HMS Conqueror was an Orion class

Orion class battleship

The Orion class battleships were four super-dreadnoughts — the first ships of that type — of the Royal Navy. The lead ship, , was launched in 1910. They were the first Royal Navy dreadnoughts to have all their main guns in the centreline, although the U.S. South Carolina class had this advanced...

 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...

 of the Royal Navy

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...

. She served in the 2nd Battle Squadron

2nd Battle Squadron (United Kingdom)

The British Royal Navy 2nd Battle Squadron was a naval squadron consisting of battleships. The 2nd Battle Squadron was initially part of the Royal Navy's Grand Fleet. After World War I the Grand Fleet was reverted back to its original name, the Atlantic Fleet...

 of the Grand Fleet in World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

, and fought 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...

, 31 May 1916, suffering no damage.

As a result of the Washington Naval Convention she was decommissioned in 1921 and sold for scrap.

Following the Colossus class

Colossus class battleship (1910)

The Colossus class of two battleships - Colossus and Hercules of the British Royal Navy were among the first battleships following the original of 1906. Originally intended to be part of the Neptune class, the two ships had thicker armour and other differences from , and so Neptune is...

, Britain’s next class of Battleship was the Orion class

Orion class battleship

The Orion class battleships were four super-dreadnoughts — the first ships of that type — of the Royal Navy. The lead ship, , was launched in 1910. They were the first Royal Navy dreadnoughts to have all their main guns in the centreline, although the U.S. South Carolina class had this advanced...

, which was the first class of British ship to dispense with the wing turret arrangement. Beaten to a world’s first by the American South Carolina class (commissioned in 1910), these were the first battleships in the Royal Navy to feature an all big-gun armament on the centre line and were a major step forward, and were thus described as 'Super-Dreadnoughts'.

With the possibility of war looming, the cost savings achieved with the Dreadnought types were dispensed with resulting in a far better and larger ship. The Orion Class

Orion class battleship

The Orion class battleships were four super-dreadnoughts — the first ships of that type — of the Royal Navy. The lead ship, , was launched in 1910. They were the first Royal Navy dreadnoughts to have all their main guns in the centreline, although the U.S. South Carolina class had this advanced...

 also saw the introduction of the new 13.5” gun. To achieve greater striking power for the later variants of the Dreadnought the barrels of the 12” guns had been lengthened to increase the muzzle velocity and hence the range and impact power; however this was an unsatisfactory gun, with poor accuracy and wear levels. With the 13.5” gun a return to lower muzzle velocities was achieved, and striking power was increased by means of a heavier shell thereby resulting in an altogether superior weapon.

Design and description

Compared to the other Orion class

Orion class battleship

The Orion class battleships were four super-dreadnoughts — the first ships of that type — of the Royal Navy. The lead ship, , was launched in 1910. They were the first Royal Navy dreadnoughts to have all their main guns in the centreline, although the U.S. South Carolina class had this advanced...

 battleships the Conqueror design came across as sleeker and more refined than earlier ships. Outwardly similar to the following King George V class, the two could be told apart by the Orion's fore mast being placed behind the forward funnel. Unfortunately this resulted in the same problems experienced by Dreadnought herself, in that the fire control top at the mast head was affected by smoke, heat and gasses from the funnel.

One other feature of the ships was dictated by the size of the dry-docks available at the time; the size of the ships was the maximum that could fit into these dry-docks and something had to give. The bilge keels were omitted, and initially the ships rolled heavily and, if reports in the tabloids of the times are to be believed, the class would capsize in any sea. In truth the rolling, whilst undesirable, was not this severe and the class were later fitted with bilge keels, but the size and design was nonetheless a compromise between effectiveness and dock size.

