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HMS Vanguard (1909)
Encyclopedia
The eighth HMS Vanguard of the British Royal Navy
was a St Vincent-class
battleship
, an enhancement of the "" design built by Vickers
at Barrow-in-Furness
. She was designed and built during the Anglo-German naval race and spent her life in the British Home Fleet
.
At the outbreak of World War I, Vanguard joined the First Battle Squadron
at Scapa Flow
, and fought in the Battle of Jutland
as part of the Fourth Battle Squadron
. She was a part of the action from beginning to end, but did not suffer any damage or casualties.
Just before midnight on Monday, 9 July 1917 at Scapa Flow, Vanguard suffered an explosion, probably caused by an unnoticed stokehold fire heating cordite
stored against an adjacent bulkhead in one of the two magazines
which served the amidships gun turret
s 'P' and 'Q'. She sank almost instantly, killing an estimated 804 men; there were only two survivors. The site is now designated as a controlled site under the Protection of Military Remains Act. One of the casualties of the disaster was Captain Kyōsuke Eto
, a military observer
from the Imperial Japanese Navy
, which was allied with the Royal Navy at the time through the Anglo-Japanese Alliance
.
In terms of loss of life, the destruction of the Vanguard remains the most catastrophic accidental explosion in the history of the UK, and one of the worst accidental losses of the Royal Navy.
type, or for three if no acceptable understanding could be reached with the other major naval powers at the Hague Conference. In the event no such understanding could be arrived at, and the St Vincent class, originally planned to contain two ships (HMS Collingwood
and HMS St Vincent
) was expanded to include HMS Vanguard.
HMS Vanguard was ordered on 6 February 1908 from Vickers
yard in Barrow
. She was laid down on 2 April 1908 and launched on 22 February 1909. She began trials in November 1909, completed in February 1910 and on 1 March 1910 she commissioned at Devonport
in the first division of the Home Fleet.
The Mark XI gun fired a shell weighing 850 pounds, and could fire two rounds per minute, although to allow for the spotting of shell fall one round per minute was more usual.
Although ten guns were shipped the lack of any facility for cross-deck firing by "P" and "Q" turrets restricted the broadside
to a maximum of eight.
The secondary armament at completion of the ship was twenty 4-inch (102mm) 50-calibre QF
(quick-firing) Mark III guns in single mounts, distributed in the superstructure and on the roofs of "A" and "Y" turrets. The guns on "A" turret, in spite of being provided with a screen, proved to be badly affected by blast from the nearby 4-inch guns in the forward superstructure, and were removed before the outbreak of the First World War. Extra guns were placed in the forward superstructure, but when later in the war the arming of merchant ships to combat the submarine assault in the Atlantic assumed a high priority, small calibre guns were taken from this and other battleships. In 1917 Vanguard retained thirteen guns of this calibre.
Vanguard also shipped four 3-pounder saluting guns. In addition she had three 18-inch torpedo tubes, one on either beam and one firing astern. There is no record of torpedoes being fired in action from this ship.
The after bulkhead, eight inches in thickness, ran across the ship between the after ends of the main belt. Forward there were two bulkheads; one five inches thick level with the forward end of "A" barbette, and one of four inches slightly less than halfway between this one and the stem
.
The strength of the decks varied in a complex fashion, dependent of the presence or absence of overlying structures. Counting from the top, the maindeck was of between 1.5 inches and 0.75 inches; the middle deck was 1.75 inches; and the lower deck was between 3 inches and 1.5 inches.
The turret faces had eleven inches of armour; the barbette trunks had five to nine inches, being less where protection was already afforded by nearby structures.
The conning tower had armour varying between eleven inches to eight inches, again according to the degree of protection afforded by nearby structures.
direct drive turbines, driving four shafts. Steam was provided by eighteen Babcock and Wilcox
large-tube boilers, with a working pressure of 235 pounds per square inch. The designed Shaft Horse Power (SHP) was 24,500, and the design maximum speed at this SHP was 21 knots. A full fuel load was 2,700 tons of coal and 850 tons of oil, which gave a radius of action of 6.900 nautical miles at ten knots
On trials she exceeded her design speed, delivering a speed of 22.1 knots from 25,800 SHP.
On 29 July, in common with much of the grand fleet, she moved to Scapa Flow
, at that time the main base of the battle fleet in time of war. On 1 September 1914 at about 18.00 she opened fire on a target which was believed to be a submarine but which proved not to be.
