HMS Malaya (1915)

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Career

Ordered:	1913
Laid down:	October 20, 1913
Launched:	March 18, 1915
Commissioned:	February 1, 1916
Decommissioned:	1944
Fate:	Scrapped
Struck:	April 12, 1948
General characteristics
Displacement:	33,020 tons
Length:	645 feet 9 inches (197 m)
Beam:	90 feet 6 inches (27.6 m)
Draught:	29 feet 10 inches (9.1 m)
Propulsion:	Steam turbines, 24 boilers, 4 shafts, 56,500 hp
Speed:	25 knots
Range:	4,400 miles
Complement:	1,124–1300
Armament:	Eight 15 inch (381 mm) guns, sixteen 6 inch (152 mm) guns, four 21 inch (533 mm) submerged torpedo tubes

HMS Malaya was a Queen Elizabeth class battleship of the Royal Navy built by Sir W. G. Armstrong Whitworth and Company at High Walker and launched in March 1915. She was named in honour of the Federated Malay States, whose government paid for her construction.

In World War I she served in Admiral Hugh Evan-Thomas's 5th Battle Squadron of the Grand Fleet. She took part in the Battle of Jutland, 31 May 1916, where she was hit eight times, though only receiving minor damage.

The guns of HMS Malaya.

In World War II she served in the Mediterranean in 1940, escorting convoys and operating against the Italian fleet. On one occasion her presence in a convoy was sufficiently discouraging to the German commerce raiders Scharnhorst and Gneisenau that they withdrew rather than risk damage in an attack.[1]

She was damaged by a torpedo from U-106 at 2323 on 20 March 1941. U-106 attacked the shadow of a merchant ship with a spread of two stern torpedoes in bad light from the port side of the convoy SL-68 about 250 miles west-northwest of the Cape Verde Islands. Kptlt Jurgen Oesten (Knights Cross) heard hits after 2 minutes 37 seconds and 3 minutes 35 seconds. One torpedo damaged Malaya and the other the Meerkerk. Malaya was hit by the torpedo on the port side, causing considerable damage. Due to the flooding of some rooms the ship took a list of 7 degrees, but safely reached Trinidad. After temporary repairs were made, she contained to the New York Navy Yard, where she was docked for 4 months.

On 9 July, under the command of Captain Cuthbert Coppinger R.N., the battleship left New York on trials and steamed to Halifax, Nova Scotia to provide protection for an urgent fast convoy. Malaya's log for 21 July 1941 reads: "Embarked passengers and stores for United Kingdom. The passengers include Major-General R. H. Dewing, DSO (late Chief of Staff Far East), Major W.E.H. Grylles, 15/19 Hussars and Mr Cherry, an American citizen."

Alex H. Cherry was a Wall Street Banker who volunteered for active duty in the Royal Navy, before America came into the War. His book, Yankee R.N. is dedicated to his friend Lt. John Parker R.N.V.R. of Boston, Mass, the first American to be killed in action, whilst serving under the White Ensign at sea in a "four stacker" in 1941. On this Atlantic crossing no ships were lost and Malaya arrived on 28 July in Rosyth. Thereafter Malaya escorted convoys from the UK to Malta and Cape Town until summer 1943. Malaya was withdrawn from service at the end of 1944 and placed in reserve and served as an accommodation ship. Sold on 20 February 1948 to Metal Industries, she arrived at Faslane on 12 April 1948 for scrapping. The ship's bell can be seen in the East India Club, London.