Another problem facing the designers was where to place the mast; place it in front of the funnel and the spotting top would be clear of smoke and heat with a head wind, but another problem then appeared: where to put the derrick needed to hoist the boats? The Orion class

Orion class battleship

The Orion class battleships were four super-dreadnoughts — the first ships of that type — of the Royal Navy. The lead ship, , was launched in 1910. They were the first Royal Navy dreadnoughts to have all their main guns in the centreline, although the U.S. South Carolina class had this advanced...

 would seem to have bowed to the seamanship problem and placed the mast aft of the fore funnel to allow the fitting of a large derrick for hoisting the ships boats. However this did cause problems with smoke and heat in the spotting top. To partially alleviate this the fore funnel was smaller in diameter than the aft funnel and only vented six boilers and the remaining twelve vented via the aft funnel.

General characteristics

Conqueror was 177.08 metres (580 ft 9 in) long overall. She had a maximum beam of 26.8 metres (88 ft 6 in) and had a draft of 8.4 metres (27 ft 6 in). She had a displacement of 22,200 tonnes at normal load and 25,870 tonnes at full load.

Building data

Ordered under the 1909 naval estimates, she was built by William Beardmore and Company

William Beardmore and Company

William Beardmore and Company was a Scottish engineering and shipbuilding conglomerate based in Glasgow and the surrounding Clydeside area. It was active between about 1890 and 1930 and at its peak employed about 40,000 people...

 at their Clydebank Dalmuir works at a cost of £1,891,164. She was laid down on the 05th April 1910, and launched on the 01st May 1911 and commissioned in November 1912.

Propulsion

The machinery arrangement for the Orion class

Orion class battleship

The Orion class battleships were four super-dreadnoughts — the first ships of that type — of the Royal Navy. The lead ship, , was launched in 1910. They were the first Royal Navy dreadnoughts to have all their main guns in the centreline, although the U.S. South Carolina class had this advanced...

 was very similar to that of the earlier Colossus class

Colossus class battleship (1910)

The Colossus class of two battleships - Colossus and Hercules of the British Royal Navy were among the first battleships following the original of 1906. Originally intended to be part of the Neptune class, the two ships had thicker armour and other differences from , and so Neptune is...

 with quadruple propellers being driven by Parsons direct drive steam turbines. The machinery spaces were split into three with the inboard shafts leading to the centre engine room and the outer shafts the port and starboard wing engine rooms. The two inboard shafts were driven by the high pressure ahead and astern turbines with the ahead turbines having an extra stage for cruising, this was separated from the main turbine by a bypass valve.

The outer shafts were driven by the ahead and astern low pressure turbines, when cruising the out board turbines would be shut down, the ship relying on the inboard shafts alone. The Babcock and Wilcox boilers of greater power remained in three groups of six, although coal fired oil spraying equipment was fitted for quickly raising steam. The normal power for the Conqueror was 27,000 SHP giving 21 knots but on trials she developed 33,198 SHP for 22.13 knots.

Armament

The main battery consisted of ten 13.5” guns arranged in five twin turrets all mounted on the centre-line and enabled this class to fire a ten gun broadside without any risk of structural damage to the ship, problems still existed with the open sighting hoods of the lower turrets (A & Y) in that to prevent muzzle blast of the two upper turrets (B & X) entering the lower turrets via the sighting hoods, firing of the upper turrets was prevented from right ahead to 30 degrees on either bow for A turret and 30 degrees either side of right astern for X turret. The mid-ships turret was designated 'Q'.

The 13.5" gun and was designated the Mark V L, the L indicating it fired the lighter of the 13.5" shells, later classes had the Mk VH guns which fired the heavier shells, the guns were just over 52 feet long and the barrel alone weighed more than 70 tons each with a working pressure of 18 tons per square inch, construction was of wire winding, so good were these weapons that they were still in use during World War II as shore guns at Dover. Although just 1.5" larger than the earlier 12" gun it fired a shell weighing 1,266.5 lbs against the 859 lbs of the earlier gun, although of lower velocity than the 12" 50 calibre gun the 13.5” 45 calibre weapon’s heavier shell maintained its in-flight velocity and so had greater hitting and penetrative power, the new gun was also very accurate and possessed very good wear rates – up to 450 rounds per gun, tests also showed that the gun had a very good safety margin so that the following King George 5th class ships could fire an even heavier 1,410 lb shell, although this lowered the wear rate to 220 rounds per gun.