In April 1916 she was transferred to the Fourth Battle Squadron
(4BS), a move which affected her position in the chain of command but not her geographical location. On 31 May she sailed with the Grand Fleet, and was present at the Battle of Jutland
. After the deployment of the battle fleet she lay in sixteenth place in the line. She took part in the action against the head of the German High Seas Fleet
and against the German battle cruisers; it is not known if she scored any hits, and she herself received no hits at all. She returned with the fleet to Scapa flow, and on 9 July 1917 spontaneously blew up.
A court of inquiry heard accounts from many witnesses on nearby ships. They accepted the consensus that there had been a small explosion with a white glare between the foremast and "A" turret, followed after a brief interval by two much larger explosions. The Court decided, on the balance of the available evidence, that the main detonations were in either "P" magazine, or "Q" magazine, or both. A great deal of debris thrown out by the explosion landed on nearby ships; a section of plating measuring some five feet by six feet landed on board . It was found possible to match it with a sister ship, and it was found to be from the central dynamo room, which reinforced the evidence suggesting that the explosion took place in the central part of the ship.
Although the explosion was obviously an explosion of the cordite
charges in a main magazine, the reason for it was much less obvious. There were a number of theories.
The inquiry found that some of the cordite on board, which had been temporarily offloaded in December 1916 and catalogued at that time, was past its stated safe life. The possibility of spontaneous detonation was raised, but could not be proved. It was also noted that a number of ship's boilers were still in use, and a number of the watertight doors which should have been closed in war-time, were open as the ship was in port. It was suggested that this might contribute to there being a dangerously high temperature in the magazines.
The final conclusion of the board was that a fire started in a 4-inch magazine, perhaps when a raised temperature caused spontaneous ignition of cordite, spreading to one or the other main magazines which then exploded.
Eight hundred and four men lost their lives. Two survived.
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...
was a St Vincent-class
St. Vincent class battleship
The St. Vincent class battleships consisted of three ships of the Royal Navy laid down in 1908, and completed between May 1909 and April 1910. They were St. Vincent, Collingwood, and Vanguard. Vanguard was destroyed in an ammunition explosion, probably due to bagged cordite.Visually, they were very...
battleship
Battleship
A battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of heavy caliber guns. Battleships were larger, better armed and armored than cruisers and destroyers. As the largest armed ships in a fleet, battleships were used to attain command of the sea and represented the apex of a...
, an enhancement of the "" design built by Vickers
Vickers
Vickers was a famous name in British engineering that existed through many companies from 1828 until 1999.-Early history:Vickers was formed in Sheffield as a steel foundry by the miller Edward Vickers and his father-in-law George Naylor in 1828. Naylor was a partner in the foundry Naylor &...
at Barrow-in-Furness
Barrow-in-Furness
Barrow-in-Furness is an industrial town and seaport which forms about half the territory of the wider Borough of Barrow-in-Furness in the county of Cumbria, England. It lies north of Liverpool, northwest of Manchester and southwest from the county town of Carlisle...
. She was designed and built during the Anglo-German naval race and spent her life in the British Home Fleet
British Home Fleet
The Home Fleet was a fleet of the Royal Navy which operated in the United Kingdom's territorial waters from 1902 with intervals until 1967.-Pre–First World War:...
.
At the outbreak of World War I, Vanguard joined the First Battle Squadron
1st Battle Squadron (United Kingdom)
The British 1st Battle Squadron was a squadron of battleships, initially part of the Royal Navy's Home Fleet, renamed the Grand Fleet during World War I...
at Scapa Flow
Scapa Flow
right|thumb|Scapa Flow viewed from its eastern endScapa Flow is a body of water in the Orkney Islands, Scotland, United Kingdom, sheltered by the islands of Mainland, Graemsay, Burray, South Ronaldsay and Hoy. It is about...
, and fought in the Battle of Jutland
Battle of Jutland
The Battle of Jutland was a naval battle between the British Royal Navy's Grand Fleet and the Imperial German Navy's High Seas Fleet during the First World War. The battle was fought on 31 May and 1 June 1916 in the North Sea near Jutland, Denmark. It was the largest naval battle and the only...
as part of the Fourth Battle Squadron
4th Battle Squadron (United Kingdom)
The British Royal Navy 4th Battle Squadron was a squadron consisting of battleships. The 4th Battle Squadron was initially part of the Royal Navy's Home Fleet. During World War I the Home Fleet was renamed the Grand Fleet...
