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HMS Rodney & HMS Nelson World Naval Ships Forums Archive


HMS Rodney & HMS Nelson


Posts 1 to 50


As I have some great shots of these two it is about time I put them together in a gallery for you all to gain access to.
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And these as well...
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And the last couple of Nelson...
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Excellent Pics Terry. Thanks for those. John

A pleasure John.

It would seem that the flag deck on these ships is 'neath the after mast,and not attached to the bridge as is usual. Anyone any info on this? Tackline.

Once again another nice set of pictures well done Terry,Here's a shot of NELSON Leaving the Tyne. Dave
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Thanks a lot Dave.

Not as good as yours Terry but a few more of the R & N. Bob.
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Thats ok Bob - there were a couple there I hadn`t seen.

Hi, We seem to have the same photo source! One of my late Uncle's collection of HMS Nelson! Cheers, Hugh
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Here's a stunning photo of Hms Nelson, enjoy! meanwhile anyone got decent sized photo's of Hms Kelly and Hms Kashmir?

sorry, here's the photo
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Excellent picture Alan. It just emphasises what a brute she was! As regards to the Kelly have a look here. [url]http://www.worldnavalships.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1292&highlight=kelly[/url] Regards, Bob.

A few shots of [I]Rodney[/I] here I don't see on the thread Bob, so I hope you like them. The unusual first one, painting the bridge at Scapa Flow in 1942, is from the IWM, and five others are from the MoD, and published in James G. Butler's book [I]Fighting Ships in Perspective[/I] Ian Allen Ltd, London 1981. The second last, deck hockey, with HMS [I]Hood[/I] in the background, is from the [I]Ships Monthly[/I] issue of May 1975.
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IMhO, a very nice painting of Nelson.............dramatic perspective. DFO :)
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[QUOTE=alanbenn;15205]Here's a stunning photo of Hms Nelson, enjoy! [/QUOTE] This really was the most dramatic and evocative of photographs in all kinds of ways: the big unusual-shaped ship in seemingly impossible proximity to the land - like it is spearing the coast; the foreground houses with a bus trundling down the street; and the sense of the weather. Thanks for posting. If you don't mind I've downloaded it to try out as a screen saver, altho I'm worried the coloured icons might spoil the overall effect.
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Sorry to keep posting these two from a 1937 Navy Week edition of the [I]Illustrated London News [/I]but I felt they should be here to keep the collection complete when we want to look at them again. There was just something about the unique long-bow design of these powerful ships that somehow lent them to dramatic photography (I get these enthusiams, btw - I feel the same about the 19th century photographs of Frank Meadow Sutcliffe around Whitby, if anyone knows his work. Staying in the Dales, I once haunted the Whitby waterfront just because of them. Well, the sea apprenticeship of Captain James Cook, RN, too.:))
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In response to your comment on visual appeal of these ships: In my opinion, they have a no-reserve appearance, i.e., what you see is what you get. There are no hidden turrets abaft the upperworks, no embellishment or pretense of grace or elegance to their lines---only the sheer spectacle of big guns and plenty of them. That makes a powerful visual statement, especially in the context of contemporary Royal Navy capital ships which, by and large, tended toward a certain elegance and sophistication; they mixed attractive lines with a deadly punch. Not so the NelRods. They [I]confronted[/I] you, dispelling any misunderstanding as to their purpose! Call it "brutal honesty"?