Using a charge of 293 lbs of cordite ranges of just short of 24,000 yards were achieved at 20 degrees elevation, although this was of little real use, the gun range finders had been designed with closer ranges in mind and so could only work up to 16 degrees elevation. Used as a railway gun and using an elevation of 40 degrees the range was then 49,000 yards using 400 lbs of propellant what this did to the wear rate is unknown.

Projectile details

The ships carried three types and weights of shell.

• Common Percussion Capped - Weighed 1,250 lbs - Bursting Charge of 117 lbs
• Armour Piercing Capped - Weighed 1,266.5 lbs - Bursting Charge of 30 to 40 lbs
• High explosive - Weighed 1,250 lbs - Bursting Charge of 176.5 lbs

At 10,000 yards the Armour Piercing Capped shell could penetrate just over 12” of Krupps cemented armour plate.

Five Mk2 turrets were fitted to the Conqueror, these were very similar to those fitted on the earlier 12” Dreadnought designs and each weighed about 600 tons. In case of failure of the magazine hoists, 8 ready use shells were stowed within the gun houses and could be loaded using manually powered davits, a further six rounds were stowed in the handling room under the gun with the cordite charges stowed in the turret trunk – the rotating section of the turret reaching down from the handling room down to the magazines and holding the hoists.

Fire control

Fire Control was effected by a nine foot six inch co-incidence type rangefinder in the fire control tower high in the ship. Range and bearing data were fed into a Dreyer table (invented and developed by Frederic Charles Dreyer

Frederic Charles Dreyer

Admiral Sir Frederic Charles Dreyer, GBE, KCB was an officer of the Royal Navy who developed a fire control system for British warships...

) which was an early mechanical computer into which was fed range and bearing of the target, wind, own course and speed, target's course and speed, temperature and wind direction, gun temperature and barrel wear, and adjustments for the Coriolis effect

Coriolis effect

In physics, the Coriolis effect is a deflection of moving objects when they are viewed in a rotating reference frame. In a reference frame with clockwise rotation, the deflection is to the left of the motion of the object; in one with counter-clockwise rotation, the deflection is to the right...

. This produced a firing solution which was fed electrically to the guns where the gun layers would follow the pointers. When the guns were loaded their interceptor switches would be closed and gun-ready lamps would light in the fire control tower. When all guns were ready they would be fired electrically by the gunnery officer.

Torpedo armament

This remained the same as the earlier Colossus class with three submerged 21" torpedo tubes, one firing on each beam and one astern. The torpedoes used by the Orion class battleships were the Whitehead 21" Mk2 these had a range of 4,000 yards at 35 knots or 5,500 yards at 30 knots and had a TNT warhead of about 400 lbs.

Armour

At the time of the design of Orion, the largest bore gun carried by battleships of other nations was twelve inches. It was believed, however, that as part of the continuing trend to increasing size in this class of warship, bores would inevitably rise. Orion and her sisters therefore received heavier and more extensive armour than had been carried by earlier British dreadnoughts.

The main waterline belt was twelve inches thick, and extended from a point level with the centre of "A" barbette to a point level with the centre of "Y" barbette. The lower edge was three feet four inches below the waterline at normal displacement. Above this belt was an upper belt of eight inches in thickness, which ran for the same length. The belt extended further upwards than in previous dreadnoughts; the upper edge was at the level of the middle deck, giving a total belt height of twenty feet six inches. Forward of "A" barbette the belt was extended by a short length of armour of six inches in thickness tapering to four; and the after end of the belt continued as a short strake two and a half inches thick. The extreme ends of the ships sides were not armoured.

