HMS Warspite (03)

Warspite under way in the Indian Ocean, 16 July 1942
History
United Kingdom
Name:	Warspite
Ordered:	1912
Laid down:	31 October 1912
Launched:	26 November 1913
Commissioned:	8 March 1915
Decommissioned:	1 February 1945
Struck:	1947
Identification:	Pennant number: 03
Motto:	Belli dura despicio ("I Despise the Hard Knocks of War")
Nickname(s):	Grand Old Lady
Honours and awards:	World War I: 1 World War II: 14
Fate:	Scrapped, 1950–57
Badge:
General characteristics (as built)
Class and type:	Queen Elizabeth-class battleship
Displacement:	32,590 long tons (33,110 t) 33,260 long tons (33,790 t) (Deep load)
Length:	643 ft 9 in (196.2 m)
Beam:	90 ft 7 in (27.6 m)
Draught:	33 ft (10.1 m)
Installed power:	75,000 shp (56,000 kW) 24 Yarrow boilers
Propulsion:	4 Shafts 2 Steam turbine sets
Speed:	24 knots (44 km/h; 28 mph)
Range:	5,000 nmi (9,260 km; 5,750 mi) at 12 knots (22 km/h; 14 mph)
Complement:	1,025 (1915) 1,262 (1920, as a flagship)
Armament:	4 × twin 15-inch (381 mm) guns 14 × single 6-inch (152 mm) guns 2 × single 3-inch (76 mm) 20 cwt AA guns 4 × 21-inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes
Armour:	Waterline belt: 13 in (330 mm) Deck: 1–3 in (25–76 mm) Barbettes: 7–10 in (178–254 mm) Gun turrets: 11–13 in (279–330 mm) Conning tower: 13 in (330 mm)
General characteristics (1937, where different)
Displacement:	31,315 long tons (31,818 t) Standard 36,450 long tons (37,030 t) (Extra-deep load)
Beam:	104 ft (31.7 m)
Draught:	32 ft 4 in (9.9 m)
Installed power:	72,000 shp (54,000 kW) 6 Admiralty 3-drum boilers
Speed:	23 knots (43 km/h; 26 mph)
Range:	7,579 nmi (14,036 km; 8,722 mi) at 12 knots
Armament:	8 × single 6-inch guns 4 × twin QF 4 in (102 mm) AA guns 4 × octuple QF 2-pdr (40 mm) AA guns 4 × quadruple Vickers 0.5 in (12.7 mm) AA machineguns
Armour:	Deck: 3.125–5 in (79–127 mm) Conning tower: 2–3 in (51–76 mm)
Aircraft carried:	4 × amphibious aircraft
Aviation facilities:	1 × aircraft catapult

HMS Warspite was a Queen Elizabeth-class battleship built for the Royal Navy during the early 1910s. Her thirty-year career covered both world wars and took her across the Atlantic, Indian, Arctic and Pacific Oceans. She participated in the Battle of Jutland during the First World War as part of the Grand Fleet. Other than that battle, and the inconclusive Action of 19 August, her service during the war generally consisted of routine patrols and training in the North Sea.

She was involved in several major engagements, including battles in the North Sea and Mediterranean, earning her the most battle honours ever awarded to an individual ship in the Royal Navy and the most awarded for actions during the Second World War. For this and other reasons Warspite gained the nickname the "Grand Old Lady" after a comment made by Admiral Sir Andrew Cunningham in 1943 while she was his flagship.

When she was launched in 1913 the use of oil as fuel and untried 15-inch guns were revolutionary concepts in the naval arms race between Britain and Germany, a considerable risk for Winston Churchill, then First Lord of the Admiralty, and Admiral John Fisher who had advocated the design. However, the new "fast battleships" proved to be an outstanding success during the First World War. Warspite was refitted twice between the wars, but advances in technology and the cumulative effects of battle damage relegated her to the role of shore bombardment towards the end of the Second World War. Decommissioned in 1945, she ran aground under tow in 1947 on rocks near Prussia Cove, Cornwall, and was eventually broken up nearby.