. She was a part of the action from beginning to end, but did not suffer any damage or casualties.
Just before midnight on Monday, 9 July 1917 at Scapa Flow, Vanguard suffered an explosion, probably caused by an unnoticed stokehold fire heating cordite
Cordite
Cordite is a family of smokeless propellants developed and produced in the United Kingdom from 1889 to replace gunpowder as a military propellant. Like gunpowder, cordite is classified as a low explosive because of its slow burning rates and consequently low brisance...
stored against an adjacent bulkhead in one of the two magazines
Magazine (artillery)
Magazine is the name for an item or place within which ammunition is stored. It is taken from the Arabic word "makahazin" meaning "warehouse".-Ammunition storage areas:...
which served the amidships gun turret
Gun turret
A gun turret is a weapon mount that protects the crew or mechanism of a projectile-firing weapon and at the same time lets the weapon be aimed and fired in many directions.The turret is also a rotating weapon platform...
s 'P' and 'Q'. She sank almost instantly, killing an estimated 804 men; there were only two survivors. The site is now designated as a controlled site under the Protection of Military Remains Act. One of the casualties of the disaster was Captain Kyōsuke Eto
Kyōsuke Eto
was a career officer in the Imperial Japanese Navy in the Russo-Japanese War and in World War I. He was killed in the disaster of 1917.-Biography:...
, a military observer
Military attaché
A military attaché is a military expert who is attached to a diplomatic mission . This post is normally filled by a high-ranking military officer who retains the commission while serving in an embassy...
from the Imperial Japanese Navy
Imperial Japanese Navy
The Imperial Japanese Navy was the navy of the Empire of Japan from 1869 until 1947, when it was dissolved following Japan's constitutional renunciation of the use of force as a means of settling international disputes...
, which was allied with the Royal Navy at the time through the Anglo-Japanese Alliance
Anglo-Japanese Alliance
The first was signed in London at what is now the Lansdowne Club, on January 30, 1902, by Lord Lansdowne and Hayashi Tadasu . A diplomatic milestone for its ending of Britain's splendid isolation, the alliance was renewed and extended in scope twice, in 1905 and 1911, before its demise in 1921...
.
In terms of loss of life, the destruction of the Vanguard remains the most catastrophic accidental explosion in the history of the UK, and one of the worst accidental losses of the Royal Navy.
Origin
The naval estimates for 1907-8, (the amount of naval spending being requested) presented to the House of Commons by the First Lord, included funding for the construction of two battleships of the dreadnoughtHMS Dreadnought (1906)
HMS Dreadnought was a battleship of the British Royal Navy that revolutionised naval power. Her entry into service in 1906 represented such a marked advance in naval technology that her name came to be associated with an entire generation of battleships, the "dreadnoughts", as well as the class of...
type, or for three if no acceptable understanding could be reached with the other major naval powers at the Hague Conference. In the event no such understanding could be arrived at, and the St Vincent class, originally planned to contain two ships (HMS Collingwood
HMS Collingwood
Three ships and one shore establishment of the British Royal Navy have been named HMS Collingwood, after Admiral Cuthbert Collingwood, 1st Baron Collingwood....
and HMS St Vincent
HMS St Vincent
Four ships and three shore establishments of the Royal Navy have been named HMS St Vincent: was an 8-gun fireship captured from the French in 1692 and sold in 1698. was a 14-gun sloop, previously the Spanish ship San Vicente. She was captured in 1780 and sold was sold in 1783...
) was expanded to include HMS Vanguard.
HMS Vanguard was ordered on 6 February 1908 from Vickers
Vickers
Vickers was a famous name in British engineering that existed through many companies from 1828 until 1999.-Early history:Vickers was formed in Sheffield as a steel foundry by the miller Edward Vickers and his father-in-law George Naylor in 1828. Naylor was a partner in the foundry Naylor &...
yard in Barrow
Barrow-in-Furness
Barrow-in-Furness is an industrial town and seaport which forms about half the territory of the wider Borough of Barrow-in-Furness in the county of Cumbria, England. It lies north of Liverpool, northwest of Manchester and southwest from the county town of Carlisle...
