She was the mightiest warship of her time, the flag ship of the greatest Navy in the world. She was the home to admirals from Agustus Kempel to Richard Howe to one of the greatest Naval Admirals in history in Horatio Nelson. She was laid down in 1759 and served for a incredible 246 years and is the worlds oldest naval ship still in service.
The HMS Victory has inspired tales and remains a key teaching point in Naval academies from the United States to Russia. A ship that was able to survive 8 major sea battles and came out operational.
Origins
In 1958 the Prime Minister of Britain ordered 12 additional ships for the British Navy including what was at the time called a First-Rate Ship. This was the designation for a ship capable of carrying over 800 men, and at least 100 guns and a tonnage of at least 2000 tons.
This first-rate ship was to become the Victory. Its architect was Sir Tomas Slade the Surveyor of the Navy, a dry dock was prepared at the Chatham Dockyard, which continued to build and refit ships until 1958 including the S-Class Submarines.
The Victory’s keep was laid down on July 23, 1759, and the name Victory was chosen in 1760. The name Victory was chosen because the 7-year war was going well for the British Empire with several key land victories including a victory at the Battle of the Plains of Abraham near Quebec City, and several key naval battles including a victory at Quiberon Bay. However, there were some doubts about the luck of naming a ship Victory, since the last ship named Victory had been lost in 1744 with all hands.
The Victory was primarily constructed from Oak with some elm, pine and fir. 6000 trees were used to build the ship and a team of 150 workers built the frame. The Hull was held in place by 6-foot-long copper bolts and treenails.
Naval construction for Ships of the Line was a long process, usually the frame is built, then the ship is covered and left to cure for months, but with the end of the 7-year war and a period of relative peace the Victory was left to cure for 3 years which probably made her a even hardier boat and explains the length of its active service.
Work was restarted in 1763 with covering and fittings, and she floated for the first time on May 7, 1765. At the time she cost 63,176 pounds which would be $16,725,912 Cdn today.
But the Victory got off to a less then famous start. First, it was discovered that the Victory was 9 ½ inches wider then the drydock gates, forcing the crew to shave off enough wood from the Gates to allow her to pass. Then it was discovered that there were severe construction and design flaws as the Victory listed to Starboard and was so heavy that her lower deck guns were only 4 feet about the waterline. The list was fixed by adjusting the ships ballast, the second issue, the ships heaviness was never fixed, instead an entry was added to the sailing instructions that the lower guns could not be used during rough weather.
In terms of propulsion, the victory was driven by roughly 6599 square yards if material spread out over 37 sails with an additional 23 sales in storage as replacements, these sales were spread over 3 masts and the front spar and had to be carefully managed so the ship wouldn’t tear itself apart in high winds. This design allowed the Victory to reach a speed of about 11 knots, and the manoeuvrability of a much smaller ship.
The victory had 3 decks, not including the hold at the bottom of the ship. A lower fun deck, middle gun deck and upper gun deck. On top there was the quarter deck and the poop deck.
By the time of Trafalgar, the Victory had an awesome array of fire power. On the lower gun deck there were 30 32-pound Bloomfield cannons, these were massive cannons capable of firing a 32-pound shot at 500 feet per second. The middle deck carried 28 long 24 pounders, the upper deck carried the shorter-range faster firing 12-pound guns, another 12 were placed on the Quarter deck. Basically, whatever the Victory could hit with a full barrage it would devastate.
The Men and Boys of Victory
From a Crew Compliment at Trafalgar the Victory sailed with 820 men and officers, the breakdown:
9 officers.
16 Non-Commissioned and Warrant Officers.
18 Midshipmen.
63 Petty Officers.
43 Supply, Supernumeraries and Retinue.
209 Able Seaman.
180 Ordinary Seaman.
90 Landsmen.
31 boys.
A Marine Contingent of 4 officers, 7 Non-Commissioned Officers and 158 privates.
The oldest crewman was 67 and the youngest crewman was just 12-year-old. In the 17th century ships carried young teenagers with the rank of Boy. Usually, they came from a mix of poor to rich families and were enlisted to prepare for a life in the Royal Navy. Usually, the youngest were ranked as Boy 3rd class and they acted as officers’ servants. Boy Second Class learned normal seaman duties acting as apprentices. The Boy First class were usually young men from rich families that were training to become officers in the Navy. Most families were happy to give up their sons to the Navy especially the poor families as it promised them a life better then what they could have on land.
Life in the 18th Century Royal Navy and on Victory
Life wasn’t easy in the Royal Navy and would be considered harsh by today’s standards. But in the 1750’s Navy pay was attractive, even thought the pay would erode until the Navy reformed in the late 18 hundreds. Despite the harsh life, there were mostly volunteers in the Royal Navy, mainly because they were well fed by the nutritional standards of the times, and decently paid. When it came to experienced sailors though, the Royal Navy was competing with the Merchant Navy and Privateers, therefore the Navy used the practice of recruiting pressed men or involuntary volunteers. One of the other benefits for volunteers is that they received a signing bonus and volunteering protected sailors from creditors.
So, what was day to day life like on the Victory? According to Lord Nelson’s diary, the lowest paid Landman earned 1.2 pounds a month ($263.00 CDN Today) , with the highest wage being the Captain who earned 32.4 pounds per month ($8472.00 CDN Today).
There was no uniform for the Non-Commissioned men, their clothing consisted of whatever the Captain ordered, but it was usually a short jacket, Trousers and a head covering with the ships name on it. The officers had elaborate uniforms that reflected their rank and wealth.
In terms of berthing, Sailors and Pretty Officers slept in the lower decks, where there was very little light, and there was no privacy. Each man was issued a 6-foot hammock, and a First Lieutenant issued them hook spaces. Each Sailor had 14 inches of width to sleep in. A Petty Officer was given double the space. Hygiene was a major problem. Men didn’t get to bathe for months at a time and sea sickness was common. So, the lower decks which were poorly ventilated reeked and were a breeding ground for disease. Statistically the biggest danger for a Sailor in the Royal Navy wasn’t enemy action, where disease and accidents accounted for 81% of deaths at sea.
The Royal Navy had decided that food and mealtimes were key to a happy ship. 45 minutes was allowed for breakfast, and 90 for dinner and supper. Dinner the mid day meal was the main meal.
Surprisingly Officers had the same rations as enlisted men, but officers could supplement these rations with a mess subscription. All the meals were cooked in the gallery using a large stove. Usually though Cooks did not have training or experience to be ships cook, they just needed to be a pensioner.
Meals were predictable, typically boiled or salted pork or beef were served from Sunday to Tuesday and Thursdays. Oatmeal and sugar with butter or cheese were common. Each man had a one-gallon ration of beer with low alcohol content which provided heavy calories.
A typical Super would be Lobcouse, which was a salted and boiled meat, onions and pepper combined with hard tack biscuits, the mixture was then stewed and served with a half pinto or wine of a pint of Grog to wash it down. Grog was a key defender against Scurvy. It was Rum mixed with water, lemon juice and cinnamon. Now looking at that diet, you’d think that the crew would be stumbling around the deck blasted all day. But being caught drunk was severely punished by the captain.
Speaking of Discipline, these ships were out to sea for long periods of time so crew discipline was harshly enforced. When the Victory was commissioned the Articles of War was read to the crew, and then once a month after that. By 1757 there were 35 articles, and any infractions not specifically named in the first 34 was covered in the 35th. This gave the Captain leeway to punish sailors based on his discretion.
Punishment could range from beatings with a cane to tying a sailor spread eagle to a sale. Serious offences would be dealt with by the Captain with the worst going to court marshals. Punishments could range from dis-rating a sailor, cutting off their rations to flogging, though the maximum was legally 12 lashes, this was ignored by some Captains. In some cases, a sailor might be flogged around the fleet, which meant that he would be transported to and flogged on each ship in the harbour. For the most egregious crimes the ultimate punishment was hanging.
Action Stations
From her commissioning in 1778 until 1796, Victory roamed the oceans, her first Captain was Sir John Lindsay, who had joined the Navy in 1756, and later achieved the rank of Rear Admiral, and was knighted before serving as a MP in Parliament. His Tenure was short as Admiral Augustus Keppel named the Victory as his flag ship and appointed Rear Admiral John Campell as Captain and Lindsay was transferred off.
Battle of Ushant 1st and 2nd.