A torpedo defence screen ran from "A" barbette to "Y" barbette, and extended from the lower deck to the bottom of the ship. It was of varying thickness, from one to one and three quarter inches, and was intended to prevent mine or torpedo detonation from causing magazine explosion.

An armoured bulkhead ten inches thick ran from the after end of the armour belt around "Y" barbette, and there was a further bulkhead mid-way between this barbette and the stern composed of two and a half inch armour. Both bulkheads extended from lower deck to upper deck level. The forward bulkhead, which ran from the forward end of the main belt on either beam to the forward aspect of "A" barbette, was eight inches thick between the forecastle deck and maindeck levels, and six inches thick from maindeck to lower deck. A further bulkhead of four inches thickness was situated in the bow, one third of the distance from the stem to the forward barbette.

There were four armoured decks. The upper and main decks were of one and a half inch armour, the middle deck was one inch thick, and the lower deck was two and a half inches tapering to one inch forward, and four inches tapering to three aft. The greater thickness was over the magazines and machinery.

The faces of the main armament turrets were eleven inches thick, the turret crowns being four inches tapering to three. The barbettes were ten inches thick at their maximum, tapering to seven, five or three inches in areas where adjacent armoured structures or armoured decks afforded some protection.

The conning tower was protected by eleven inches of armour, tapering to three in less vulnerable areas.

Service history

Conqueror was commissioned in November 1912 and was the last of the four Orion-class to be completed; together they formed the Second division of the 2nd Battle Squadron

2nd Battle Squadron (United Kingdom)

The British Royal Navy 2nd Battle Squadron was a naval squadron consisting of battleships. The 2nd Battle Squadron was initially part of the Royal Navy's Grand Fleet. After World War I the Grand Fleet was reverted back to its original name, the Atlantic Fleet...

 with the Home Fleet. In 1914 the 2nd Battle Squadron joined the Home Fleet, on 27 December 1914 she was rammed by the Monarch, which caused serious damage to both ships. Conqueror was given temporary repairs at both Scapa Flow and Invergordon before being fully repaired at Devonport. On completion of these repairs she rejoined the 2nd Battle squadron and the home fleet in March 1915.

At Jutland on 31 May 1916 all four of the Orions were present under the leadership of Rear Admiral Arthur Leveson flying his flag in Orion, her CO was Captain O. Backhouse, followed by: Monarch – Captain G.H. Borret, Conqueror - Captain H.H.D. Tothill and Thunderer- Captain J.A. Fergusson. It is thought that Conqueror had engine problems during the battle and was having trouble maintaining 20 knots as a signal from Admiral Jellicoe at 1717 instructed Thunderer to overtake the Conqueror if she could not maintain speed. Conqueror first came to action at 1831 when she sighted a König class battleship at 12,000 yards and fired three salvoes of 13.5”. No hits were claimed and the target rapidly disappeared in the smoke and mist. A few minutes later and the disabled German light cruiser Wiesbaden appeared; this ship had been disabled by the battle-cruiser Invincible and was then fired at by a large number of British battleships as they passed and she appeared to them out of the mist; the number of hits she took before sinking and who actually hit her was impossible to tell by the sheer number of ships which fired at her. At 1912 the Conqueror engaged the German destroyers of the 3rd. 6th. and 9th flotilla’s which were attacking with torpedoes to distract the Grand fleet and allow the German High seas fleet to escape to the south, There was also an attempt to rescue the crew of the sinking Weisbaden; Conqueror engaged with 13.5” Common percussion capped shells but again claimed no hits. This was the last action by Conqueror as the main German fleet was now fleeing south and contact was not regained. In total, Conqueror fired 57 rounds, of which 16 were armour-piercing Capped and 41 were high explosive. The Conqueror suffered no damage or casualties. Post war she was placed in lay-up and decommissioned in 1921; under the 1922 Washington naval treaties she was sold for scrap in 1922.

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