HMS Princess Royal was the second of two s built for the Royal Navy before the First World War. Designed in response to the s of the Imperial German Navy, the ships significantly improved on the speed, armament, and armour of the preceding . The ship was named after Louise, The Princess Royal, a title occasionally granted to the Monarch's eldest daughter.
Completed in 1913, Princess Royal participated in the Battle of Heligoland Bight a month after the start of World War I in August 1914. She was then sent to the Caribbean Sea to prevent the German East Asia Squadron from using the Panama Canal. After the East Asia Squadron was sunk at the Battle of the Falkland Islands in December, Princess Royal rejoined the 1st Battlecruiser Squadron (BCS). During the Battle of Dogger Bank, the ship scored only a few hits, although one crippled the German armoured cruiser . Shortly afterward, she became the flagship of the 1st BCS, under the command of Rear-Admiral Osmond Brock.
Princess Royal was moderately damaged during the Battle of Jutland and required a month and a half of repairs. Apart from providing distant support during the Second Battle of Heligoland Bight in 1917, the ship spent the rest of the war on uneventful patrols of the North Sea. She was placed into reserve in 1920, then was sold for scrap in 1922 to meet the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty.
Design
The Lion-class battlecruisers, nicknamed the "Splendid Cats", were designed by Philip Watts, the Director of Naval Construction, to be as superior to the new German battlecruisers of the Moltke class as the German ships were to the Indefatigable class. The increase in speed, armour and gun size forced a 70% increase in size over the preceding battlecruisers. Princess Royal had an overall length of , a beam of , and a draught of at deep load. The ship normally displaced and at deep load, over more than the earlier ships. She had a metacentric height of at deep load.
Propulsion The Lion-class ships had two paired sets of Parsons direct-drive steam turbines housed in separate engine-rooms, each set driving two propeller shafts using steam provided by 42 Yarrow large-tube boilers. Designed power was for a speed of . In September 1912, Princess Royal began her sea trials and developed for a speed of . During maximum power trials in July 1913, the battlecruiser achieved for a speed of while at the unusually high displacement of . Maximum bunkerage was of coal and an additional of fuel oil to be sprayed on the coal to increase its burn rate. At , the ship's range was .
Armament Princess Royal was armed with eight BL 13.5-inch Mk V guns ("BL" for breech-loading) in four twin hydraulically powered turrets, designated 'A', 'B', 'Q' and 'X' from bow to stern. Her secondary armament consisted of 16 BL 4-inch Mk VII guns, most of which were mounted in casemates in the superstructure. The two guns mounted on the deck above the forward group of casemates were fitted with gun shields in 1913 and 1914 to better protect their crews from enemy fire.
The battlecruiser was built without anti-aircraft (AA) guns, but from October 1914 to December 1916 she was fitted with a single QF 6-pounder Hotchkiss gun ("QF" for quick-firing) on a high-angle mount. A single QF 3-inch 20 cwt AA gun was added in January 1915 and carried until April 1917.
Princess Royal received a fire-control director between mid-1915 and May 1916 that centralised fire-control under the gunnery officer who now fired the guns. To align their guns on the target, the turret crewmen had to follow pointers whose position was transmitted from the director. This greatly increased accuracy as it was easier for the director to spot the fall of shells and eliminated the shell spread caused by the ship's roll as the turrets fired individually.
By early 1918, Princess Royal carried a Sopwith Pup and a Sopwith 1½ Strutter on flying-off ramps fitted on top of 'Q' and 'X' turrets. The Pup was intended to shoot down Zeppelins while the 1½ Strutter was used for spotting and reconnaissance. Each platform had a canvas hangar to protect the aircraft during inclement weather.
Armour The armour protection given to Lion and Princess Royal was heavier than on the Indefatigables. The waterline belt of Krupp cemented armour measured thick amidships; this thinned to 4 inches towards the ships' ends, and did not reach the bow or stern. The upper armour strake had a maximum thickness of 6 inches over the same length as the thickest part of the waterline armour and thinned to abreast of the end turrets. The gun turrets and barbettes were protected by of armour, except for the turret roofs which used . The thickness of the nickel steel deck ranged from . Nickel-steel torpedo bulkheads thick were fitted abreast of the magazines and shell rooms. The sides of the conning tower were thick. After the Battle of Jutland revealed a vulnerability to plunging shellfire, 1 inch of additional armour, weighing approximately , was added to the magazine crowns and turret roofs.
Construction and career
Princess Royal was laid down at the Vickers shipyard in Barrow-in-Furness on 2 May 1910. She was launched on 29 April 1911 by Louise, Princess Royal, and commissioned on 14 November 1912. She cost £1,955,922 plus an additional £120,300 for her armament. Upon commissioning, Princess Royal joined the 1st Cruiser Squadron, which was renamed the 1st BCS in January 1913. Rear-Admiral David Beatty assumed command of the 1st BCS on 1 March 1913. The squadron, including Princess Royal, visited Brest in February 1914 and ports in the Russian Empire during June.