On July 9, 1778, Victor put to sea as the flag ship of 29 Ships of the Line, this was a massive fleet at the time. On July 23, they sighted a equal sized French Force off of the Island of Ushant. The French Admiral had orders to avoid battle, but the British fleet cut them off from returning to the French port city of Brest. The French tried to manoeuvre free, however due to shifting winds and driving rain, battle became inevitable. The British managed to keep their column discipline. However the French managed to get some of their ships to pass along the British line. Victor opened fire on the French Flagship Bretagne, which was being trailed by her 89 gun Ville de Paris. The British managed to avoid major damage. But the follow up division under Captain Hugh Palliser suffered damage from the French Guns. Keppel made signal to follow the French, but Palliser in command of the famous HMS Formidable refused the order and the French fleet was lost. Keppel was court marshalled for allowing the French fleet to escape but was cleared. Palliser was not cleared by an Inquiry and his reputation was ruined, but he was eventually cleared in a General Court Marshal.
In 1780 Victory received a needed refit, her hull was sheathed with 3,923 sheets of copper below the water line to protect it from ship worm. The victory returned to duty under the Command of Captain Henry Cromwell, and Admiral Richard Kempenfelt raised his pennant as Victory became the flagship of a fleet that included 11 other ships of the line a 50 gun fourth rate and five frigates. This fleet was to intercept a French Convoy out of Brest. The British originally expected the Convoy to be protected by 10 French Ships of the Line. However they were surprised to find out that the Squadron had been re-enforced and now numbered 19 Ships of the Line, which were protecting 100 transport ships.
The French fleet was situated downwind from the Convoy, allowing Kempenfelt to sweep in with a speed advantage to capture 15 ships carrying troops and supplies before the French could intervene. However, Kempenfelt knew that his fleet wasn’t strong enough to take on the French escorts, but he caught a break due to the bad weather forcing the French fleet to disperse and return to port.
The Great Siege of Gibraltar.
In 1779 Spain and France attempted to capture the British Naval Base at Gibraltar during the American Revolutionary War. A great blockade was enacted as the French and Spanish committed 47 ships of the line and 30 gunboats to starve the British out. It failed. Victory under Admiral Richard Howe was the fleet flagship for a convoy of transport and managed to resupply Gibralter before the beginning of the Blockade.
Battle of Hyeres Islands
This was a naval engagement fought between a combined British and Neapolitian Fleet and the French Mediterranean fleet during the French Revolutionary War in 1795. The Victory came under fire and returned fire in kind blasting a French Rowboat.
Battle of Cape St. Vincent.
By 1796 Captain Robert Calder and taken over Command of the Victory, and Admiral Sir John Jervis had raised his fleet command pendant. By this point in time the British position had become un-defendable in the Mediterranean in the face of a powerful force of a powerful French and Spanish fleet.
Jervis had stationed his fleet off Cape St Vincent to prevent the Spanish from Sailing North to protect Horatio Nelson and his fleet of 5 ships while they evacuated the Island of Elba. Once the evacuation was completed Nelson sailed for Gibraltar and while on the way he learned that the Spanish fleet had sailed past a few days before. The Spanish fleet had been blown off of course by gale force winds and was working its way back to Cadz. In an amazing display of nerves and thanks to darkness and a thick fog, Nelson sailed his ships through the Spanish fleet and rendezvoused with Jarvis. By this time the British had re-enforced Jarvis with a further 5 ships of the Line, and the British now had a fleet of 15 ships of the Line with Jarvis on the 100-gun Victory. Jervis split his ships into two lines of battle but was not aware of the size of the Spanish fleet until sails started appearing on the horizon and Calder and Jervis started counting sails on the horizon.
"There are eight sail of the line, Sir John"
"Very well, sir"
"There are twenty sail of the line, Sir John"
"Very well, sir"
"There are twenty-five sail of the line, Sir John"
"Very well, sir"
"There are twenty-seven sail of the line, Sir John"
"Enough, sir, no more of that; the die is cast, and if there are fifty sail I will go through them
The Spanish had sailed in two divisions, and Jervis was determined to steer between them, surprised by his ferocity Victory exploited the gap raking the Spanish ships with fire from its 100 cannons. The 104 gun 3 decked Principe de Asturias was battered and according to Jervis squared her yards and ran clear out of the battle and did not return. Jervis then realizing that the split Spanish fleet could cross behind the victory and reunite ordered his ships to change course. But Sir Charles Thompson who was leading the rear division, failed to obey and the following ships were indecisive on whether to follow Thompson or Jervis. The decision was made by Nelson on the HMS Captain a 74-gun 3rd ship of the line. Nelson broke off and attacked the Spanish main fleet capturing two ships within minutes and the other ships of the rear division followed suite and the Spanish fleet was routed by the much smaller British fleet, they were prevented form joining French and Dutch allies in the channel. And the Spanish fleet lost 4 ships of the line to British captures, 250 Spanish sailors were killed, 550 wounded and 3000 taken prisoner. The British lost 73 dead and 227 wounded.
When Captain Calder later bought up Nelson’s disobeying of orders by his division commander, Jervis glibly stated "It certainly was so, and if you ever commit such a breach of your orders, I will forgive you also."
Jervis and Nelson were hailed as heroes, Jervis was made a Baron and an Earl, Nelson was invested as a Knight of the Bath. Jervis was also vested with a 3,000 pound per year pension.
Return home and reconstruction.
After the Battle of St. Vincent, the Victory returned home to England, when it was inspected, it was found that the stern timbers had weakened, and it was no longer ship worthy. She was declared unfit for active service and anchored off the Chatham Dockyard for 2 years until 1798, when she was ordered to be converted to a hospital and prison ship for Spanish and French prisoners.
But fate intervened, when the HMS Impregnable a 98-gun Second Ship of the Line was lost off Chichester when she ran aground while escorting a convoy to Lisbon. She couldn’t be re-floated and was stripped and dismantled leaving the British Navy in need for another Ship of the line. The Admiralty looked at the old Victory and decided to recondition the Victory. As the work proceeded more and more defects were found and what was deemed to be a repair and refit became a reconstruction. The original cost estimate of 23,000 pounds exploded to 70,933 pounds. They increased the gun count to 104 and lined the magazine with copper both to protect powder from moisture and to prevent fires. The galleries along her stern weas removed. Her sales and masts were replaced, and she was given a yellow and black paint job a pattern that was adopted by most of the Royal Navy and called the Nelson Chequer. The work was completed in 1802, and the Victory sailed under her new captain Samuel Sutton.
Under Admiral Nelson
The one-armed Admiral hoisted his flat on the Victory on May 18, 1803. Nelson to this day is one of the greatest Naval Commanders in history combining a firm grasp of tactics with an aggressive nature and a person high level of bravery. But it came with a cost. Nelson had lost partial sight in one eye in Corsica and had lost his arm in the Battle of Santa Cruz de Tenerife. He had taken part in over 20 battles over 4 wars with Trafalgar being his tragic last and yet most glorious battle.
The Battle of Trafalgar
The Battle of Trafalgar took place on October 20th, 1805, between the French Navy and their Spanish allies and the British Navy during the War of the Third Coalition of the Napoleonic Wars. As part of Napoleon’s plans to invade the United Kingdom, the French and Spanish Fleets with 33 Ships of the Line were to take control of the English Channel to provide the Grande Armee safe passage.
French Admiral Pierre-Charles Villeneuve and his fleet sailed from the port of Cadiz in South France on the 18th of October 1805, and they encountered the British fleet of 27 Ships of the Line under Horatio Nelson on Oct 21st.
Nelson was outnumbered 27 Ships of the Line to 33 Ships of the Line. As a note the Spanish fleet had the largest warship in the world at that time, the awesome Santisma Tinidad which featured over 130 guns over 3-gun decks.
