom of Great Britain, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have devolved self-government
3.
Royal Navy
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The Royal Navy is the United Kingdoms naval warfare force. Although warships were used by the English kings from the medieval period. The modern Royal Navy traces its origins to the early 16th century, from the middle decades of the 17th century and through the 18th century, the Royal Navy vied with the Dutch Navy and later with the French Navy for maritime supremacy. From the mid 18th century it was the worlds most powerful navy until surpassed by the United States Navy during the Second World War. The Royal Navy played a key part in establishing the British Empire as the world power during the 19th. Due to this historical prominence, it is common, even among non-Britons, following World War I, the Royal Navy was significantly reduced in size, although at the onset of the Second World War it was still the worlds largest. By the end of the war, however, the United States Navy had emerged as the worlds largest, during the Cold War, the Royal Navy transformed into a primarily anti-submarine force, hunting for Soviet submarines, mostly active in the GIUK gap. The Royal Navy is part of Her Majestys Naval Service, which includes the Royal Marines. The professional head of the Naval Service is the First Sea Lord, the Defence Council delegates management of the Naval Service to the Admiralty Board, chaired by the Secretary of State for Defence. The strength of the fleet of the Kingdom of England was an important element in the power in the 10th century. English naval power declined as a result of the Norman conquest. Medieval fleets, in England as elsewhere, were almost entirely composed of merchant ships enlisted into service in time of war. Englands naval organisation was haphazard and the mobilisation of fleets when war broke out was slow, early in the war French plans for an invasion of England failed when Edward III of England destroyed the French fleet in the Battle of Sluys in 1340. Major fighting was confined to French soil and Englands naval capabilities sufficed to transport armies and supplies safely to their continental destinations. Such raids halted finally only with the occupation of northern France by Henry V. Henry VII deserves a large share of credit in the establishment of a standing navy and he embarked on a program of building ships larger than heretofore. He also invested in dockyards, and commissioned the oldest surviving dry dock in 1495 at Portsmouth, a standing Navy Royal, with its own secretariat, dockyards and a permanent core of purpose-built warships, emerged during the reign of Henry VIII. Under Elizabeth I England became involved in a war with Spain, the new regimes introduction of Navigation Acts, providing that all merchant shipping to and from England or her colonies should be carried out by English ships, led to war with the Dutch Republic. In the early stages of this First Anglo-Dutch War, the superiority of the large, heavily armed English ships was offset by superior Dutch tactical organisation and the fighting was inconclusive
4.
Naval fleet
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A fleet or naval fleet is a large formation of warships, which is controlled by one leader and the largest formation in any navy. A fleet at sea is the equivalent of an army on land. Fleets are usually, but not necessarily, permanent formations and are assigned to a particular ocean or sea. Most fleets are named after that ocean or sea, but the convention in the United States Navy is to use numbers. A fleet is normally commanded by an admiral, who is also a commander in chief. Most fleets are divided into squadrons, each under a subordinate admiral. Those squadrons in turn are divided into divisions. In the age of sail, fleets were divided into van, centre and rear squadrons, in more modern times, the squadrons are typically composed of homogeneous groups of the same class of warship, such as battleships or cruisers. Since many smaller navies only contain a single fleet, the term the fleet is often synonymous with the navy, multinational fleets are not uncommon in naval history. For example, several nations made up the Holy League fleet at the Battle of Lepanto in 1571, in modern times, NATO has formed standing combined fleets and operations from several national navies such as Operation Active Endeavour. Modern fleets combine surface warships, submarines, support ships and ship-based aircraft to conduct operations at sea. Generally understood to be the water, or oceanic, green water or littoral versus the brown water or coastal/riverine forces. The fleets of larger navies are usually divided into smaller numbered or named fleets based on geographic operating areas or on administrative groupings of same type ships, modern fleets are usually administrative units. Typically, individual task forces are formed to conduct specific operations, list of fleets Media related to Fleets at Wikimedia Commons
5.
