... was the eighth ship of the Royal Navy to bear that name. Launched in 1914, she saw combat in the Battle of Jutland two years later. She attracted worldwide attention in 1928 when her senior officers were controversially court–martialled over what amounted to a bitter personal feud; this brought considerable embarrassment to what was at the time the world's largest navy.
Attempts to modernise Royal Oak throughout her 25–year career could not fix her fundamental lack of speed, and by the start of the Second World War she was no longer suitable for front–line duty.
This being so, the loss of the Royal Oak did little to affect the numerical superiority enjoyed by the British navy and its Allies, but it had a considerable effect on morale. The raid made an immediate celebrity and war hero out of Günther Prien, who became the first German submarine officer to be awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross. Before the sinking of the Royal Oak, the Royal Navy had considered the naval base at Scapa Flow impregnable to submarine attack, but the raid by U47 demonstrated that the German navy was capable of bringing the war to British home waters. The shock resulted in rapid changes to dockland security and the construction of the Churchill Barriers around Scapa Flow.
The wreck of the Royal Oak is a designated war grave. The ship lies almost upside down in 100 feet of water, with her hull 16 feet beneath the surface. In an annual ceremony marking her loss, Royal Navy divers place a White Ensign underwater at her stern. Unauthorised divers are prohibited from approaching the wreck under the Protection of Military Remains Act 1986.
The above is a slightly edited version of the introduction to Wikipedia's page, entitled Royal Oak (08).
In total, the Royal Navy lost 1,401 ships during World War II: 3 battleships, 2 battlecruisers, 5 aircraft carriers, 3 escort aircraft carriers, 34 cruisers, 153 destroyers, 74 submarines, 8 minelayers, 32 minesweepers, 10 frigates, 22 corvettes, 10 sloops, 15 auxiliary cruisers, and 1,035 "smaller units". This includes ships lent to Commonwealth and other Allied naval forces.
The Royal Navy lost 50,758 men killed in action, 820 missing in action and 14,663 wounded in action. The Women's Royal Naval Service lost 102 killed and 22 wounded.
These numbers (for losses of ships and personnel) are from Wikipedia's List of Royal Navy Losses in World War II page.
The other two battleships that were lost were Barham (25 November 1941, by U–331 off Egypt's Mediterranean coast at the start of the Western Desert campaign) and the Prince of Wales (10 December 1941, by Japanese aircraft in the South China Sea). The two battlecruisers were Hood (24 May 1941, by naval gunfire from the Bismarck in the Denmark Strait) and Repulse (10 December 1941, along with the Prince of Wales). The five aircraft carriers were Courageous (17 September 1939, by U–29 off the coast of Ireland), Glorious (8 June 1940, by naval gunfire from the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau in the Norwegian Sea), Ark Royal (13 November 1941, by U–81 off Gibraltar), Hermes (9 April 1942, by Japanese aircraft off Ceylon) and Eagle (11 August 1942, by U–73 off Majorca).
Royal Oak was the second ship of any size to be lost by the Royal Navy in World War II, after the aircraft carrier HMS Courageous.
© Haydn Thompson 2020