Everyone knew that Nelson was going to address this unbalance by sailing his fleet directly at the allied battle line, even though he knew and worried about it Villeneuve failed to react to it. Nelson’s columns chopped the French/Spanish fleet into 3 groups and isolating the rear half form Villeneuve’s flag ship and giving Nelson’s fleet a temporary advantage, costing the Spanish and French 20 ships while the British lost no ships. Victory led the way; it broke the line between the 80 gun French Flagship Bucentaure and the 74 gun French Redoutable and fired her 100 guns at such close range that she singed the paint of both ships and the shock waves added to the damage caused by the shot killing over half of the men on both ships in one massive barrage. At a quarter past one 5 hours into the battle Admiral Hardy who was commanding Victory realized that Nelson was not at his side, he turned around to see Nelson kneeling on the deck with a smile on his face. Hardy rushed to his side
“Hardy, I do believe they have done it at last .... my backbone is shot through”
Nelson had been hit by a musket shot from the Mizzen-Top of the Redoubtable at a range of 50 feet. The ball entered through Nelson’s shoulder and passed through his lungs and struck his vertebrae.
Nelson was taken below deck while Hardy took over command of the battle. All the surgeon could do is make Nelson comfortable by bringing him lemonade. Hardy made his way down to see Nelson and witnessed his death with Nelson’s last coherent words being to ask that his family was taken care of, then with a sigh Nelson asked on hearing Hardy’s voice.
“Who is that?" On hearing that it was Hardy, he replied, "God bless you, Hardy."
But the battle wasn’t over, nor was Victory’s trials. The crew of the Redoubtable tried to board and take the Victory, but they were thwarted by the arrival of Admiral Eliab Harvey on the HMS Temeaire whose broad side sank the French ship and broke the spirit of the French and Spanish fleet. Nelson issued one last command to “Anchor the Fleet”. But this order was ignored by Admiral Cuthbert Collingwood who pressed the attack completing the route. But Victory had suffered badly, 57 of her crew were dead and 102 were wounded. Victory herself was battered and could not move under her own sails, she was towed back to Gibraltar for Repairs and then carried Nelson’s body back to England.
King George responded tearfully to the news of the Victory and Nelson’s death “We have lost more then we gained”.
The Times reporting on the victory at Trafalgar.
“We do not know whether we should mourn or rejoice. The country has gained the most splendid and decisive Victory that has ever graced the naval annals of England; but it has been dearly purchased” After Trafalgar
The British Admiralty considered the Victory to be too old and too damaged to continue as a First-Rate ship of the line. They downgraded her guns replacing her 24 pounders with 18 pounders. She was then recommissioned as a troop ship in 1810, before being relocated to Portsmouth as a floating depot and finally a prison ship in 1813. She was finally towed into dry dock to repair her hull and refloated in 1824 and was designated as the Port Harbor’s flagship.
Victorian Era
In 1831, the Admiralty issued orders to break up the Victory for her timber, but there was a public outcry to save the ship, and so the Victory was left, forgotten at its Portsmouth Moring. They permitted public tours of the ship, but the Victory saw a resurgence when Princess Victory made a visit to the ship to meet the surviving veterans of Trafalgar. This generated a surge of interest, but the 10,000 to 12,000 people that toured the ship of year further damaged the ship. In 1854 the Victory sprang a leak and sank, she was raised and sank again in 1887. The Admiralty at this point provided a small subsidy for maintenance and in 1899 the Victor became home of a signal school.
In 1903 Victory continued to rot at her mooring. Then she was accidentally rammed by the HMS Neptune and only emergency repairs kept her from sinking. The Admiralty again proposed scrapping her, but King Edward VII prevented that.
In 1921, a public save the victory campaign was started led by shipping Magnate Sir James Caird. A considerable amount of dollars was spent on repairs and restoration.
Work was suspended during World War 2 and the old girl after nearly 150 years saw itself taking battle damage as she was struck by a 500-pound breaking her keel. The Germans saw this as a victory and announced that they had sunk the Victory, the Admiralty called them filthy liars.
Post World War 2 until today.
Keeping the Victory is a constant and expensive job, but the British have continued to refit and repair the old wooden ship. She has survived beetle infestations, and rotting word and fungus and pests. She was eventually restored to her Trafalgar configuration in the 1920’s and the work was finished in 2005; Her damaged sails were displayed in the Royal Naval Museum.
The Victory is now the oldest commissioned warship in the world and attracts 350,000 visitors a year.
Out Thoughts
The Victory is simply put an amazing story. A ship with a nearly 250 year record. She took part in 2 major battles in Trafalgar and St Vincent and came out victorious. Her actions and victory at Trafalgar cemented the Royal Navy’s reputation as the best in the world and saved the British Empire.
She served as the flag ship of a who’s who of Naval royalty from Keppel to Hardy to Jervis to Nelson. She was the home to thousands of sailors who joined the crew as 13-year-old boys and served on her til their retirement, and she always bought them home.
At the time of her construction her sail and hoist and hull construction were a marvel of engineering, she was a picture of speed, elegance and manoeuvrability with a vicious bite.
There are very few names of ships in Military History that produce a real reaction and sign of respect from people that study history or fight in wars. Victory, Enterprise, to name a few.
Before the Battle of Trafalgar Horatio Nelson signalled every ship in the fleet “England expects that every man will do his duty” Its as if that was a message from the ship itself.
#### yes
Nice to have you back old fella.
I couldn't even imagine serving on that ship.
Thing of nightmares
__________________
Captain James P. DeCOSTE, CD, 18 Sep 1993
thanks that means a lot, I'm hoping to do more, just not as regularly. This one took a good 3 weeks of research and writing.
In terms of the living conditions. Imagine cramming 300 unbathed men who work in the heat all day, in the unventalated 3rd gun deck which is right above the cargo with the rats and pests. When I read interviews of sailors, it stank like hell itself, it was completely dark because they worried about fire. But at least all those bodies made it warm.
However people willingly joined because the pay compared to jobs on land if you could find it was really good. And the food was considered really good compared to what civilians on land ate.
__________________
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
The Following User Says Thank You to CaptainCrunch For This Useful Post:
Guess I'll re-watch master and commander again, that got me in the mood
Great movie, but kind of romanticizes life at sea.
Mutiny on the bounty is a great movie to watch to get a sense of life at sea. Not the Mel Gibson movie, though it was actually good, but I'm talking the 1962 movie with Marlon Brando. But the problem is that they over exaggerate Captain Bligh's casual cruelty though.
Even the Russian movie Battleship Potemkin is good at reflecting how awful life was at sea.
Hmm, maybe a writeup at some point on the Bounty would be cool. But I want to do my next one on the Controversy around the SU-57 and the Chinese J-20 and the Iranian Qahar 313 which is a scam. But I'm scared to in a way because there are some people on this board that probably understand 5th generation fighters better then me.
__________________
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
This period in history is of particular interest to me.
The decision by Nelson to split his fleet in two at Trafalgar and essentially ram the combined Spanish/French fleet, thereby cutting it in three was a very risky move. HMS Victory and HMS Royal Sovereign, at the head of each column, would have endured an extensive direct bombardment which they were essentially incapable of responding to with their guns until they managed to cut the Spanish/French lines. Conditions on the ship during that battle would have been nearly unbearable.
This period in history is of particular interest to me.
The decision by Nelson to split his fleet in two at Trafalgar and essentially ram the combined Spanish/French fleet, thereby cutting it in three was a very risky move. HMS Victory and HMS Royal Sovereign, at the head of each column, would have endured an extensive direct bombardment which they were essentially incapable of responding to with their guns until they managed to cut the Spanish/French lines. Conditions on the ship during that battle would have been nearly unbearable.
Its funny because the Admiral in charge of the Fench/Spanish fleet knew that Nelson was going to do it, because it was typical Nelson, and he either didn't prepare his fleet for it, or he simply froze, and gave the British the first blow.
When the Victory cut through the gap, the split was so close that the pressure waves from the cannon barrage and the flames scorched paint and shattered wood and bodies.
Nelson did get and its a weird term since he died lucky, his aggressive move should have allowed the French and Spanish Armada to close in behind the British after they passed and exposed them to massive counter fire. But luck and poor communications actually saved the British.
__________________
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
The Bonaventure the last of Canada’s Aircraft Carriers.
I thought it was important when I wrote this “article” that I would dive into a abridged history of the Royal Canadian Navy, a key part of Canada’s participation in World War 2 though the Cold War and to the modern era. Unfortunately, due to government decisions from the Conservatives to the Liberals, the Canadian Navy has gone from a height of 400 ships at the end of World War 2 to a barely functional and understaffed flotilla, whose ability to carry out its primary missions of defending Canada’s coastline and arctic to participation in NATO is in question.