Battle of Jutland
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The battle unfolded in extensive maneuvering and three main engagements, from 31 May to 1 June 1916, off the North Sea coast of Denmarks Jutland Peninsula. It was the largest naval battle in that war and the only full-scale clash of battleships, Jutland was the third fleet action between steel battleships, following the smaller but more decisive battles of the Yellow Sea and Tsushima during the Russo-Japanese War. Jutland was the last major battle fought primarily by battleships in world history, germanys High Seas Fleet intended to lure out, trap, and destroy a portion of the Grand Fleet, as the German naval force was insufficient to openly engage the entire British fleet. This formed part of a strategy to break the British blockade of Germany. Meanwhile, Great Britains Royal Navy pursued a strategy of engaging and destroying the High Seas Fleet, thereby keeping German naval forces contained and away from Britain and they stationed submarines in advance across the likely routes of the British ships. The German plan had been delayed, causing problems for their submarines. On the afternoon of 31 May, Beatty encountered Hippers battlecruiser force long before the Germans had expected, in a running battle, Hipper successfully drew the British vanguard into the path of the High Seas Fleet. Fourteen British and eleven German ships sank, with loss of life. The British lost more ships and twice as many sailors but succeeded in containing the German fleet, however, the British press criticised the Grand Fleets failure to force a decisive outcome, while Scheers plan of destroying a substantial portion of the British fleet also failed. Finally, the British strategy of denying Germany access to both the United Kingdom and the Atlantic did succeed, which was the British long-term goal, subsequent reviews commissioned by the Royal Navy generated strong disagreement between supporters of Jellicoe and Beatty concerning the two admirals performance in the battle. Debate over their performance and the significance of the battle continues to this day, with 16 dreadnought-type battleships, compared with the Royal Navys 28, the German High Seas Fleet stood little chance of winning a head-to-head clash. The Germans therefore adopted a divide-and-conquer strategy, in January 1916, Admiral von Pohl, commander of the German fleet, fell ill. He was replaced by Scheer, who believed that the fleet had used too defensively, had better ships and men than the British. On 25 April 1916, a decision was made by the German admiralty to halt indiscriminate attacks by submarine on merchant shipping and this followed protests from neutral countries, notably the United States, that their nationals had been the victims of attacks. Instead, he set about deploying the submarine fleet against military vessels and it was hoped that, following a successful German submarine attack, fast British escorts, such as destroyers, would be tied down by anti-submarine operations. If the Germans could catch the British in the expected locations, the hope was that Scheer would thus be able to ambush a section of the British fleet and destroy it. A plan was devised to station submarines offshore from British naval bases, the battlecruiser SMS Seydlitz had been damaged in a previous engagement, but was due to be repaired by mid May, so an operation was scheduled for 17 May 1916. At the start of May, difficulties with condensers were discovered on ships of the battleship squadron
6.
John Jellicoe, 1st Earl Jellicoe
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Admiral of the Fleet John Rushworth Jellicoe, 1st Earl Jellicoe, GCB, OM, GCVO, SGM, DL was a Royal Navy officer. He fought in the Anglo-Egyptian War and the Boxer Rebellion and commanded the Grand Fleet at the Battle of Jutland in May 1916 during the First World War. Jellicoe later served as First Sea Lord, overseeing the expansion of the Naval Staff at the Admiralty and the introduction of convoys and he also served as the Governor-General of New Zealand in the early 1920s. He was made a midshipman in the steam frigate HMS Newcastle in September 1874 before transferring to the ironclad HMS Agincourt in the Mediterranean Fleet in July 1877. Promoted to sub-lieutenant on 5 December 1878, he joined HMS Alexandra, flagship of the Mediterranean Fleet, as signal sub-lieutenant in 1880. Promoted to lieutenant on 23 September 1880, he returned to HMS Agincourt in February 1881, Jellicoe qualified as a gunnery officer in 1883 and was appointed to the staff of the gunnery school HMS Excellent in May 1884. He joined the turret ship HMS Monarch as gunnery officer in September 1885 and was awarded the Board of Trade Silver Medal for rescuing the crew of a steamer near Gibraltar in May 1886. Promoted to commander on 30 June 1891, Jellicoe joined the battleship HMS Sans Pareil in the Mediterranean Fleet in March 1892. He transferred to the battleship HMS Victoria in 1893 and was aboard when it collided with HMS Camperdown and was wrecked off Tripoli in Lebanon on 22 June 1893 and he was then appointed to the new flagship, HMS