King George V-class battleship (1911)

Not to be confused with King George V-class battleship (1939).

300px HMS Audacious
Class overview
Name:	King George V class
Operators:	Royal Navy
Preceded by:	Orion class
Succeeded by:	Iron Duke class
In commission:	1912–1924
Planned:	4
Completed:	4
Lost:	1
Retired:	3
General characteristics
Type:	Battleship
Displacement:	23,400 tonnes
Length:	598 ft (182.3 m)
Beam:	89 ft (27.1 m)
Draught:	28 ft (8.5 m)
Propulsion:	18 boilers 4 Parsons turbines, direct drive 4 shafts; 27,000 shp (20,100 kW)
Speed:	21 knots (39 km/h; 24 mph)
Armament:	10 × BL Mk V guns 16 × BL Mk VII guns 4 × 3-pounder (47-mm) guns 3 × 21-inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes
Armour:	Belt: 8 to 12 in (203 to 305 mm) Decks: 1 to 4 in (25 to 102 mm) Barbettes: 3 to 10 in (76 to 254 mm) Turrets: 11 in (279 mm)

The King George V-class battleships were a series of four Royal Navy super-dreadnought battleships built just prior to and serving in the First World War. The King George V class immediately followed the Orion class upon which they were based.

Design

These ships were of slightly larger displacement than the Orions; the extra tonnage allowed for some small enhancements that were incorporated into the design. The most obvious differences in appearance, compared to the Orions, were the repositioning of the main mast and fore-funnel, and the conspicuously slab sided funnels themselves.

They used the same 13.5-inch Mark V gun, but fired a slightly heavier (1,400 lb (635 kg) as against 1,250 lb (567 kg)) shell. Their secondary armament was re-arranged to improve fire distribution ahead, which had been indicated by tactical modelling to be the most effective direction of attack for enemy torpedo boats.

Armour was slightly redistributed and, it was thought, improved. Underwater protection was also improved, although these changes did not save Audacious when she struck a single German mine late in 1914.

There were slight revisions to the superstructure and masts. The engine and boiler arrangements were the same as the Orions with 27,000 SHP giving a design speed of 21 knots (39 km/h; 24 mph) but Centurion achieved a best recorded speed of 22.5 knots (41.7 km/h; 25.9 mph).

Overall, they were a successful design, although received without particular enthusiasm by the public and press. They had been substantially promoted as a great advance over the Orions. In particular, it was expected that they would carry 6 inch guns as their secondary armament. In fact it was the subsequent Iron Duke class that first received 6 inch secondaries.

Service

File:Цеппелин над Килем.jpg

Three King George V-class battleships on a visit to Kiel in 1914. Several Town-class (Chatham sub-class) light cruisers are in the foreground.

The ships remaining after the end of the First World War were all decommissioned in the 1920s to allow for the two Nelson-class battleships under the Washington Naval Treaty.

Ships in the class

King George V-class battleships

Name	Builder	Laid down	Launched	Completed	Operations	Fate
King George V (ex-Royal George)	HM Dockyard, Portsmouth	16 January 1911	9 October 1911	November 1912	Battle of Jutland	Decommissioned in 1919 and scrapped in 1926
Centurion		16 January 1911	18 November 1911	May 1913	Battle of Jutland, Operation Neptune	Converted to a target ship in 1927, converted to a decoy 1941/42 and sunk as a breakwater in June 1944
Audacious	Cammell Laird	March 1911	14 September 1912	August 1913		Struck a mine off Northern Ireland and sank on 27 October 1914
Ajax	Scotts Shipbuilding and Engineering Company, Greenock	27 February 1911	21 March 1912	31 October 1913	Battle of Jutland	Decommissioned in 1924 and sold for scrap on 9 November 1926

See also

• List of battleship classes
• Lists of ship launches in: 1911, 1912
• List of ship commissionings in 1913
• Lists of shipwrecks in: 1914, 1944

References

Robert Gardiner: Conway's All the World’s Fighting Ships 1922–1946, Conway Maritime Press London 1980

External links

• Dreadnought Project Technical material on the weaponry and fire control for the ships