Town-class cruiser (1936)
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 HMS Liverpool in 1942
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| Class overview | |
|---|---|
| Name | Town class |
| Operators |  Royal Navy |
| Preceded by | Template:Sclass- |
| Succeeded by | Template:Sclass- |
| Subclasses |
|
| Completed | 10 |
| Lost | 4 |
| Retired | 5 |
| Preserved | 1 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type | Light cruiser |
| Displacement |
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| Length |
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| Beam |
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| Draught |
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| Installed power |
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| Propulsion |
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| Speed | |
| Range | 5,300 nmi (6,100 mi; 9,800 km) at 13 kn (15 mph; 24 km/h) |
| Capacity | 1,325 short tons (1,202 t) fuel oil |
| Complement | 750 |
| Sensors and processing systems | Radar |
| Armament |
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| Aircraft carried | 2 × Supermarine Walrus flying boats (removed in the latter part of WWII) |
| Aviation facilities | 1 × catapult |
The Town class was a 10-ship class of light cruisers of the Royal Navy. The Towns were designed to the constraints imposed by the London Naval Treaty of 1930. The ships were built in three distinct sub-classes, the Southampton, Gloucester and Edinburgh classes respectively, each sub-class adding on further weaponry.
Armament
Like their US and Japanese counterparts of that era, the Town-class cruisers were "light cruisers" in the strict terms of the Treaty. The London Treaty defined a "light cruiser" as one having a main armament no greater than 6.1 in (155 mm) calibre, all three major naval powers sought to circumvent the limitations on heavy cruiser numbers by building "light cruisers" that were equal in size and effective power to heavy cruisers. These ships made up for their smaller calibre guns by carrying larger numbers of them.
All of these ships carried BL 6-inch Mk XXIII guns in triple turrets, with the centre gun mounted 30 in (76 cm) behind the two outer guns to prevent interference between the shells in flight and to give the gunners more room to work in.[1] The turret roofs had cutouts at the front to allow extreme elevation, originally intended to give the guns an anti-aircraft capability. In practice the guns could not be trained or manually loaded quickly enough for continuous anti-aircraft fire, so the Royal Navy designed the ABU, which allowed the guns to be preloaded with time-fuzed shells and then fired when the target aircraft reached the preset range. These ships were equipped with the HACS AA fire control system for the secondary armament and the Admiralty Fire Control Table for surface fire control of the main armament.
The secondary armament consisted of four twin X1X 4 inch guns, quad pom poms (fitted with British 40mm guns, inferior to the Swedish Bofors) and during wartime single and twin oreilikons, which were light and accurate enough to pick of aircraft. The 4 inch and pom pom guns were not particulary accurate and the wartime 285 radar directors and their postwar 275 radar glass house replacements were difficult to use and unreliable, the point of the 4 inch guns and pom poms was to create a wall of lead over the ship that hostile German, Italian and Japanese aircraft would either stay away from or fly into. The twin 4 inch mounts had similar 20rpm rates of fire per gun, 40rpm per turret and often 80rpm for two turrents controlled by each 285/275 radar director, but were not in any way equal to superficially wartime and immediate postwar Russian and French 100/15mm mounts which were usually all enclosed, heated and stabilised and much more accurate with effective DC.
Southampton class
The Southampton class was the first and the subsequent two sub-classes were also known as modified or improved Southamptons. They had originally been built in response to the US Template:Sclass- and Japanese Template:Sclass- light cruisers.
Gloucester class
The subsequent Gloucesters had a redesigned deck and received thicker armour on the gun turrets.