HMS Nelson,built by Armstrong,launched 3/9/1925.Arrived at Inverkeithing for breaking up,15/3/1949. The three turrets from forward to aft were "A", "B" and "X". The guns received individual nicknames being known as Happy, Grumpy, Sneezy, Dopey, Sleepy, Bashful, Doc, Mickey and Minnie, sometime after the release of the film Snow White in 1937. HMS Nelson was commissioned in August 1927 and joined by her sister ship Rodney (built by Cammell Laird) in November. She cost 7.504 million British Pounds to build, and made partial use of the material prepared for the cancelled HMS Anson and Howe, planned sisterships of HMS Hood. She was the flagship of the Home Fleet from launch. In 1931, the crews of both Nelson and Rodney took part in the Invergordon Mutiny. On 12 January 1934 she ran aground on Hamilton's Shoal, just outside Portsmouth, as she was about to embark with the Home Fleet to the West Indies. HMS Nelson was modified little during the 1930s, and was with the Home Fleet when war broke out in September 1939. On 25–26 September, she performed escort duty during the salvage and rescue operations of the submarine HMS Spearfish. Nelson was first deployed in the North Sea in October against a German formation of cruisers and destroyers, all of which easily evaded her. On 30 October, she was unsuccessfully attacked by U-56 near the Orkney Islands, being hit by 3 torpedoes, none of which exploded. She was later again shown up for pace in the futile pursuit of German battlecruisers. In December 1939, she struck a mine (laid by U-31) off the Scottish coast and was laid up for repairs until August 1940. Upon return to service, she was deployed in the English Channel. From April to June 1941 she was on convoy escort in the Atlantic. In late May, she was in Freetown, and was ordered to Gibraltar to stand by to take part in the chase of the German battleship Bismarck. In June 1941, Nelson, now in Gibraltar, was assigned to Force H, operating in the Mediterranean as an escort. On 27 September 1941, she was extensively damaged by a Regia Aeronautica torpedo strike, and was under repair in Britain until May 1942. She returned to Force H as the flagship in August 1942, performing escort duties for supply convoys running to Malta. She supported Operation Torch around Algeria in November 1942, the invasion of Sicily in July 1943, and the Salerno operation in September 1943 by coastal bombardment. The Italian armistice was signed between Eisenhower and Marshal Pietro Badoglio aboard Nelson on 29 September. HMS Nelson returned to England in November 1943 for a refit including extensive additions to her anti-aircraft defences. Returning to action, she supported the Normandy landings but hit two mines on 18 June 1944, and was sent to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, for repairs. She returned to Britain in January 1945, and then was deployed to the Indian Ocean, arriving in Colombo in July. She was used around the Malayan Peninsula for 3 months; the Japanese forces there formally surrendered aboard her. HMS Nelson returned home in November 1945, as the flagship of the Home Fleet, until reduced to a training vessel in July 1946 and decommissioned in February 1948. She was used as a target vessel for bombing exercises for a few months before being scrapped on 15 March 1949 at Inverkeithing. B a t t l e H o n o u r s-MALTA CONVOYS 1941-42 - NORTH AFRICA 1942 -43 - MEDITERRANEAN 1943 - SICILY 1943 - SALERNO 1943 - NORMANDY
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HMS Rodney,built by Cammell Laird,launched 17/12/1925.Arrived at Inverkeithing for breaking up,26/3/1948. From commissioning until World War II broke out in September 1939, Rodney spent her entire time with the British Atlantic Fleet or Home Fleet. In 1931, the crews of both ships took part in the Invergordon Mutiny. In late December 1939, she was under refit and repair because she was having steering gear problems. She was damaged by German aircraft at Karmøy, near Bergen on 9 April 1940 when hit by a 500 kg (1,103 lb) bomb that pierced the armoured deck, but did not explode. On 13 September 1940, she was transferred from Scapa Flow to Rosyth with orders to operate in the English Channel when the German invasion of Britain was expected. In November and December, she did convoy escort duties between Britain and Halifax, Nova Scotia. In January 1941, she participated in the chase of the German battlecruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau, with no success. On 16 March, however, while escorting a convoy in the North Atlantic, she made contact with the German battlecruisers, but no battle followed, as the German ships turned away when they realized that they were facing superior firepower. In May 1941 while commanded by Admiral Frederick Dalrymple-Hamilton, Rodney and two destroyers were escorting the troop ship RMS Britannic to Canada; the Britannic was taking civilians over to Canada, and would be bringing Canadian troops back to Britain. It was during this run on 24 May that she was called to join in the pursuit of the German battleship Bismarck. On 26 May, she joined up with King George V; Admiral Sir John Tovey sent the destroyers home because they were low on fuel, and had Rodney fall in behind King George V for the battle against the Bismarck the next day. On the early morning of 27 May 1941, along with the battleship King George V and the cruisers Norfolk, and Dorsetshire, she engaged the Bismarck, which had had its rudder machinery damaged by a Swordfish-launched torpedo the day before. After Bismarck's guns were knocked out, Rodney closed with Bismarck until she was firing essentially a flat trajectory, and spotters could actually follow the shells to the target. One 16-inch (410 mm) shell was tracked from the gun to where it hit the face of Bismarck's #2 gunhouse (turret Bruno) and exploded, blowing out the back of the gunhouse. She later broke off action and was ordered home because of her low fuel status, though not before firing torpedoes into both sides of the stricken German battleship. This is believed to be the only time one battleship torpedoed another in battle. After this, she went to Boston, Massachusetts' South Boston Navy Yard, for engine repairs. This is significant because the United States would not formally enter the war for several months and the stateside docking of the Rodney illustrated the U.S. government's true sympathies in the growing global conflict. Since the repairs would take several weeks to complete, the Rodney's crew was furloughed to local Civilian Conservation Corps camps. In the interim, some members of the crew struck up lasting relationships with American civilians. In September, Rodney was stationed with Force H in Gibraltar, escorting convoys to Malta. In November, she returned home, and was stationed in Iceland for a month. Then she underwent refit and repair until May 1942. After the refit, she returned to Force H, where she again escorted Malta convoys and took part in Operation Torch, the invasion of Northwest Africa. Later, she was involved with landings in Sicily and Salerno. From October 1943, she was in the Home Fleet, and took part in the Normandy invasion in June 1944, destroying targets at Caen and Alderney. In September 1944, she performed escort duties with a Murmansk convoy. During the entire war, she steamed over 156,000 nautical miles (289,000 km) with no engine overhaul after 1942. Because of her frequent machinery problems and the fact that she had not been upgraded to the extent that her sister Nelson had, starting in December 1944, she was put in reserve in Scapa Flow, with her crew assigned to new construction. She remained there until she was sold for scrap in February 1948. She was scrapped starting 26 March 1948 at Inverkeithing. B a t t l e H o n o u r s- NORWAY 1940 - ATLANTIC 1940-41 - BISMARCK Action 1941 - MALTA CONVOYS 1941-42 - NORTH AFRICA 1942-43 - SICILY 1943 - SALERNO 1943 - MEDITERRANEAN 1943 - NORMANDY 1944 - ENGLISH CHANNEL 1944 - ARCTIC 1944
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Two interesting posts Bob - I have only now noticed them!!:)