A brief look at the Canadian Navy’s history
Canada’s Navy was official founded as a branch of the Canadian Navy in 1910 when Prime Minister Wilfrid Laurier introduced the Naval Service of Canada, which was intended to define the Canadian Navy as a distinct service arm, that if the need arrived could be placed under the command of the British Navy.
The British initially equip the Navy with 2 vessels, the light cruiser HMCS Nioble, and the protected Cruiser Rainbow.
During WW1, Canada had a small coastal navy of defended the East and West Coast of North America consisting of 6 ships with a primary mission of hunting for German U-Boats.
After WW1 the Canadian Navy started building out their Navy growing it to 11 combat vessels, but WW2 was about to change the legacy of the Navy and its place in history.
With its initial primary role in WW2 of escorting Convoys to Britain to prevent it being starved into submission by the German U-Boat wolf packs that patrolled the Atlantic Ocean, Canada played a key role in winning the Battle of Atlantic. Canadian vessels sank 31 U-Boats, and captured 42 enemy vessels wile escorting over 25,000 Atlantic Convoy crossings. At the same time the Navy lost 33 ships. The Canadian Navy also served during the D Day Invasion.
By the end of WW2 the Canadian Navy had expanded to 400 combat vessels, they had acquired 2 small Escort Carriers. These vessels were part of the Ruler Class and capable of carrying up to 24 aircraft The HMS Nabob was torpedoed during the attack on the Tirpitz and eventually scrapped. The HMS Puncher served in the British home fleet and eventually scrapped after World War 2.
There is a misnomer used in Canadian Naval History that by the end of WW2, Canada had the 3rd most powerful Navy in the world. It could be debated that Canada had the 4th largest Navy in the World at the end of WW2. She had expanded to 400 vessels that included 2 carriers, 2 light cruisers, 3 armed merchant Cruisers, roughly 43 Destroyers including 8 of the excellent Tribal Class Destroyers. Over 70 frigates, 120 Frigates, roughly 120 Corvettes and another 100 frigates.
While Canadian’s flotilla was massive and a perfect blend of ships to deal with rough water anti-submarines operations in the Atlantic. It lacked the offensive punch and submarine fleets of the United States, British Empire, and even the emerging Soviet Navy.
With the post war peace dividend the Canadian Navy looked at how it could change its composition to counter the growing Cold War Threat. The decision was made to operate 1 aircraft carrier, and the British lent Canada the HMS Warrior, a Colossus Light Escort Carrier that could carry 2 squadrons, 1 squadron of Supermarine Seafires and with squadron of Fairey Fireflys. The Warrior had a short career and was exchanged back to the British in 1948 for the slightly larger HMCS Magnificent, a Majestic Class Light Carrier which could carry 37 aircraft with the improved Hawker Sea Fury while a squadron of Fairey Firefly’s carried out anti-submarine duties.
During the Korean War Canada participating in shore bombardments off the coast of Korea and deep water interdiction.
The Magnificent took place in the Suez Canal Crisis where it acted as transport for Canadian Troops and vehicles.
The Canadian Navy also became experts on submarine hunting to counter the growing Soviet Submarine Fleet.
In 1957 with the growing age of Jet Aircraft and the Magnificent not being able to support Jet Aircraft naval operations, the Magnificent was paid off, and the HMCS Bonaventure, Canada’s last aircraft carrier was commissioned, and this is where our story begins.
The Bonaventure
Originally ordered by the British Navy, and designated as the HMS Powerful, The Majestic Class was originally laid down as the Colossus class in 1942 as an order of 16 carriers by the Royal Navy. With the need to be able to handle faster and heavier aircraft, the last 6 of the class were redesigned as the Majestic Class and construction was halted until the end of WW2 because of the uncertainty of future aircraft designs. 5 of the 6 were eventually completed with the last being completed in 1961, with these carriers eventually serving in the Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canadian, Indian and French Navies.
While the Majestic Class was a transitional carrier design with a life span of 3 to 5 years, the last Majestic was decommissioned in 2001, when Brazil finally decommissioned the Minas Gerais.
The Majestic class was a light carrier. Light Carriers were the mid class of carriers between the Escort Carriers and the tremendously expensive Fleet Carriers that the Americans were pumping out in great numbers. Designed by Vickers-Armstrong a engineering firm with a claim to fame in designing and manufacturing the Vickers Machine gun, the company had begun to build ships in 1927 and eventually its ship building was spun off to become BAE Systems Submarines, the company behind the Astute class submarines.
The Majestic Class hull was based on the Colossus hulls, but because of the rapidly changing face of both naval aviation due to the arrival of the jet age, and the evolving nature of anti aircraft defences. The Majestic also needed to be a simple and easy and cheap to build design.
Due to faster and heavier aircraft the Majestic featured a redesign of the catapult and arrester system, the elevators needed to be redesigned to work with heavier jets, and the deck had to be re-enforced. The weapons system and radar were upgraded to increase the range of detection and the ability to react to faster jet attacks. Among the British innovations were an angled Flight deck to allow for faster operations, steam catapults and the mirrored landing aid.
With the delay in construction of the Majestic Class, the ship that became the HMCS Bonaventure was completed and entered service in 1957, She was purchased in 1952, and completed at the Harland & Wolf shipyard in Ireland and completed her sea trials in 1957. She embarked on a 13-year career. She was originally designated as RML 22, and eventually giving the designation CVL 22.
Bonaventure or Bonnie as she was affectionately referred to, had a length of 704 feet with a maximum beam of 128 feet. She had a net displacement of 20,000 tons. She used 4 boilers and a Parson’s single Turbine which could drive her at a snappy 25 knots. Bonaventure depended on three radar systems, the AN/SPS-10 surface search radar, the AN/SPS-12 air search radar, and the AN/SPS-8 height finder Radar. All combined the Carrier had a up to 100 km detection bubble.
To protect itself from air and surface attacks, the Bonnie had 4x3 inch twin mounted 76 mm guns and 8xbofors 40 mm guns. To project power the Bonne could carry an air wing of up to 34 aircraft and helicopters.
Just to do a comparison between a light carrier and a Fleet Carrier, the closest chronological comparison would be the USS Oriskany which we commissioned in 1950. The Oriskany had a length of 888 feet, and beam of 129 feet, she displaced 30,800 tons. She was driven by 4xsteam turbines with a speed of 33 knots. While Bonnie carried a crew of 133 sailors and pilots, the Oriskany carried 2600 officers and enlisted men. Her air-group ranged from 90 to 103 aircraft.
The Bonnie’s teeth
The Bonaventure was designed to enter the jet age and carry up to 34 aircraft. During her life she carried 5 squadrons. During any early deployment she carried 15 McDonnell F2H Banshee Jet Fighters and 7 Gruman CS2F ASW craft. She also carried a squadron of Sikorsky HO4S Anti-Submarine helicopters.
The Banshees were drawn from VF-860 out of Nova Scotia, and VF-87 which was stationed in the United Kingdom. The CS2F’s were drawn from VS-880 out of the United Kingdom and VS-881 out of Nova Scotia.
McDonnell FSH Banshee
An early carrier based Jet Aircraft the Banshee first took to the air in 1947 and retired in 1962. Canada originally wanted to purchase 60 aircraft for $40 million dollars, but the Canadian Parliament dithered for 2 years, and by the time the purchase was approved the Banshees were no longer in production and 39 used Banshees were purchased from the United States Navy for $25 million dollars. By the time it was deployed, it was found that the straight winged Banshee was up to 100 MPH slower then land based swept wing aircraft. They had a short combat radius of 600 miles, were armed with 4 20 mm canons. She had a combat speed of 479 Miles per hour, a ceiling of 41,100 feet, Besides her cannons she had wing mounts for 2 early sidewinder missiles or 15 rockets of 5 500 lb bombs.
As noted before the Banshee had a short service life in the Canadian Navy retiring in 1962 as Canada refocused the Bonnie on Anti-Submarine Warfare. She also had a short and dangerous life as 12 of the original 39 aircraft were lost due to failures in the folding wing structure and brake failures.
Gruman S-2 Tracker
Was a duel propeller, anti-submarine tracking aircraft. The Tracker could carry 2 torpedoes or a nuclear depth charge in its internal bay. She could carry up to 4 more torpedoes on her wings. She carried a AN/SPS-38 surface search radar and a Magnetic Anomaly Detector. To aid in her submarine detection, the Tracker also carried a smoke particulate sniffer to detect the diesel exhaust from Diesel Electric Subs who were charging their batteries on the surface.
