HMS King George V (41)

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Career
At Japan, 1945 (USS Missouri in background)
Ordered:
Laid down:	1 January 1937
Launched:	21 February 1939
Commissioned:	11 December 1940
Decommissioned:	1949
Fate:	sold for scrap
Struck:	1957
General characteristics
Displacement:	44,460 tons
Length:	745 feet/227.2 m
Beam:	103 feet/31.4 m
Draught:	35.5 feet/10.8 m
Propulsion:	140,000 hp
Speed:	27.5 knots (28.5 in an emergency)
Range:	4,750 nm at 18 knots
Complement:	1,314 to 1,631
Armament:	10 × 14 inch (356 mm) mk VII guns 16 × 5.25 inch (133 mm) guns 64 × 2 pounder pom-pom (40 mm)
Aircraft:	4 x Walrus
Motto:

The second HMS King George V was the lead ship of the King George V class of battleships of 1939.

Following the tradition of naming the first battleship constructed in the reign of a new monarch after the current monarch, she was originally to be named King George VI (after George VI). However the King instructed the Admiralty to name the ship in honour of his father, George V. King George V was built by Vickers-Armstrong at Walker's Naval Yard, Newcastle upon Tyne and laid down on 1 January 1937, launched on 21 February 1939, and commissioned on 11 December 1940.

She was the flagship of the Home Fleet under the command of Admiral Sir John Tovey, and was involved in the chase for the German battleship Bismarck. On 27 May 1941, she and Rodney fired a large number of shells into to the hull of the ill-fated ship.

While escorting convoy PQ-15 to Murmansk on 1 May 1942, King George V collided with the destroyer HMS Punjabi, resulting in the sinking of the latter ship with 49 crew, and bow damage to the battleship.

In the Mediterranean, King George V covered the Operation Husky landings at Sicily, as well as transporting the Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, back to Britain from the Tehran Conference.

From 1944 until the surrender of Japan, King George V served with the British Pacific Fleet, and was present off Japan during the official surrender ceremony.

She was recommissioned as flagship of the Home Fleet in 1946. Just three years later, King George V was decommissioned into the Reserve Fleet and subsequently scrapped at Dalmuir in 1957.

For the other ship of the same name see HMS King George V (1911).

[edit] Refits

During her career, King George V was refitted on several occasions, in order to bring her equipment up-to-date. The following are the dates and details of the refits undertaken.

Dates	Location	Description of Work
Early 1941		Type 271 Radar added
December 1941		Removal of UP mountings; addition of 1 4-barrelled 2 pdr Pom-pom, 1 8-barrelled 2 pdr Pom-pom, and 18 20 mm Oerlikons; UP directors were replaced with pom-pom directors; the Type 271 radar was replaced with the Type 273; 5 Type 282 radars were also added
May-June 1942	Liverpool	Damage from the collision with HMS Punjabi repaired; external degaussing coil replaced with an internal coil; 4 Type 285 radars added; FM2 MF D/F added
Late 1943		20 20 mm Oerlikons added
February-July 1944	Liverpool	Removal of 1 4-barrelled 2 pdr Pom-pom, 12 20 mm Oerlikons, Type 273 radar and HF/DF; addition of 3 8-barrelled 2 pdr Pom-poms, 6 2-barrelled 20 mm and 2 4-barrelled 40 mm Bofors; the Type 279 radar replaced by the Type 279B, the Type 284 with the Type 274; addition of the Types 277, 293, 2 × 282, and 285 radars, and the RH2 VHF/DF; removal of the aircraft and catapult equipment, replaced with new superstructure upon which the ship's boats were relocated.
1945		Removal of 2 20 mm Oerlikons, 2 40 mm Bofors added