Hi Terry Two photos of Nelson" taken during 1931, first passing through the Pedro Miguel Locks on 6.3.1931, the largest Battleship to do so at the time., the second taken passing other ships of the Atlantic Fleet en route to Gibraltar on 24.3.1931
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Thanks for posting those Dave. The first one especially is a really great photo and if you look at Bob Batstigers post #9 above is another picture taken at the same time as his 6th picture along...:) In fact co-incidentally I think your second picture was taken at the same time as his 9th picture again in post number #9!!

Yesterday and today:
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This photographic postcard of Rodney gives a really good idea of how huge she actually was.
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Small photo of the HMS Nelson:
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Smashing pix of Rodney guys, oh and Nelson!! Mik

Once again -- HMS Rodney:
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Nice pic of Rodney, thanks for that one Antoine Mik

Two side views of these ships in camo (1942). HMS Nelson: [ATTACH]78781[/ATTACH] HMS Rodney: [ATTACH]78782[/ATTACH]
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Thanks for those pictures my friend!

[QUOTE=astraltrader;12453]Thanks a lot Dave.[/QUOTE] Great pictures my Grandfather was a 4.7inch gunner on the Nelson 42/43 during pedestal..just found this site love it!!

Glad you like us Grant. I have this picture I recently discovered but I am not sure whether it is of Nelson or Rodney. A good picture nevertheless!
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Good view! Thanks, Terry! It's Rodney.

The quality and quantity of picture everyone has never ceases to amaze me. Thanks to all who have posted!

I don't know if this has been discussed before, I am fairly new to the board and haven't seen anything pertaining to this question and I thought that with all the knowledgeable people here I could get an answer. Why was the main armament all concentrated forward on these ships? It seems to have been a fad, with the French also trying it and the Japanese with some of their cruisers. My thoughts are it was perhaps an experiment in order to be able to concentrate the armor protection? Would there have been any other reasons? Obviously it was decided that there was no great advantage to this arrangement as future battleships went back to the more conventional design. I would be interested in reading what others have to say. Being an American I don't think the US Navy ever thought of doing this but it has always fascinated me.