De Havilland Canada built 100 trackers under contract to Gruman between 1954 and 1957 and were built specifically for coastal defence and carrier duties. They were refitted in 1964 to improve their sensors, but with the end of the Bonaventure in 1970, the Trackers were effectively retired to the bone yard except for some use with the Fisheries ministry.
Sikorsky H-18 Chickasaw And Sikorsky CH-124 Sea King
The H-18 was a search and rescue helicopter. The Sea King was the primary ASW helicopters. The Sea King was equipped with sonar buoys and could carry depth charges or a single light Torpedo.
Operational History
Bonaventure was named after Bonaventure Island which was a bird sanctuary located in the Gulf of St Lawrence. She completed her trials in 1957 and completed her sea trials with the detection of a Soviet Submarine off the coast of Nova Scotia. She then completed her sign off with a visit to the United Kingdom.
In 1960 NATO reorganized their plans for the Atlantic Ocean and the Bonaventure commanded a Anti-Submarine Hunter Killer Group.
After her NATO obligations, Bonaventure returned to the Canadian Fleet and embarked with her air group including the Banshees. And Trackers.
She then interacted and exercised with the American Atlantic fleet.
In 1962 the Bonnie transitioned to a strictly anti-submarine platform and the Banshees were retired and she was augmented with more Sea Kings and Trackers.
The Cuban Missile Crisis
When it was discovered that the Soviets were shipping and assembling medium and short-range ballistic missile on Cuba, the Americans took a week after they learned of the missiles on Oct 16th. Kennedy rejected calls from his own military who waned to mount a series of air strikes against the missile sites. Instead Kennedy decided on a naval blockade of Cuba, but they called it a quarantine, as a Blockade required a formal declaration of war. On Oct 22, 1962, President Kennedy went on TV and threatened the Soviets with further action if the missiles weren’t removed.
Kennedy informed Prime Minister John Diefenbaker of the US plan shortly before the television broadcast. But Canadian US relations were at a low point as the two leaders disliked each other. When Diefenbaker was on the phone he informed Kennedy that he was skeptical about the Soviet Unions intention and demanded further proof, Diefenbaker also urged Kennedy to send a team of UN inspectors to Cuba to verify the US intel.
But there were bigger problems for Diefenbaker as his own military commanders also disliked Dief. The Americans requested that the Canadian Forces move to DEFCON 3, Diefenbaker who was angry that the US hadn’t consulted with Canada earlier and not wanting to fall too quickly into line with the US demands refused. Diefenbaker and his Foreign Affairs Minister also didn’t want to provoke the Soviets.
The National Defence Minister Doug Harkness despite the PM’s objections asked his Military Units to raise their level of alertness to the Ready State, which is equivalent to the US’s Defcon three. However formal permission was denied as the Cabinet argued for two days. Harkness argued that the nature of the crisis and Canada’s international treaties made the alert necessary.
As the crisis grew and the Soviet ships approached the quarantine zone other NATO members announced their support for the Blockade, in the end on October 24th Diefenbaker surrendered and authorized a ready state allowing Canadian ships and aircraft to participate in Anti-Submarine patrols.
But the truth was that the Canadian Navy had been active in ASW duties in the Atlantic since early October due to an increase in Soviet Sub activity. Naval Commanders ignore the government and operated at a higher level of readiness in support of the US Quarantine zone. After Kennedy’s speech on October 22nd, additional ships were fuelled and provisioned and slipped anchor.
Canada’s hesitancy worsened an already tense relationship with the Kennedy administration. After the crisis ended, the US accused the Diefenbaker government of lying and avoiding its military duties. Harkness resigned as the Minister of Defence and Diefenbaker’s PC government lost the next election to Lester Pearson and the Liberals in 1963.
The Bonaventure was in English waters on Oct 13th, as the crisis worsened the Bonaventure was recalled to Canada, on her trip back the Bonnie played a primary role as part of the main anti-submarine barrier in the Atlantic, they were tasked with stopping or slowing down Soviet Submarines from reaching the Quarantine Zone, this allowed the American’s to redeploy their carriers further south to reinforce the American Navy’s actions around Cuba.
Later Action and the End
On January 3, 1963 the Bonaventure returned to St John, during the refit she was further modified as a Helicopter carrier and ASW platform as Canada saw their role within NATO as providing a capable fleet built around Submarine actions. She returned to Sea on Aug 7th and took her place as the flag ship of the Atlantic Fleet.
In 1964 the Navy estimates called for a major refit to the Bonaventure to extend the Aircraft Carriers service life. While the Navy board decided on the refit the Bonnie assisted in embarking troops for service in United Nations Peacekeeping in Cyprus.
On March 30th the Bonnie headed to Norfolk Virginia for trials with the legendary A-4 Skyhawk as a replacement for the Banshees, but Canada’s military budget had been slashed the decision was final made to begin sea trials with the Sea King Helicopters. From that point the Bonnie's air group was made up of Trackers and Sea King Helicopters, she also took part in joint operations in the Caribbean, and South America.
The Bonnie underwent a half life refit in 1968 at the Davie Shipbuilding Yard. Initially estimated to cost $8 million dollars, the refit found several long-standing builder defects and lead to a cost over run to $17 million and took 18 months. This was the first body blow to the Bonnie as the government was looking at ways to cut defence spending.
The 1968 unification of the Canadian Forces under Defence Minister Paul Hellyer spelled the end of the Bonnie. With the stroke of a pen naval aviation and the concept of the Navy as a service branch disappeared. The Bonaventure and its air wing merged wit the rest of the Canadian Armed Forces and became vulnerable cuts to the single Defence Budget line in the Government’s budget. The Bonnie continued until 1969. But by that time the government was rapidly shrinking the Canadian Military and the vulnerable carrier and carrier operations were deemed as surplus luxuries, The last deck landing occurred on December 12, 1969.
The Bonnie returned to the HMC shipyard in Halifax on July 3, 1979 and was sold off for disposal. Her steam catapult was removed and sent to Australia and was used for repairs by the HMAS Melbourne of the Royal Australian Navy. The Vessel was purchased by Tung Chen S Steel Company in Taiwan and was broken up by 1971.
Out Thoughts
With the end of the Bonnie, Canada lost nearly 30 years of Naval Aviation experience and the Navy started a slow decline that has lead to the current state of the Canadian Navy today as the forgotten arm of the Canadian Navy.
While the Bonnie never took part in any kind of war action, she did play a key role in ferrying troops for the UN, containing the threat of the Soviet Submarine fleet and participated in the Cuban Missile Crisis.
There is a certain amount of pride and tradition in having a navy with the ability to project power, Canada lost that as it became a frigate navy, a certain amount of prestige was lost to the Navy.
While there are arguments especially made by the Stephen Harper government that a helicopter carrier concept is needed to support NATO and UN operations over seas, giving the Navy and the country the ability to quickly deploy large numbers of troops, supplies, vehicles and even limited helicopter air support, the idea never got beyond the theoretical stage as micro carriers or Amphibious assault ships and their accompanying air wing have become enormously expensive. For the men and woman that served on Canadian Carriers from the HMCS Warrior to the Magnificent to the Bonnie, there was a certain amount of pride in serving on a Carrier, especially in the Jet age during the Cold War.
Did the Canadian Government bungle in ending the Carrier Line? It’s a debatable point, the bigger concern was the shrinking of the Navy from a flotilla of nearly 400 ships at the end of World War II to the current Canadian Navy which stands at 4 Diesel Electric Submarines that are entering their end of life, 12 Halifax Frigates that are nearing their end of life. And 4 Harry DeWolf Arctic Patrol Ships. On paper it seems like a good mid sized navy, but the 12 Halifax, 4 Victoria Class submarines and 4 coastal defence ships are all obsolete platforms, and the Canadian Navy has a difficult journey ahead in terms of staffing these ships. The role that the Bonnie added beyond its AWS duties was to act as a Command vessel which allowed Canada to form comprehensive Task Forces. With the replacement River Class Destroyers and next generation submarines arriving in the distant future, Canada will have probably lost a large number of their more experienced officers and Non Enlisted type and will struggle to re build the Navy’s traditions and levels of training.