Ramillies, in October 1893. Promoted to captain on 1 January 1897, Jellicoe became a member of the Admiraltys Ordnance Committee and he was badly wounded during the Battle of Beicang and told he would die but confounded the attending doctor and chaplain by living. He was appointed a Companion of the Order of the Bath and given the German Order of the Red Eagle, 2nd class, centurion returned to the United Kingdom in August 1901, and was paid off the following month, when Captain Jellicoe and the crew went on leave. Promoted to rear admiral on 8 February 1907, he pushed hard for funds to modernise the navy, supporting the construction of new Dreadnought-type battleships and Invincible-class battlecruisers. Dreyers improvements in gunnery fire-control systems, and favoured the adoption of Dreyers Fire Control Table, Jellicoe arranged for the output of naval ordnance to be transferred from the War Office to the Admiralty. Jellicoe was appointed second-in-command of the Atlantic Fleet in August 1907 and he was appointed Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order on the occasion of the Kings Review of the Home Fleet in the Solent on 3 August 1907. He advanced to Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath on the Coronation of King George V on 19 June 1911 and he became Second Sea Lord in December 1912. At the start of the First World War, the First Lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill, removed Admiral George Callaghan, Commander-in-Chief of the Home Fleet. Jellicoe was promoted to admiral on 4 August 1914 and assigned command of the renamed Grand Fleet in Admiral Callaghans place. He was advanced to Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath on 8 February 1915, Jellicoe commanded the British Grand Fleet at the Battle of Jutland in May 1916, the largest clash of dreadnoughts, albeit an indecisive one
7.
David Beatty, 1st Earl Beatty
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Admiral of the Fleet David Richard Beatty, 1st Earl Beatty GCB, OM, GCVO, DSO, PC was a Royal Navy officer. He is remembered for his comment at Jutland that There seems to be something wrong with our bloody ships today, after two of his ships exploded. Later in the war he succeeded Jellicoe as Commander in Chief of the Grand Fleet and he then followed Jellicoes path a second time, serving as First Sea Lord—a position that Beatty held longer than any other First Sea Lord in history.75 each. Beatty was born into an Anglo-Irish family at Howbeck Lodge in the parish of Stapeley, near Nantwich, Cheshire, Katrine had fair hair and blue eyes, soft wide lips, and overall an air of command. Beattys father was 6 ft 4 in tall, dark haired with big hands, both David and his elder brother Charles were short, about 5 ft 5 in with small hands and feet. Charles was fair haired taking after his mothers features, whereas David had more the look of his father, David Longfield resigned from the regiment on 21 November 1865, with the honorary rank of Captain. He took up residence with Katrine in Cheshire and in 1869 sold his commission, David Longfield was unable to marry Katrine until Katrine had obtained a divorce on 21 February 1871, after the birth of their first two sons. Beattys birth certificate recorded his mothers surname as Beatty, and his parents eventual marriage at St Michaels Church in Liverpool was kept secret, Beattys early education concentrated on horsemanship, hunting and learning to be a gentleman. Beatty had a relationship with his elder brother Charles, who became his ally against their oppressive. They remained close throughout life, so much so that the only time Beatty felt despair was at his brothers death, Beatty later wrote to his wife about Charles, we lived together, played together, rode together, fought together. His brothers would join the British Army, but early on young David developed an interest in ships. In 1881 Beattys grandfather died and David Longfield succeeded to the 18th century mansion, Borodale, outside Enniscorthy, after retiring from the army David Longfield established a business training horses first in Cheshire and then at The Mount, near Rugby, Warwickshire. On inheriting and following the death of his wife at The Mount, Beatty was educated at Kilkenny College and in 1882 entered Burneys Naval Academy at Gosport, which was a crammer for boys wishing to take the entrance examinations for the Royal Navy. Beatty joined the Royal Navy as a passing into the training ship HMS Britannia tenth out of ninety-nine candidates in January 1884. During his two years at Britannia, moored at Dartmouth, he was three times for various infractions. He passed out of Britannia eighteenth out of the remaining cadets at the end of 1885. Beattys letters home made no complaint about the living conditions in Britannia, and generally he was extrovert, even aggressive. However, he understood how far he could transgress without serious consequences, Beatty was, in February 1886, instead appointed to HMS Alexandra, flagship of Admiral the Duke of Edinburgh, Queen Victorias second son, who was Commander-in-Chief of the Mediterranean Squadron
8.
