HMS Rodney (29)

HMS Rodney (pennant number 29) was one of two s built for the Royal Navy in the mid-1920s. She was named after Admiral Lord Rodney. The Nelsons were unique in British battleship construction, being the only ships to carry a main armament of 16 inch (406 mm) guns, and the only ones to carry all the main armament forward of the superstructure (as her superstructure was located aft of midships like RN fleet oilers, whose names carried the '-ol' suffix, she was unofficially referred to as "Rodnol"). Commissioned in 1927, Rodney served extensively in the Mediterranean Sea and Atlantic Ocean during World War II.

She played a major role in the sinking of the GERMAN BATTLESHIP Bismarck in May 1941. During and after the Torch and the Normandy landings, Rodney participated in several coastal bombardments. In poor condition from heavy use and lack of refits, she was scrapped in 1948.

Design
Known as 'Queen Anne's Mansions' on account of the bridge structure bearing some resemblance to the well-known London block of flats, or 'Cherry Tree Class' because they were designed as larger ships but 'cut down' by the Washington Treaty of 1922, the design was limited to 35,000 tons and showed certain compromises. To accommodate 16-inch main guns in three turrets, all of the turrets were placed forward and the vessel's speed was reduced and maximum armour was limited to vital areas. Even with the design limitations forced on the designers by the treaty, the Rodney and Nelson were regarded as the most powerful battleships afloat until the new generation of all big gun ships was launched in 1936.

Construction and commissioning
Rodney was laid down on 28 December 1922, the same date as her sister ship Nelson. She was built at Birkenhead by Cammell-Laird shipyard. Launched in December 1925, she was commissioned in November 1927, three months behind her sister. Her construction cost £7,617,000. Her captain in 1929 was Lieutenant Commander (later Admiral) George Campell Ross, son of Sir Archibald Ross, a marine engineer and pioneer of shipbuilding.

Service
From commissioning until World War II broke out in September 1939, Rodney spent her entire time with the British Atlantic Fleet or Home Fleet. In 1931, her crew joined the crews of other ships in taking part in the Invergordon Mutiny. In late December 1939, she was under refit and repair because she was having steering gear problems.

She was damaged by German aircraft at Karmøy, near Stavanger on 9 April 1940 when hit by a 500 kg (1,103 lb) bomb that pierced the armoured deck, but did not explode. On 13 September 1940, she was transferred from Scapa Flow to Rosyth with orders to operate in the English Channel when the German invasion of Britain was expected. In November and December, she did convoy escort duties between Britain and Halifax, Nova Scotia. In January 1941, she participated in the hunt for the German battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau, with no success. On 16 March, however, while escorting a convoy in the North Atlantic, she made contact with the German battleships, but no battle followed, as the German ships turned away when they realized that they were facing superior firepower.

The Bismarck
In May 1941, while commanded by (then) Commodore Frederick Dalrymple-Hamilton, Rodney and four destroyers were escorting the troop ship RMS Britannic to Canada; the Britannic was taking civilians over to Canada, and would be bringing Canadian troops back to Britain. It was during this run on 24 May that she was called by the Admiralty to join in the pursuit of the German battleship Bismarck leaving the destroyer HMS Eskimo (F75) to escort the Britannic and taking HMS Somali (F33), HMS Mashona (F59), HMS Tartar (F43) with her in the search. Despite Admiral Sir John Tovey in HMS King George V (41) heading northwest due to a misinterpreted signal from the Admiralty, Dalrymple-Hamilton and his own 'Operations Committee' consisting of Captain Coppinger, his Navigator Lt.Cmdr. Galfrey George Gatacre RAN, USN Naval Attache' Lt.Cmdr. Joseph Wellings and Executive Officer, Cmdr. John Grindle, decided it was most likely that Bismarck was headed to Brest and so set course to the East to head Bismarck off, 'at some stages exceeding her designed speed by two knots' despite her engines being in need of an overhaul. On 26 May, she joined up with King George V, as Admiral Tovey had realised the mistake and doubled back. Tovey then sent the 3 remaining destroyers home because they were low on fuel, and had Rodney fall in behind King George V for the battle against the Bismarck the next day. Early on the morning of 27 May 1941, along with the battleship King George V and the cruisers HMS Norfolk (78), and HMS Dorsetshire (40), she engaged the Bismarck, which had had its rudder machinery damaged by a torpedo launched by HMS Ark Royal (91)'s Swordfish bombers the day before. Unable to manoeuver and listing to port, Bismarck scored no hits before her forward guns were knocked out, after which Rodney closed with Bismarck until she was firing on a virtually flat trajectory, and spotters could actually follow the shells to the target. One 16 in (406.4mm) shell was tracked from the gun to where it hit the face of Bismarck's #2 turret Bruno and exploded, blowing out the back of the turret with the splinters killing most of the crew on the bridge. Rodney fired 340 16" shells, some in 9-gun broadsides and 716 6" shells during the battle, scoring many hits from a range of under 3000 yards, inflicting most of the damage suffered by Bismarck whose stern was blown off. During the battle Rodney also fired twelve 24.5" torpedoes at her whilst zig-zagging across Bismarck's bows, mostly with no hits but later, one hit Bismarck amidships on the starboard side, thus being the only battleship in history to have successfully torpedoed another battleship. Rodney and King George V finally broke off the action and then Dorsetshire was ordered to finish Bismarck off with torpedoes. Rodney and King George V were ordered home short of fuel and were unsuccessfully attacked by Luftwaffe bombers who sank Mashona but missed Tartar with whom the battleships had rejoined.

Force H
After this, she went to the South Boston Navy Yard in Boston, Massachusetts, for repairs to her engines and the fitting of more 8-barrelled "Pom-Pom" AA guns which she had been carrying in crates on the deck throughout the battle. This is significant because the United States would not formally enter the war for several months and the stateside docking of the Rodney illustrated the US government's true sympathies in the growing global conflict. Since the repairs took several weeks to complete, the Rodney's crew was furloughed to local Civilian Conservation Corps camps. In the interim, some members of the crew struck up lasting relationships with American civilians.

She also destroyed targets at Caen and Alderney. On June 7, 1944 a collision between the Rodney and LCT 427 resulted in the loss of 13 Royal navy seamen. In September 1944, she performed escort duties with a Murmansk convoy.

During the entire war Rodney steamed over 156000 nmi with no engine overhaul after 1942. Because of her frequent machinery problems and the fact that she had not been upgraded to the extent that her sister Nelson had, starting in December 1944, she became the flagship of Home Fleet in Scapa Flow and rarely left her mooring. She was finally scrapped - starting 26 March 1948 - at Inverkeithing.