HMS Royal Oak

1939

Scapa Flow, Günther Prien, thirteen minutes Location: Scapa Flow, Orkney Islands, Scotland · Coordinates: 58.93°N 2.97°W · Casualties: 834 · Survivors: 400 · Depth: 30 m · Cause: submarine torpedo — Torpedoed at anchor in Scapa Flow by German submarine U-47 (Günther Prien, commanding) on the night of 14 October 1939. Prien had threaded the blockship barriers at Kirk Sound to penetrate the base. Four of seven torpedoes struck; she rolled over in thirteen minutes. · Fate: war grave · protected · Type: battleship · Revenge class · Tonnage: 29,150 tons · Crew: 1234 · Flag: United Kingdom · Launched: 1914 Royal Navy Revenge-class battleship, at anchor in Scapa Flow on the night of 14 October 1939. German submarine U-47 under Günther Prien threaded the blockship barriers at Kirk Sound and fired seven torpedoes; four struck, and she rolled over in thirteen minutes. 834 dead of 1,234 aboard, including 134 boy seamen. Prien returned to Berlin a national hero; the defences at Scapa were rebuilt as the Churchill Barriers. The Vessel HMS Royal Oak was a Revenge-class battleship of the Royal Navy, laid down at Devonport Dockyard in January 1914 and commissioned on 1 May 1916 at Devonport. She was 189 metres long, 29,150 tons standard displacement, with eight 15-inch guns in four twin turrets, a secondary battery of twelve 6-inch guns, and a design speed of 21 knots on four shafts. The Revenge-class had been built to replace the 1905-era pre-dreadnoughts of the Grand Fleet's second-line battle squadrons, and Royal Oak served in exactly that capacity from her commissioning through the interwar period and into the Second World War. She fought at Jutland on 31 May 1916 as part of Vice-Admiral Sir Cecil Burney's 1st Battle Squadron; she fired 38 rounds of 15-inch, hit the German battleship Derfflinger once, and emerged undamaged. She served in the Mediterranean through the 1920s, participated in the international naval demonstration at Corfu in 1923, and patrolled the Spanish coast during the Spanish Civil War. She returned to the Home Fleet in early 1939 as one of five Revenge-class battleships then still in first-line service; of that class she was the best-maintained. Her master at the outbreak of the Second World War was Captain William Benn. She had taken on 1,234 officers and ratings, including the unusually high number of 134 "boy seamen" in training, sixteen-year-old Royal Navy recruits on their first sea assignment. By September 1939 she was the flagship of Rear-Admiral Henry Blagrove, commanding the H The Disaster Of Prien's first spread of four torpedoes, one struck Royal Oak's starboard bow at approximately 00:58 on 14 October 1939. The detonation was minor; the bow anchor capstan was damaged but the hull compartments adjacent to the strike were not breached. Captain Benn and Admiral Blagrove both assumed the bang was either a small internal explosion or a collision. A damage-control party was dispatched to the bow. Twenty-three minutes passed between the first strike and the second. Prien, under the assumption that his first spread had failed to cripple the battleship, turned U-47 and fired a second spread of three torpedoes at 01:21. This spread struck true: three torpedoes hit in quick succession, one under the starboard forward funnel and two at the starboard quarter. The second spread breached Royal Oak's torpedo protection, ignited the aft 15-inch magazine, and broke her back. She rolled onto her starboard side and sank in thirteen minutes, at 01:34. 834 of her 1,234 crew died, including Admiral Blagrove, 120 boy seamen, and nearly every man in the forward and aft compartments. 386 men survived, most of whom were rescued from the harbour by the tender Daisy 2, the small boat Supply, and the rescue tug Scott. The sinking was the worst single-ship loss of life Scapa Flow had seen in either world war.