. She was laid down on 2 April 1908 and launched on 22 February 1909. She began trials in November 1909, completed in February 1910 and on 1 March 1910 she commissioned at Devonport
HMNB Devonport
Her Majesty's Naval Base Devonport , is one of three operating bases in the United Kingdom for the Royal Navy . HMNB Devonport is located in Devonport, in the west of the city of Plymouth in Devon, England...
in the first division of the Home Fleet.
Armament
The main armament consisted of ten 12-inch (305mm) Mark XI 50-calibre guns, grouped in pairs in five turrets. (see footnote). There was one turret ("A") turret on the forecastle on the centreline; one turret on the quarterdeck ("Y") and one between the after funnel and the after superstructure ("X"), also both on the centreline; and two wing turrets ("P" and "Q"), situated one on either beam just astern of the fore funnel. All turrets except "A" were on maindeck level. "A" and "Y" turrets had a field of fire of approximately 270 degrees over the bow and stern respectively. "X" had a field of approximately 100 degrees on either beam. Both "P" and "Q" had in theory a 180 degree field from right ahead to right astern; in practice firing at any angle less than 30 degrees from the keel line produced unacceptable blast damage to the ship's own superstructure.The Mark XI gun fired a shell weighing 850 pounds, and could fire two rounds per minute, although to allow for the spotting of shell fall one round per minute was more usual.
Although ten guns were shipped the lack of any facility for cross-deck firing by "P" and "Q" turrets restricted the broadside
Broadside
A broadside is the side of a ship; the battery of cannon on one side of a warship; or their simultaneous fire in naval warfare.-Age of Sail:...
to a maximum of eight.
The secondary armament at completion of the ship was twenty 4-inch (102mm) 50-calibre QF
Quick-firing gun
A quick-firing gun is an artillery piece, typically a gun or howitzer, which has several characteristics which taken together mean the weapon can fire at a fast rate...
(quick-firing) Mark III guns in single mounts, distributed in the superstructure and on the roofs of "A" and "Y" turrets. The guns on "A" turret, in spite of being provided with a screen, proved to be badly affected by blast from the nearby 4-inch guns in the forward superstructure, and were removed before the outbreak of the First World War. Extra guns were placed in the forward superstructure, but when later in the war the arming of merchant ships to combat the submarine assault in the Atlantic assumed a high priority, small calibre guns were taken from this and other battleships. In 1917 Vanguard retained thirteen guns of this calibre.
Vanguard also shipped four 3-pounder saluting guns. In addition she had three 18-inch torpedo tubes, one on either beam and one firing astern. There is no record of torpedoes being fired in action from this ship.
Armour
The whole waterline was protected, to a variable extent. The main armour belt was ten inches thick, and ran from a point level with the forward end of "A" barbette to the after end of "Y". Armour two inches thick extended all the way from the belt to both ends of the ship. An upper belt of eight inches thickness extended above the whole length of the main belt.The after bulkhead, eight inches in thickness, ran across the ship between the after ends of the main belt. Forward there were two bulkheads; one five inches thick level with the forward end of "A" barbette, and one of four inches slightly less than halfway between this one and the stem
Stem (ship)
The stem is the very most forward part of a boat or ship's bow and is an extension of the keel itself and curves up to the wale of the boat. The stem is more often found on wooden boats or ships, but not exclusively...
.
The strength of the decks varied in a complex fashion, dependent of the presence or absence of overlying structures. Counting from the top, the maindeck was of between 1.5 inches and 0.75 inches; the middle deck was 1.75 inches; and the lower deck was between 3 inches and 1.5 inches.
The turret faces had eleven inches of armour; the barbette trunks had five to nine inches, being less where protection was already afforded by nearby structures.
The conning tower had armour varying between eleven inches to eight inches, again according to the degree of protection afforded by nearby structures.
Machinery
Vanguard was powered by four ParsonsParsons Marine Steam Turbine Company
Parsons Marine Steam Turbine Company was a British engineering company based in Wallsend, North England, on the River Tyne.-History:The company was founded by Charles Algernon Parsons in 1897 with £500,000 of capital, and specialised in building the steam turbine engines that he had invented for...
direct drive turbines, driving four shafts. Steam was provided by eighteen Babcock and Wilcox
Babcock and Wilcox
The Babcock & Wilcox Company is a U.S.-based company that provides design, engineering, manufacturing, construction and facilities management services to nuclear, renewable, fossil power, industrial and government customers worldwide. B&W's boilers supply more than 300,000 megawatts of installed...
large-tube boilers, with a working pressure of 235 pounds per square inch. The designed Shaft Horse Power (SHP) was 24,500, and the design maximum speed at this SHP was 21 knots. A full fuel load was 2,700 tons of coal and 850 tons of oil, which gave a radius of action of 6.900 nautical miles at ten knots
On trials she exceeded her design speed, delivering a speed of 22.1 knots from 25,800 SHP.