Hi Skipperbob.I think the reason for this armament layout falls to the Washington Treaty.It does make use of easier armour,without compromise of machinery space armour,But I do believe the original plans would have put a third triple turret aft? Don't quote me on that though.Terry I Believe your picture does show Nelson,As I have one about the same period,showing Rodney,with a Sea Walrus on 'C' Turret. Many Regards Steve.

skipperbob Steve is right. If you go to the HMS Nelson Thread you will find the discussion about it [url]http://www.worldnavalships.com/forums/showthread.php?t=782[/url]

[QUOTE=kronserg;121289]Good view! Thanks, Terry! It's Rodney.[/QUOTE] For what its worth, as they are far from being my favourite ships, I am with Kronserg on this one. My opinion is that it is RODNEY!! Regards stontamar

Thanks Krons and Stontamar - Rodney it is then!

Very simple way to distinguish prewar-era's Rodney from Nelson if the forward part of the starboard is visible only.:) [ATTACH]80836[/ATTACH]
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[QUOTE=qprdave;121325]skipperbob Steve is right. If you go to the HMS Nelson Thread you will find the discussion about it [url]http://www.worldnavalships.com/forums/showthread.php?t=782[/url][/QUOTE] Thanks very much for the direction!

[QUOTE=astraltrader;121260]Glad you like us Grant. I have this picture I recently discovered but I am not sure whether it is of Nelson or Rodney. A good picture nevertheless![/QUOTE] Fantastic picture...im new at this and was wondering is there a way i can findout which of the 4.7 guns my Grandfather manned? and did he use them..i know also on his time aboard, Nelson supplied cover for the Salerno landings..My father tells me he never seen a medal but from research ive done he should of at least had a service medal or battlefield medal..he always said it was to horrible to talk about..he was in Pedestal, Harpoon, Avalanche in force h and z i think, please if anyone can tell me more?

These are great photos guys. Well done to all. In reference to my own thread I started in the New Members area, would anyone mind if i take copies of some of these and print them out, so i can put together an album for the Nelson? I also have some photos at home of the Nelson that I will scan and upload.

[QUOTE=Grant D;121379]Fantastic picture...im new at this and was wondering is there a way i can findout which of the 4.7 guns my Grandfather manned? and did he use them..i know also on his time aboard, Nelson supplied cover for the Salerno landings..My father tells me he never seen a medal but from research ive done he should of at least had a service medal or battlefield medal..he always said it was to horrible to talk about..he was in Pedestal, Harpoon, Avalanche in force h and z i think, please if anyone can tell me more?[/QUOTE] Hi Grant, I'm in the same situation trying to find out about my grandfather who served on the Nelson and know very little. I do however know that he had the Burma Star, The War Medal and the 1939 - 45 Star. I think he may have had the Defence medal but shall have to do a bit more digging to make sure. However I'm not sure exactly where it was that he served with the ship so cannot match it up with what you have provided. I only know some of his medal details from talking to him before he passed away. Hope this helps and best of luck with your research. There are some links that people have provided on the new members page to those trying to find service and medal details of family members that you may find useful.

Skipperbob, The USN did actually float the idea of all armament mounted forward with the North Carolina class. Some of the sketches are in Friedman's US Battleships an Illustrated Design History. It was only an idea in the brainstorm stage but I will see if I can scan the drawings later perhaps...

[quote=Evan Finnegan;121407]These are great photos guys. Well done to all. In reference to my own thread I started in the New Members area, would anyone mind if i take copies of some of these and print them out, so i can put together an album for the Nelson? I also have some photos at home of the Nelson that I will scan and upload.[/quote] Evan please help yourself my friend - I look forward to seeing yours!! :)

Just in case some of the newer members haven't yet mastered the search facility, here are two separate threads that deal with HMS [I]Rodney[/I] and HMS [I]Nelson[/I], where you will find some more excellent photographs and information. [FONT=Verdana][URL="http://www.worldnavalships.com/forums/showthread.php?t=6143&highlight=rodney"][COLOR=#800080]http://www.worldnavalships.com/forums/showthread.php?t=6143&highlight=rodney[/COLOR][/URL][/FONT] [FONT=Verdana][URL="http://www.worldnavalships.com/forums/showthread.php?t=782&highlight=nelson"][COLOR=#800080]http://www.worldnavalships.com/forums/showthread.php?t=782&highlight=nelson[/COLOR][/URL][/FONT]

Nelson and Rodney anchored Torbay in 1929 [I]Richard Perkins photograph[/I]
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