HMS New Zealand was one of three Indefatigable-class battlecruisers. Launched in 1911, the ship was funded by the government of New Zealand as a gift to Britain, and she was commissioned into the Royal Navy in 1912. She had been intended for the China Station, but was released by the New Zealand government at the request of the Admiralty for service in British waters.
New Zealand in Australia, May 1919
Starboard elevation and deck plan as depicted in Brassey's Naval Annual, 1915. Note: plan is of Invincible-class battlecruisers; the Indefatigable-class had a third superstructure element with 'P' & 'Q' turrets more widely spaced.
New Zealand's bell; this bell had previously been used on the battleship of the same name
William Lionel Wylie, Tower House, Portsmouth [HMS “New Zealand” fitting out]
The Raid on Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby on 16 December 1914 was an attack by the Imperial German Navy on the British ports of Scarborough, Hartlepool, West Hartlepool and Whitby. The bombardments caused hundreds of civilian casualties and resulted in public outrage in Britain against the German Navy for the raid and the Royal Navy for failing to prevent it.
British recruiting poster picturing damage from German naval artillery to a civilian house: "No 2 Wykeham Street, Scarborough....four people were killed in this house including the wife...and two children, the youngest aged 5."
In Hartlepool near Heugh Battery, a plaque in Redheugh Gardens War Memorial "marks the place where the first ...(German shell) struck... (and) the first soldier was killed on British soil by enemy action in the Great War 1914–1918".