Edinburgh class
The Edinburgh class were longer at 614 ft (187 m) compared to 592 ft (180 m), initially to allow an increase in the main armament from twelve 6 in (152 mm) guns in four triple turrets as in the two previous sub-classes, to sixteen 6 in guns in four quadruple turrets. The idea was soon shelved however, due to the difficulties in actually manufacturing an effective quadruple 6 in turret, and so the class reverted to the original main armament design, although improved through a "long trunk" Mk XXIII turret design, which reduced the crew requirements and increased the speed of the ammunition hoists.[2] Four extra 4 in (102 mm) "High Angle Low Angle" guns and eight extra 2-pounder (40 mm) guns and further armour protection were added instead.
Later improvements
All were heavily modified during the Second World War and after the Korean War; Glasgow, Sheffield and Newcastle had one aft turret replaced by two quad 40 mm Bofors guns during the Second World War, since there was insufficient space to fit the needed extra anti-aircraft guns and retain the turret. This was not a problem in the Edinburghs, because they were longer and had more room. They still had substantial modifications to their weaponry, including addition of 40 mm Bofors guns. The addition of radar equipment during the Second World War aided the ships' combat effectiveness.
Service
The first Town-class ship was launched in 1936 and commissioned in 1937, just two years before the outbreak of war. The Town class saw much service during the Second World War and took in many famous actions, such as the sinking of the German battleship Scharnhorst. Four were sunk during the war, Edinburgh, Gloucester, Manchester, and Southampton. Many of the surviving ships saw successful service during the Korean War and continued in active service to the end of the 1950s. The last Town-class ship to be scrapped was Sheffield in 1967. One Town-class warship — Belfast — remains, moored on the River Thames in London as a museum-ship of the Imperial War Museum, a role she has performed since 1971.
Ships
| Name | Pennant | Builder | Laid down | Launched | Commissioned | Fate |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Southampton class | ||||||
| Newcastle (ex-Minotaur) |
C76 | Vickers-Armstrongs, Newcastle | 4 October 1934 | 23 January 1936 | 5 March 1937 | Broken up at Faslane, 1959 |
| Southampton (ex-Polyphemus) |
C83 | John Brown, Clydebank | 21 November 1934 | 10 March 1936 | 6 March 1937 | Scuttled following air attack off Malta, 11 January 1941 |
| Sheffield | C24 | Vickers-Armstrongs, Newcastle | 31 January 1935 | 23 July 1936 | 25 August 1937 | Broken up at Faslane, 1967 |
| Glasgow | C21 | Scotts, Greenock | 16 April 1935 | 20 June 1936 | 9 September 1937 | Broken up at Blyth, 1958 |
| Birmingham | C19 | HM Dockyard, Devonport | 18 July 1935 | 1 September 1936 | 18 November 1937 | Broken up at Inverkeithing, 1960 |
| Gloucester class | ||||||
| Liverpool | C11 | Fairfields, Govan | 17 February 1936 | 24 March 1937 | 2 November 1938 | Broken up at Bo'Ness, 1958 |
| Manchester | C15 | Hawthorn Leslie, Hebburn | 28 March 1936 | 12 April 1937 | 4 August 1938 | Scuttled following torpedo attack off Cap Bon, 13 August 1942 |
| Gloucester | C62 | HM Dockyard, Devonport | 22 September 1936 | 19 October 1937 | 31 January 1939 | Sunk following air attack off Crete, 22 May 1941 |
| Edinburgh class | ||||||
| Belfast | C35 | Harland and Wolff, Belfast | 10 December 1936 | 17 March 1938 | 5 August 1939 | Preserved as museum ship in London |
| Edinburgh | C16 | Swan Hunter, Newcastle | 30 December 1936 | 31 March 1938 | 6 July 1939 | Scuttled following torpedo attack, 2 May 1942 |
See also
Notes
References
- Colledge, J. J.; Warlow, Ben (2006) [1969]. Ships of the Royal Navy: The Complete Record of all Fighting Ships of the Royal Navy (Rev. ed.). London: Chatham Publishing. ISBN 978-1-86176-281-8.
- Tony DiGiulian, Britain 6"/50 (15.2 cm) BL Mark XXIII
External links
