HMS King Edward VII
_in_early_1907.jpg)
HMS King Edward VII in early 1907
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| History | |
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 United Kingdom
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| Name: | HMS King Edward VII |
| Namesake: | King Edward VII |
| Ordered: | 1903/04 Estimates |
| Builder: | Devonport Dockyard |
| Laid down: | 8 March 1902 |
| Launched: | 23 July 1903 |
| Completed: | February 1905 |
| Commissioned: | 7 February 1905 |
| Nickname(s): | The King Edward VII-class battleships were known as "The Wobbly Eight" |
| Fate: | Mined off Cape Wrath, 6 January 1916 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | King Edward VII-class pre-dreadnought battleship |
| Displacement: |
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| Length: | 453 ft 6 in (138.2 m) |
| Beam: | 78 ft (23.8 m) |
| Draught: | 26 ft 9 in (8.15 m) |
| Installed power: | 18,000 ihp (13,420 kW) |
| Propulsion: |
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| Speed: | 18.5 kn (21.3 mph; 34.3 km/h) |
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| Capacity: |
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| Complement: | 777 |
| Armament: |
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| Armour: | |
HMS King Edward VII, named after King Edward VII, was the lead ship of her class of Royal Navy pre-dreadnought battleships. She was commissioned in 1905, and entered service with the Atlantic Fleet as Flagship, Commander-in-chief (by request of the King, she was always to serve as a flagship). Rendered obsolete in 1906 with the commissioning of the revolutionary Dreadnought, she underwent a refit in 1907, following which she was assigned to the Channel Fleet and then to the Home Fleet. In 1912, she, together with her sister ships, formed the 3rd Battle Squadron.
During the early phase of World War I, the 3rd Battle Squadron was attached to the Grand Fleet and served on the Northern Patrol. In January 1916 she struck a mine while in transit to a scheduled refit at Belfast and sank. All but one of her crew were safely evacuated.
HMS King Edward VII was laid down at Devonport Dockyard on 8 March 1902, the first plate was laid by King Edward VII who with his wife Queen Alexandra had just attended the naming and launching ceremony of HMS Queen. She was launched by the King on 23 July 1903, and completed in February 1905.
Although King Edward VII and her seven sister ships of the King Edward VII class were a direct descendant of the Majestic class; they were also the first class to make a significant departure from the Majestic design, displacing about 1,000 long tons (1,000 t) more and mounting for the first time an intermediate battery of four 9.2 in (230 mm) guns in addition to the standard outfit of 6 in (150 mm) guns. The 9.2-inch incher was a quick-firing gun like the 6-incher, and its heavier shell made it a formidable weapon by the standards of the day when King Edward VII and her sisters were designed; it was adopted out of concerns that British battleships were undergunned for their displacement and were becoming outgunned by foreign battleships that had begun to mount 8 in (200 mm) intermediate batteries. The four 9.2-inchers were mounted in single turrets abreast the foremast and mainmast, and King Edward VII thus could bring two of them to bear on either broadside. Even then, King Edward VII and her sisters were criticised for not having, a uniform secondary battery of 9.2-inch guns, something considered but rejected because of the length of time it would have taken to design the ships with such a radical revision of the secondary armament layout. In the end, it proved impossible to distinguish 12-inch and 9.2-inch shell splashes from one another, making fire control impractical for ships mounting both calibres, although King Edward VII had fire-control platforms on her fore- and mainmasts rather than the fighting tops of earlier classes.
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Wikipedia