Battle of Heligoland Bight
Princess Royal first saw combat during the Battle of Heligoland Bight on 28 August 1914. She was part of Beatty's battlecruiser force, which was originally to provide distant support to the British cruisers and destroyers closer to the German coast if the German High Seas Fleet sortied in response. The battlecruisers headed south at full speed at 11:35, when the British light forces failed to disengage on schedule, as the rising tide meant that German capital ships would be able to clear the bar at the mouth of the Jade Estuary. The British light cruiser had been crippled earlier in the battle and was under fire from the German light cruisers and when Beatty's battlecruisers appeared out of the mist at 12:37. Strassburg was able to duck into the mists and evade fire, but Cöln was quickly crippled by the squadron's guns. Before Cöln could be sunk, Beatty was distracted by the sudden appearance of the German light cruiser directly to his front, and ordered pursuit. Ariadne was reduced to a burning hulk after only three salvos at less than .
Princess Royal sailed from Cromarty on 28 September to rendezvous with a Canadian troop convoy bound for the United Kingdom. She rejoined the 1st BCS on 26 October, but was detached again a few days later to reinforce the North Atlantic and Caribbean Squadrons in the search for Admiral Graf Spee's East Asia Squadron after it destroyed the British West Indies Squadron on 1 November during the Battle of Coronel. Princess Royal arrived at Halifax on 21 November, then spent several days off New York City before she steamed down to the Caribbean to guard against the possibility that Graf Spee would use the Panama Canal. The East Asia Squadron was sunk off the Falkland Islands on 7 December, and Princess Royal left Kingston, Jamaica, en route to the UK on 19 December.
Battle of Dogger Bank
On 23 January 1915, a force of German battlecruisers under the command of Admiral Franz von Hipper sortied to clear the Dogger Bank of any British vessels that might be collecting intelligence on German movements. The British were reading the German coded messages, and a large battlecruiser force under Beatty sailed to intercept. Contact was initiated at 07:20 on the 24th, when the British light cruiser Arethusa spotted the German light cruiser . By 07:35, the Germans had seen Beatty's force; Hipper – aboard – ordered his ships south at , thinking he could outpace any British battleships, and could increase to Blüchers maximum speed of if the pursuing ships were battlecruisers.
Beatty ordered his battlecruisers to catch the Germans before they could escape. The leading ships – Lion, Princess Royal and – pursued at , and Lion opened fire at 08:52 at a range of . The other ships followed a few minutes later, but the extreme range and decreasing visibility meant they did not start scoring hits until 09:09. The German battlecruisers opened fire two minutes later at a range of and concentrated their fire on Lion, hitting her once. At 09:35, Beatty signalled to "engage the corresponding ships in the enemy's line", but Tigers captain – believing that was already engaging Blücher – joined Lion in attacking Seydlitz, which left unengaged and able to fire on Lion without risk. Moltke and combined their fire to badly damage Lion over the next hour, even with Princess Royal attacking Derfflinger.
Meanwhile, Blücher had been heavily damaged; her speed had dropped to , and her steering gear was jammed. Beatty ordered Indomitable to attack her at 10:48. Six minutes later, he spotted what he thought was a submarine periscope on the starboard bow and ordered an immediate 90° turn to port to avoid the submarine, although the submarine warning flag was not raised because most of Lions signal halyards had been shot away. Soon afterward, Lion lost her remaining dynamo to the rising water, which knocked out all remaining light and power. At 11:02, Beatty had flags hoisted signalling "course north-east", to bring his ships back to their pursuit of Hipper, and "attack the rear of the enemy". Rear-Admiral Sir Gordon Moore – temporarily commanding the squadron from – thought the signals meant to attack Blücher, which was about to the north-east, and ordered the four other battlecruisers away from the pursuit of Hipper's main force to engage. Beatty tried to correct the mistake, but he was so far behind the leading battlecruisers that his signals could not be read in the smoke and haze.
Beatty transferred to the destroyer at 11:50 and set off in pursuit of his battlecruisers, reaching them shortly before Blücher sank. He boarded Princess Royal at 12:20 and ordered the ships to pursue the main German force. This order was rescinded when it became clear that the time lost in sinking Blücher meant the rest of Hipper's battlecruisers would reach friendly waters before they could be caught. Beatty's battlecruisers turned for home, catching up to Lion, which was limping along at .
Princess Royal hit Derfflinger once, but only damaged two armour plates and caused a coal bunker to flood. She hit Blücher at least twice, including the shot that crippled her, out of a total of 271 shells fired during the battle, a hit rate of only 0.7%. By way of contrast, her sister made four hits out of 243 shells fired, a rate of 1.6%. She also fired two 13.5-inch shrapnel shells at the German airship L 5 as its crew attempted to bomb the sinking Blücher, mistaking it for a British ship, despite the fact that the maximum elevation of those guns was only 20°. Princess Royal was not damaged during the battle.
Battle of Jutland