While this doesn’t have in theory much to do with the Bonnie being cut into razer blades over 50 years ago, Canada didn’t learn the lessons that it could have provided with its decommissioning.
__________________
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to CaptainCrunch For This Useful Post:
I’m always utterly fascinated by Soviet/Russian Naval doctrine and ship design. They do things differently. While other Navies design ships for specific roles, the Russians prefer a mixed and brute force approach. In Russia a Carrier will act as a cruiser, a anti-submarine platform and a carrier.
The Russian’s have also been plagued by serious design flaws and issues with quality control. Their ships and submarines usually seem to have major and devastating technical flaws. From the myriads of problems with the Kuznetsov, to the Kursk accident, the Soviets seem to have issues. This also can be attributed to a poorly thought-out conscription system that leads to poor crew training and discipline among the ranks.
I wanted to look at a specific part of Russian Naval doctrine built around Aircraft carriers. Outside of their submarine fleets, The Russians have designed their navy mainly around shoreline defense of the motherland, with occasional forays into deep waters. However, the Russians did not build a Navy that was designed to project power in the same way that the American’s do, or that the Chinese are moving to.
With that in mind, the Russians did play with the concept of Aircraft carriers and were late players to the game. The Russian designs have evolved over time from what could be generously classed as aircraft carrying cruisers right up to their own concept of a fleet carrier, and the Russian continue to look at designing and building a next generation super carrier of their own.
So, the final question is, why do the Russians continue to want to add carriers to their fleet. Beyond the ability to project power, A Aircraft carrier is almost a requirement for a modern Navy and brings with it a certain amount of prestige. Let’s face facts, despite Russia’s victories in WW2 and in the war against Napoleon, Russia’s military history in the last 200 or so years has had more losses than victory. From the thrashing of the Russian Navy at the Battle of Tsushima by the Japanese to the failure and collapse of the Russian Army in WW1, to Afghanistan to their current war in Ukraine, the Russians don’t seem to win that often. Russia also seems to have an inferiority complex, especially when it comes to Western Powers, because of this there is a certain amount of overcompensation when it comes to the Military, so having a aircraft carrier goes towards feeling better about themselves.
Since 1967, The Russian’s have had 5 classes of ships capable of carrying fixed wing aircraft, they are also looking at a new design of Super Carrier in the Project 23000E which as of me writing this is still hanging in Limbo. We want to take a closer look at the life of each of these classes.
From time to time, I might refer to the Russians as Klingons, the thought comes from the Federation always trying to figure out how the Klingons think in Star Trek because their thought process is so different. The Russian’s when it comes to Naval doctrine and tactics are very Klingon.
The first attempt, Moskva
One thing that I’ve always said about the Russian designers is that they build beautiful looking naval vessels and fighter planes. They manage to give their designs a rakish intimidating look. Sure, they might be failures more due to quality control, but they’re pretty much museum pieces.
But those designers took the day off when it came to the Moskva class of helicopter carriers. There is nothing pretty about this early helicopter carrier. While the Moskva wasn’t really an aircraft carrier it was an early experimentation in Naval Aviation for the Soviets.
This initial class of 3 ships was designed primarily to defend the Soviet coast and Soviet Naval formations from early Western Nuclear Submarines. It also became a key part of Soviet Naval Doctrine. In the event of a war, the Soviets would scramble their Ballistic Missile Submarines to Northern Sea Bastians and use the Moskva to defend these Strategic assets. This would free the Soviets to surge their Attack Boats into the Atlantic to cut off NATO Convoys.
The three ships were ordered by Admiral Gorshkov the head of the Soviet Navy who was responsible for the massive expansion of the Soviet Navy in the cold war, and designed as command ships of anti-submarine formations, 3 ships were laid down but only two ships were built. The first named Moskva entered service in 1967, and the second named Leningrad sailed in 1968.
The Moskva which did not carry any fixed wing aircraft had a flight wing of either 18 Kamov KA-25 or 18 MI-8 Naval anti-submarine helicopters.
With the Moskva the Klingon effect hadn’t taken over the Russian Military design bureau, where ships could perform multiple missions, she was primarily armed as a ASW platform with limited air defense. She carried 2 x twin SA-N-2 SAM launchers, 2 twin 57 mm guns, a single launcher for a FRAS-1 Anti Submarine missile, 2 RBU 60000ASW Rockets, 10 553 mm Torpedo tubes and 2 decoy launchers.
From a performance perspective, there were some serious design flaws, its 2 steam turbines were under powered and because of that she was slow with a maximum speed of 30 knots, her hull design was notoriously bad in rough seas, and her crew of up to 850 men and officers could only stay at sea for 16 days.
Despite its flaws, the Moskva class cruisers were ideal command ships, and could protect themselves, the Moskva acted as the command ship of the Black Sea Fleet.
However their life was short by naval standards, and the Moskva was scrapped in 1997 and the Leningrad in 1968. The Soviets were about to take a large leap into Carrier Aviation with the new Kiev class of Carriers.
And this is where the Klingon design philosophy comes into play.
The Kiev Class
After the experimentation of the Moskva class the Soviets decided that they needed to create their own class of fixed wing carriers, something that they lacked. For the Soviets to transition from what is nicely called a frigate navy to a true-blue water navy with power projection capabilities, they needed to apply the lessons that they’d learned in the past from the Moskva class and the British and American carrier programs.
The Kiev carrier was more defined as an Aircraft carrying cruiser but could generously be called an escort carrier.
Admiral Sergei Gorshikov had spent a lot of time and energy focusing on the construction of a well-balanced navy that could theoretically project power into the third world, at the forefront of his vision was the construction of ballistic missile submarines. However, the Cuban missile crisis exposed what could be argued as a fatal flaw in Soviet Naval strategies. They lacked the long-range striking power and ability to challenge US carriers that could have confronted the US Naval blockade. The US dramatic leap forward in terms of ballistic missile technology including the Sub launch Trident C-3 meant that the Soviet Navy needed the assets to be able to challenge the US navy further out to sea to protect the motherland.
Gorshikov needed a platform that could perform multiple roles, it needed to be a strong sub hunter, be able to project power and confront and destroy Aircraft carriers. While this was an interesting concept on paper, it ignored traditional naval doctrine and became a symbol of the Klingon thought process of Soviet naval strategists while they have one platform attempting to do a lot of different things and not being able to do one thing well. It also created what could be generously called a Frankenstein carrier.
Laid down in 1970, there were a total of 4 ships in the Kiev class with the first ship the Kiev being launched in 1972 and commissioned in 1975. Originally the Navy wanted to build something that would have resembled the Kitty Hawk class of conventional carriers, instead they settled on a smaller design that seemed like some mad scientists had mashed two different types of ships together.
The front end of the ship resembled a traditional Cruisers and carried an overwhelming amount of offensive weaponry, the first two ships in this class carried:
4 twin P500 Bazait SSM missiles carrying 8 missiles. The Bazait was designated as the SS-N-3 Shaddock had a range of 550 km’s and flew at a speed of faster than Mach 3 and carried a massive 1-ton warhead and was designed as a carrier killer.
72 SA-N-3 Goblet intermediate range SAMs 40 OSA short range Sams
2 76 mm air defense guns. 9 CIWS 10 21-inch torpedo tubes 1 1 FRAS Anti-Submarine Rocket launchers.
The back end of the Kiev was the carrier section and designed to host a carrier air wing of 12 YAK-38 Forger STOL fighters and 16 anti-submarine helicopters.
To understand the interesting design choice, we need to pause for a second to look at modern carrier doctrine. The United States views a carrier as a strategic asset and not a tactical asset. A US Aircraft carrier’s main weapon is a fighter wing of 80 strike aircraft who can project power and created a exclusive zone of operations. Because of this doctrine, an aircraft carrier is heavily protected by its battle group made up of specialized warships and submarines to protect the carrier from air, surface and sub surface attacks. A Supercarrier is not a strong sub hunter, nor is it a missile boat. It launches aircraft and is one of the safest ships in the Navy.
The Kiev class on the other hand is treated as a tactical asset. It is designed to be able to hunt submarines, directly attack surface ships. Go after American carriers with its Surface to air missiles and protect itself from air threats and launch limited strikes with its combination of Sam and fixed wing aircraft. It also is designed to augment its escorts instead of completely depending on its escorts for protection and offensive fire power.
