Continuing a tradition of many-years standing, a party from the Unit detached itself from the camping weekend (see previous entry) to attend the annual memorial service for those lost aboard HMS Hood, at the church of St John the Baptist, Boldre.
The battle cruiser HMS Hood was, at over 40,000 tons, the pride of the Royal Navy. Battle cruisers were a pre 1st World War concept; the guns of a battleship but less armour and therefore more speed- they should have been to able to out run anything that they couldn’t out-fight. At first the concept worked well. In December 1914 the battle cruisers HMS Invincible and HMS Inflexible destroyed a German cruiser squadron at the Battle of the Falklands. Perhaps inevitably, battle cruisers suffered mission creep, used as part of the fleet in the Battle of Jutland (1916) three British battle cruisers were torn apart by magazine explosions (including Invincible), as large shells penetrated vital spaces. HMS Hood, laid down in 1916, was the last British battle cruiser to be built.
As dawn broke over the Denmark Strait on the morning of May 24th 1941 Admiral Holland, commanding a force of Hood and the brand new, still teething, battleship HMS Prince of Wales, was closing the German battleship Bismarck and the heavy cruiser Prince Eugen at full speed to shorten the range to the point where incoming shells would not strike Hood’s weak deck armour. The British opened fire at 05 52. At 06 00, judging that he was close to a safer range for Hood’s armour, Holland ordered a turn to port, to bring the British after gun turrets to bear. As the turn was being executed, a 15 inch shell penetrated deep into Hood and triggered a catastrophic magazine explosion. There were only three survivors from a crew of over 1,400 men.
For another 13 minutes Prince of Wales exchanged salvos with Bismarck. Both Bismarck and Prince Eugen landed several hits on Prince of Wales- though Prince Eugen’s 8 inch shells were too light to be a real danger. Prince of Wales suffered several technical failures with her guns, and her captain broke off the action. In fact Prince of Wales had hit Bismarck with three 14 inch shells, one of which had caused serious damage: slowing Bismarck, depriving her of usable fuel and, so, ultimately sealing her fate
The loss of the Hood, the globe-trotting icon of the Empire’s naval power in the 20’s and 30’s, was a massive blow to British morale. Every available heavy ship of the Royal Navy was dispatched to dispatch Bismarck. On the morning of 27th May Bismarck was sunk by the battleships HMS Rodney and HMS King George V.
Before the war Admiral Holland and his wife Phyllis had worshipped at St John’s in Boldre. After the war a tradition formed of holding a memorial service for those lost, close to the anniversary of the Battle of the Demark Strait. There is an area of the church dedicated to HMS Hood, known as the “Hood Chapel”.
Photo: Cadets Janes, Bartley, Leblebici and Ambler in the Hood Chapel. The painting of HMS Hood was donated by the renowned maritime artist Montague Dawson.