World War I
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World War I, also known as the First World War, the Great War, or the War to End All Wars, was a global war originating in Europe that lasted from 28 July 1914 to 11 November 1918. More than 70 million military personnel, including 60 million Europeans, were mobilised in one of the largest wars in history and it was one of the deadliest conflicts in history, and paved the way for major political changes, including revolutions in many of the nations involved. The war drew in all the worlds great powers, assembled in two opposing alliances, the Allies versus the Central Powers of Germany and Austria-Hungary. These alliances were reorganised and expanded as more nations entered the war, Italy, Japan, the trigger for the war was the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary, by Yugoslav nationalist Gavrilo Princip in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914. This set off a crisis when Austria-Hungary delivered an ultimatum to the Kingdom of Serbia. Within weeks, the powers were at war and the conflict soon spread around the world. On 25 July Russia began mobilisation and on 28 July, the Austro-Hungarians declared war on Serbia, Germany presented an ultimatum to Russia to demobilise, and when this was refused, declared war on Russia on 1 August. Germany then invaded neutral Belgium and Luxembourg before moving towards France, after the German march on Paris was halted, what became known as the Western Front settled into a battle of attrition, with a trench line that changed little until 1917. On the Eastern Front, the Russian army was successful against the Austro-Hungarians, in November 1914, the Ottoman Empire joined the Central Powers, opening fronts in the Caucasus, Mesopotamia and the Sinai. In 1915, Italy joined the Allies and Bulgaria joined the Central Powers, Romania joined the Allies in 1916, after a stunning German offensive along the Western Front in the spring of 1918, the Allies rallied and drove back the Germans in a series of successful offensives. By the end of the war or soon after, the German Empire, Russian Empire, Austro-Hungarian Empire, national borders were redrawn, with several independent nations restored or created, and Germanys colonies were parceled out among the victors. During the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, the Big Four imposed their terms in a series of treaties, the League of Nations was formed with the aim of preventing any repetition of such a conflict. This effort failed, and economic depression, renewed nationalism, weakened successor states, and feelings of humiliation eventually contributed to World War II. From the time of its start until the approach of World War II, at the time, it was also sometimes called the war to end war or the war to end all wars due to its then-unparalleled scale and devastation. In Canada, Macleans magazine in October 1914 wrote, Some wars name themselves, during the interwar period, the war was most often called the World War and the Great War in English-speaking countries. Will become the first world war in the sense of the word. These began in 1815, with the Holy Alliance between Prussia, Russia, and Austria, when Germany was united in 1871, Prussia became part of the new German nation. Soon after, in October 1873, German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck negotiated the League of the Three Emperors between the monarchs of Austria-Hungary, Russia and Germany
9.