Despite that and because of the design of the class where they packed a ton of weapons into its hull it limited the size of its air wing to a single squadron of single mission aircraft. It goes to the theory of trying to master all and not being good at any.
As an interesting note the Kiev was designed with Black Sea duties in mind, and it was designated as a heavy cruiser which allowed it to pass through the Turkish Straits because the 1936 Montreux Convention prohibiting aircraft carriers of greater then 15,000 tons from passing through the Straits.
In total 4 vessels were built, the Kiev was the first followed by the Minsk and the Novorossiysk, the class went through a redesign and the 4th vessel the Admiral Gorshkov was part of a subclass called the Baki class which had a slightly different weapons load.
Fate was cruel to the Kiev class, with the breakup of the Soviet Union the Russian Federation ended up with 4 ships that they couldn’t afford to maintain, what made things worse is that the Nikolayev Shipyards, the only Soviet shipyard capable of maintaining these huge ships was now property of Ukraine.
With a Russian Federation that suddenly didn’t have the money or facility to maintain these ships, it was decided that they should be retired.
The Kiev and Minsk were sold to a Chinese company, the Kiev was converted to a hotel in Tianjin, but before it was converted the Chinese studied it as part of their interest in carrier construction. The Minsk because a museum piece in in Jiangsu. The Novorossiysk was broken up for scrap. The interesting story was that the Admiral Gorshkov was sold to India in one of the great money grabs by the cash poor Russians. The Indians removed the offensive weaponry from the bow of the ship, and they replaced it with a traditional ski jump launching system. They doubled the size of the airwing using the excellent Mig 29K multi-role fighter and renamed it as the INS Vikramadtya, which continues to serve the Indian Navy today.
Yak-38 Forger
If we’re going to look at the Kiev class of carrier its important to take a quick look at the Yak 38 Forger which was specifically designed to serve as its carrier strike class.
The Yak-38 was the first carrier based fixed wing aircraft that the Soviet Union developed and its first and only attempt at a VTOL naval based aircraft.
When the Soviet Navy requested that the Yakolev Design Bureau submit a design for a naval strike carrier, they asked for a light weight, supersonic, easy to fly, VTOL aircraft. In every aspect what they wanted was an aircraft that reflected the predecessor of the Hawker Harrier which was the P1154.
However issues came right from the start, it was decided that making a super sonic VTOL fighter was too difficult and they instead created a sub-Mach 1 fighter. While the Hawker version used one engine with controllable variable nozzles. The Forger used three engine, one vertical thrust engine in the back and two downward facing engines in the front, this created a heavier fighter, with poor range performance and a difficult to fly fighter. There was so little trust in the design that they installed a automatic ejection system that would fire the pilot out if the aircraft rolled past 60 degrees on take off.
What the Russian’s got was a poor performance aircraft, it had a max speed of Mach .95, it had a range of 810 miles, a service ceiling of 36,000 feet, it had 4 hardpoints with a capacity of 4400 lbs. It had no radar. Just to make a comparison, the most common carrier aircraft in the US navy was the F-14 Tomcat which had a speed of Mach 2.35, a range of 1800 miles, a service ceiling of 53,000 feet and had 10 hardpoints with a capacity of 14,500 pounds.
The Yak served in until the mid 1980’s seeing service with the Soviet Navy and seeing limited user in Afghanistan. It was, frankly, too slow, too lightly armed and too limited to be an effective combat threat. While the Harrier had a long and distinguished career and served in multiple navies and militaries around the world. Nobody can think of a good thing to say about the Forger.
The Soviet Navy was about to take a generational step forward In Naval Aviation, using the lessons learned by the Kiev class, and it would eventually become one of the most embarrassing chapters in Soviet and Russian Naval history.
The Kuznetsov Class
The Soviets first attempt at a full sized dedicated fixed win aircraft would eventually become one of the biggest misfires in Naval design history, expose the fact that while the Soviet/Russian Navy might be able to build them but don’t know how to maintain them, and lead to the rise of Chinese power protection.
While the Kuznetsov was designed to be a generational leap forward in Soviet power projection concepts, poor design decisions, poor technology choices and a Klingon viewpoint led to disaster after disaster making experts think that there was a for real curse on this ship.
Once again designated as a heavy aircraft cruiser to get around that pesky Montreux Convention, the Kuznetsov class was to be a class of three ships and was built on the frame of the Kiev class carrier. It was designed to be a primary ASW platform with an anti-carrier capability and carry a larger wing of more capable fixed wing aircraft.
In 1978, the Soviets were building the Kiev class carriers, but with the Soviets love of subclasses like the Bakut subclass of the Kiev class, they envisioned a 5th Kiev class as coming with catapults and arresting gear which would nicely get them away from the horrible Forger fighter. In other words, the Soviets wanted a more traditional Catapult and Barrier carrier.
In 1980 however after a review of the defense ministry, it was decided that this subclass would be too heavy and slow, and too expensive for what was becoming a cash poor Soviet Union, so the requirements of the Catapult were removed and replaced with the typical Ski Jump ramp.
This larger “Kiev” was to feature a greatly expanded flight wing, instead of 12 aircraft and 12 helicopter, the Air Wing was to be composed of 33 Fixed Wing Aircraft, composed of the Mig 29K and Sukhoi SU 33’s, and a dozen KA-27 ASW helicopters or KA-52K attack helicopters.
Once again though Soviet designers couldn’t decide on if they were building a carrier, or a offensive cruiser and basically smashed the two different concepts together like an angry kid with Lego. They placed a dozen SS-N-19 Shipwreck surface to surface missiles. 200 Kinzil SAMS and a UDAV ASW torpedo rocket launcher.
The biggest issue with the Kuznetsov design was at its heart with its propulsion plant, it was decided to continue to use a Mazut burning steam turbines. Mazut is known for its high energy output, however you can easily tell when a ship is burning Mazut by the cloud of black soot trailing the ship, and its murderous on a poorly maintained boiler, to continue to use Mazut there needs to be a high degree of maintenance which the Russian Navy is poor at. This propulsion decision led to not only endurance problems as the Kuznetsov can realistically stay at sea for 45 days, but it led to fires and environmental accidents.
The first ship of the lass originally named the Riga, then the Brezhnev and finally the Kuznetsov was laid down in 1982 and underwent a long construction period due to funding issues. However more issues rose, and the story of the Kuznetsov reads like a script from a grand theft auto game. Built at the Nikolayev shipyard, the ship was completed in 1989. However, the fall of the Soviet Union, the attempted coup attempts by the Russian Military, and the declaration of independence by Ukraine led to a tense situation as Ukraine declared ownership of the Kiev and ordered it to stay in port. This led to the Deputy of the Russian Northern Fleet Yuri Ustimenko to fly down to the Ukraine, and he basically stole the carrier and sailed it to Vidyayevo so it could remain with the Soviet Fleet.
Kuznetsov became fully operational in 1995 and was deployed to the Mediterranean with a limited air wing in time to celebrate the 300th anniversary of the Russian Navy. This cruise also started the cascading failures, as the evaporators that provided fresh water and drinking water to the crew broke down leading to severe water rationing.
The Kuznetsov returned home for repairs and a refit that was delayed for 2 years due to a lack of funds, but she eventually returned to sea in 2000, but its triumphant return to international duty was delayed due to the sinking of the Kursk and the Kuznetsov participated in the search and salvage operation, but further operations were cancelled due to the investigation and reform attempts of the Russian Navy and the Kuznetsov sat inactive for 5 years. Disaster continued to follow the carrier as during her triumphant return to operations a SU-33 fell off the deck.
In 2007, the Kuznetsov returned to sea in a truly disastrous fashion, while in the Med, a small fire broke out that led to the death of a crewmember, the cause of the fire was poor maintenance practices, and then in 2009, a burst pipe led to a massive oil spill while refueling off the coast of Ireland. Once again, the Kuznetsov returned to its dock with its tail between its legs.
Then in 2012 during a deployment to the Med, the Kuznetsov suffered what could be generously described as a catastrophic failure of its propulsion system, and it was towed back to port. From that point on, the Kuznetsov was not allowed to leave port without a tugboat accompanying it.
In 2013, despite cascading problems with the Kuznetsov and more time spend in repairs then at sea the Russian Government announced that they were expending the life of the carrier, whoops sorry heavy aircraft cruiser until 2030, far beyond its design limits.