Career
Following her commissioning she remained with the Grand fleet, taking part in periodic exercises. She was present at the Coronation Fleet review on 24 June 1910. She underwent a refit in 1911-12, leading otherwise an uneventful existence .On 29 July, in common with much of the grand fleet, she moved to Scapa Flow
Scapa Flow
right|thumb|Scapa Flow viewed from its eastern endScapa Flow is a body of water in the Orkney Islands, Scotland, United Kingdom, sheltered by the islands of Mainland, Graemsay, Burray, South Ronaldsay and Hoy. It is about...
, at that time the main base of the battle fleet in time of war. On 1 September 1914 at about 18.00 she opened fire on a target which was believed to be a submarine but which proved not to be.
In April 1916 she was transferred to the Fourth Battle Squadron
4th Battle Squadron (United Kingdom)
The British Royal Navy 4th Battle Squadron was a squadron consisting of battleships. The 4th Battle Squadron was initially part of the Royal Navy's Home Fleet. During World War I the Home Fleet was renamed the Grand Fleet...
(4BS), a move which affected her position in the chain of command but not her geographical location. On 31 May she sailed with the Grand Fleet, and was present at the Battle of Jutland
Battle of Jutland
The Battle of Jutland was a naval battle between the British Royal Navy's Grand Fleet and the Imperial German Navy's High Seas Fleet during the First World War. The battle was fought on 31 May and 1 June 1916 in the North Sea near Jutland, Denmark. It was the largest naval battle and the only...
. After the deployment of the battle fleet she lay in sixteenth place in the line. She took part in the action against the head of the German High Seas Fleet
High Seas Fleet
The High Seas Fleet was the battle fleet of the German Empire and saw action during World War I. The formation was created in February 1907, when the Home Fleet was renamed as the High Seas Fleet. Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz was the architect of the fleet; he envisioned a force powerful enough to...
and against the German battle cruisers; it is not known if she scored any hits, and she herself received no hits at all. She returned with the fleet to Scapa flow, and on 9 July 1917 spontaneously blew up.
Explosion
On the afternoon of 9 July 1917 the ship's crew had been exercising, practising the routine for abandoning ship. She anchored in the northern part of Scapa flow at about 18.30. There is no record of anyone detecting anything amiss until the moment of the explosion at 23.20.A court of inquiry heard accounts from many witnesses on nearby ships. They accepted the consensus that there had been a small explosion with a white glare between the foremast and "A" turret, followed after a brief interval by two much larger explosions. The Court decided, on the balance of the available evidence, that the main detonations were in either "P" magazine, or "Q" magazine, or both. A great deal of debris thrown out by the explosion landed on nearby ships; a section of plating measuring some five feet by six feet landed on board . It was found possible to match it with a sister ship, and it was found to be from the central dynamo room, which reinforced the evidence suggesting that the explosion took place in the central part of the ship.
Although the explosion was obviously an explosion of the cordite
Cordite
Cordite is a family of smokeless propellants developed and produced in the United Kingdom from 1889 to replace gunpowder as a military propellant. Like gunpowder, cordite is classified as a low explosive because of its slow burning rates and consequently low brisance...
charges in a main magazine, the reason for it was much less obvious. There were a number of theories.
The inquiry found that some of the cordite on board, which had been temporarily offloaded in December 1916 and catalogued at that time, was past its stated safe life. The possibility of spontaneous detonation was raised, but could not be proved. It was also noted that a number of ship's boilers were still in use, and a number of the watertight doors which should have been closed in war-time, were open as the ship was in port. It was suggested that this might contribute to there being a dangerously high temperature in the magazines.
The final conclusion of the board was that a fire started in a 4-inch magazine, perhaps when a raised temperature caused spontaneous ignition of cordite, spreading to one or the other main magazines which then exploded.
Eight hundred and four men lost their lives. Two survived.
External links
- Maritimequest HMS Vanguard Photo Gallery
- The Orcadian "Research puts Vanguard loss at 843"