HMS King George V (1911)
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HMS King George V was the lead ship of her class of four dreadnought battleships built for the Royal Navy in the early 1910s. She spent the bulk of her assigned to the Home and Grand Fleets. After the war, King George V became flagship of the Home Fleet, the ship evacuated refugees during the Great fire of Smyrna in September 1922 before returning home at the beginning of 1923. King George V was reduced to reserve and used as a ship until late 1926 and was sold for scrap later in the year in accordance with the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty. The King George V-class ships were designed as enlarged and improved versions of the preceding Orion-class battleship, King George V had an overall length of 594 feet 4 inches, a beam of 89 feet 1 inch and a draught of 28 feet 8 inches. She displaced 25,420 long tons at load and 27,120 long tons at deep load, by 1918. Her crew numbered 869 officers and ratings upon completion and 1,114 in 1916, the ships of the King George V class were powered by two sets of Parsons direct-drive steam turbines, each driving two shafts, using steam provided by 18 coal-burning Babcock & Wilcox boilers. The turbines were rated at 27,000 shaft horsepower and were intended to give the battleships a speed of 21 knots, during her sea trials on 4 November 1912, King George V reached a maximum speed of 22.4 knots from 33,022 shp. She had a range of 5,910 nautical miles at a speed of 10 knots. Like the Orion class, the King George Vs were equipped with 10 breech-loading 13. 5-inch Mark V guns in five hydraulically powered twin-gun turrets, the turrets were designated A, B, Q, X and Y, from front to rear. Their secondary armament consisted of 16 BL 4-inch Mark VII guns, eight of these were mounted in the forward superstructure, four in the aft superstructure, and four in casemates in the side of the hull abreast of the forward main gun turrets, all in single mounts. Four 3-pounder saluting guns were also carried, the ships were equipped with three 21-inch submerged torpedo tubes, one on each broadside and another in the stern, for which 14 torpedoes were provided. The King George V-class ships were protected by a waterline 12-inch armoured belt that extended between the end barbettes and their decks ranged in thickness between 1 inch and 4 inches with the thickest portions protecting the steering gear in the stern. The main battery turret faces were 11 inches thick, and the turrets were supported by 10-inch-thick barbettes, by October 1914, a pair of 3-inch anti-aircraft guns had been added. The torpedo nets were removed in 1915–1916, approximately 80 long tons of additional deck armour was added after the Battle of Jutland and a medium-length rangefinder was added atop the conning tower. Around the same time, the ship was modified to use a kite balloon, by April 1917, the 4-inch guns had been removed from the hull casemates as they were frequently unusable in heavy seas. The casemates were plated over and some of the compartments were used for accommodations and that same year, the spotting top was enlarged and the foremast was fitted with full-sized tripod legs to handle the additional weight. Her stern torpedo tube was removed in 1917–1918 and flying-off platforms were fitted on the roofs of B and Q turrets during 1918
10.
HMS Thunderer (1911)
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HMS Thunderer was the fourth and last Orion-class dreadnought battleship built for the Royal Navy in the early 1910s. She spent the bulk of her assigned to the Home. After the Grand Fleet was dissolved in early 1919, Thunderer was transferred to back to the Home Fleet for a few months before she was assigned to the Reserve Fleet. The ship was converted into a ship for naval cadets in 1921. While being towed to the scrapyard, Thunderer ran aground, the ship was refloated, in recognition of these improvements, the class was sometimes called super-dreadnoughts. The ships had a length of 581 feet, a beam of 88 feet 6 inches. They displaced 21,922 long tons at load and 25,596 long tons at deep load as built. Her crew numbered 738 officers and ratings when completed in 1912 and 1,107 in 1917, the Orion class was powered by two sets of Parsons direct-drive steam turbines, each driving two shafts, using steam provided by 18 coal-burning Babcock & Wilcox boilers. The turbines were rated at 27,000 shaft horsepower and were intended to give the battleships a speed of 21 knots. During her sea trials 0n 5 March 1912, Thunderer reached a speed of 20.8 knots from 27,427 shp. The ships had a range of 6,730 nautical miles at a speed of 10 knots. The Orion class was equipped with 10 breech-loading 13. 5-inch Mark V guns in five hydraulically powered twin-gun turrets, the turrets were designated A, B, Q, X and Y, from front to rear. Their secondary armament consisted of 16 BL 4-inch Mark VII guns and these guns were split evenly between the forward and aft superstructure, all in single mounts. Four 3-pounder saluting guns were also carried, the ships were equipped with three 21-inch submerged torpedo tubes, one on each broadside and another in the stern, for which 20 torpedoes were provided. The Orions were protected by a waterline 12-inch armoured belt that extended between the end barbettes and their decks ranged in thickness between 1 inch and 4 inches with the thickest portions protecting the steering gear in the stern. The main battery turret faces were 11 inches thick, and the turrets were supported by 10-inch-thick barbettes, a prototype fire-control director was installed sometime before November 1912, on a platform below the spotting top. In 1914 the shelter-deck guns were enclosed in casemates and by October 1914, additional deck armour was added after the Battle of Jutland in May 1916. Around the same time, a pair of guns were removed from the aft superstructure
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United Kingdom
Royal Navy
Historic fleets and naval commands of the Royal Navy