In a rare war deployment in 2016, the Kuznetsov participated in strikes using SU-33’s against militants in Syria, and its mission was viewed as successful despite losing an aircraft due to a defective arrestor cable. With that it was decided that Kuznetsov would go through a extensive refit and repair cycle in Murmansk in 2017. She has never left port since then and has taken on the appearance of a rusted abandoned ship. However, this wasn’t the end of the curse of the Kuznetsov. In 2018 the floating drydocks servicing the carrier sank and sent a crane crashing through the flight deck. Due to not having a large enough drydock the Russians decided to take a year and a half to merge two dry docks, but poor maintenance and repair practices led to a major fire that killed 2 people and caused extensive damage. A second fire broke out in 2023, then when the Russians finally had their stuff together enough to get the ship into the franken dock bad weather delayed repair work for almost a year.
It was expected that the Kuznetsov would return to the sea in early 2024, but is seems like the repair and refit is years behind schedule and the question is, will it ever return to duty, its become too expensive and too obsolete, also with the Russian Navy’s failure in Ukraine, a change in the Russian submarine fleet to boats that can defend themselves against the West, and an emphasis on ground operations In Ukraine, it seems unlikely that the Kuznetsov will leave port except for a trip to a chop shop.
Mig-29k – an excellent, and probably one of the best designed fighters that the Soviets/Russians have ever produced. The 29K is a carrier based twin-engine all-weather fighters. Originally rolled out in the late 1970’s. Originally designed as a counter to the F-15 and the F-14, the Mig 29k has different avionics and heavier landing gear and an arrester hook. Currently the 29k continues to serve in the Russian Military and is the fighter of choice for the Indian Navies 2 carriers.
Sukhoi Su-33 – the naval variation of the venerable SU-27. It is a twin-engine Multirole fighter that was first rolled out in 1998.
We’ve talked a lot about the Kuznetsov, but what happened to the other ships in the class? The second ship in the class was laid down in 1985 in the Mykolaiv shipyards in the Ukraine. With the collapse of the Soviet Union the ship was barely 2/3rds completed; Ukraine ordered construction stopped as they claimed ownership of the hulk. Ukraine then put the ship up for auction, and it was purchased for 20 million dollars by a Chinese private conglomerate, who wanted to make it into a hotel. The west viewed this deal with a lot of suspicion as the Chong Lot the company that bought the hulk had no telephone office and no address and was run by former PLAN officers. The ship was towed to a dry dock in Dalian and refitted by the Chinese Navy as their first operational dedicated aircraft carrier, she was named the Liaoning and was designated as a type 01 class carrier. She was commissioned in 2012. The Liaoning was never meant to be anything but a proof-of-concept experimental carrier. Her whole idea was to learn about carrier aviation and use it as a test bed project and use those lessons to create a made in China version of a heavy carrier.
The Chinese then rolled out the type 002 carrier, the Shandong was commissioned in 2019, she is a enhanced made in China version of the Kuznetsov class, while she looks like her predecessor, she uses a conventional oil steam turbine proposal system instead of Mazut, she has none of the offensive punch of her predecessor carrying light defensive weapons and she focuses on air wing
operations. The Future
In the 1988 the Soviet Navy laid down the keep of the next generation Ulyanovska class carrier, this represented a massive leap forward in carrier construction. This was to be a true super carrier featuring steam catapults and an air wing featuring 69 Mig-29k of SU-33s and 16 helicopters. And 4 nuclear power plants. She was 44% complete when the Soviet Union was collapsed follow by the collapse of the new Russian Navy. With a lack of funds, she was scrapped in 1991.
So, is there a future for Russian Aircraft carriers? There is a proposal for a new carrier designated as the Shtorm class which as of 2017 had been in development for 10 years and shows no signs of being laid down even though its still in the Russian’s state armament Programme. This carrier is rumored to be a nuclear powered Stobar carrier with a capability of carrying up to 100 fighters in its air wing.
However, a lack of funds, a shifting priority to the modernization of the Russian Navy’s subs and surface ships, and a technology embargo due to the war in Ukraine that has strangled the Russian’s access to high tech components that they have killed will probably doom this project.
Every modern Navy wants to have carriers, they are the best political expression of power projections. Even countries that have a relatively small Military Budget have joined the carrier club. The British recently built two Queen Elizabeth Class Carriers. Japan has recently joined the carrier club thanks to the flexibility of the F-35C variant. China continues to learn and build new carriers as their type 003 is currently reaching the end of its construction, and of course there are the Americans’ the king of the Carrier class.
Will Russia rejoin the Carrier club; it doesn’t look likely even though Putin has stated repeatedly that he wants a carrier to enhance the reach of power of the Russian Navy.
The problem Is that the Russians have never gotten carriers right, the other problem is that the poorly trained Russian sailors just aren’t good at maintaining equipment or using it effectively which is detrimental to something as complex and expensive as a Aircraft carrier in its flight wing.
The question is also around the future of the Aircraft carrier, which is up for debate, but the technology around anti-ship missiles, long range ordinance and the ability to track the movements of carriers might put the future in jeopardy, and the Soviets don’t have the money or the training to take that risk.
__________________
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
The Following 4 Users Say Thank You to CaptainCrunch For This Useful Post:
Not sure if this is the right place to put this but its been neat holding my GrandFathers jump wings and uniform patches, reading into what the 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion did during WWII.
Quote:
By the end of the war the battalion had gained a remarkable reputation: they never failed to complete a mission, and they never gave up an objective once taken. They are the only Canadians to participate in the Battle of the Bulge and had advanced deeper than any other Canadian unit into enemy territory.[3] Despite being a Canadian Army formation, it was assigned to the British 3rd Parachute Brigade, a British Army formation, which was itself assigned to the British 6th Airborne Division.
Last edited by Otto-matic; 11-11-2024 at 11:24 AM.
The Following 4 Users Say Thank You to Otto-matic For This Useful Post:
This is absolutely the right place, and that's a great find.
If your interested, you can probably get the war diaries on line for that unit, which are really interesting reads.
I remember reading about them on D-Day, due to piss poor weather and spotting they were scattered to hell and back, and they still managed to find a way to achieve all their objectives.
BTW, I can't imagine jumping out of a plane with over 70 pounds of supplies and a parachute.
Insane.
__________________
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
The Following User Says Thank You to CaptainCrunch For This Useful Post:
See that's the interesting debate, in this research is who actually killed the Red Baron. Was it Arthur Brown? was he killed by ground fire.
What were the effects on the commulative PTSD and a headwound that caused brain damage that led the Baron to fight differently then he usually did in his last fight?
When I started researching this I had a lot of pre conceived notions on the life and death of the Red Baron, and a lot of them were really wrong.
__________________
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
The Following User Says Thank You to CaptainCrunch For This Useful Post:
The Majestic class was a light carrier. Light Carriers were the mid class of carriers between the Escort Carriers and the tremendously expensive Fleet Carriers that the Americans were pumping out in great numbers. Designed by Vickers-Armstrong a engineering firm with a claim to fame in designing and manufacturing the Vickers Machine gun, the company had begun to build ships in 1927 and eventually its ship building was spun off to become BAE Systems Submarines, the company behind the Astute class submarines.
An early carrier based Jet Aircraft the Banshee first took to the air in 1947 and retired in 1962. Canada originally wanted to purchase 60 aircraft for $40 million dollars, but the Canadian Parliament dithered for 2 years, and by the time the purchase was approved the Banshees were no longer in production and 39 used Banshees were purchased from the United States Navy for $25 million dollars. By the time it was deployed, it was found that the straight winged Banshee was up to 100 MPH slower then land based swept wing aircraft. They had a short combat radius of 600 miles, were armed with 4 20 mm canons. She had a combat speed of 479 Miles per hour, a ceiling of 41,100 feet, Besides her cannons she had wing mounts for 2 early sidewinder missiles or 15 rockets of 5 500 lb bombs. 
Was a duel propeller, anti-submarine tracking aircraft. The Tracker could carry 2 torpedoes or a nuclear depth charge in its internal bay. She could carry up to 4 more torpedoes on her wings. She carried a AN/SPS-38 surface search radar and a Magnetic Anomaly Detector. To aid in her submarine detection, the Tracker also carried a smoke particulate sniffer to detect the diesel exhaust from Diesel Electric Subs who were charging their batteries on the surface. 
