HMS Repulse

HMS Repulse was a Renown-class battlecruiser of the Royal Navy built during the First World War.

 

Originally laid down as an improved version of the Revenge-class battleships, her construction was suspended on the outbreak of war because she would not be ready in a timely manner. Admiral Lord Fisher, upon becoming First Sea Lord, gained approval to restart her construction as a battlecruiser that could be built and enter service quickly. The Director of Naval Construction (DNC), Eustace Tennyson-D'Eyncourt, quickly produced an entirely new design to meet Admiral Lord Fisher's requirements and the builders agreed to deliver the ships in 15 months. They did not quite meet that ambitious goal, but the ship was delivered a few months after the Battle of Jutland in 1916. Repulse, and her sister ship Renown, were the world's fastest capital ships upon completion.

 

Repulse participated in the Second Battle of Heligoland Bight in 1917; the only combat she saw during the war. She was reconstructed twice between the wars; the 1920s reconstruction increased her armour protection and made lesser improvements, while the 1930s reconstruction was much more thorough. Repulse accompanied the battlecruiser Hood during the Special Service Squadron's round-the-world cruise in 1923–24 and protected international shipping during the Spanish Civil War in 1936–39.

 

The ship spent the first months of the Second World War hunting for German raiders and blockade runners. She participated in the Norwegian Campaign of April–June 1940 and searched for the German battleship Bismarck in 1941. Repulse escorted a troop convoy around the Cape of Good Hope from August to October 1941 and was transferred to East Indies Command. She was assigned in November to Force Z which was supposed to deter Japanese aggression against British possessions in the Far East. Repulse and her consort Prince of Wales were eventually sunk by Japanese aircraft on 10 December 1941 when they attempted to intercept landings in British Malaya.

Second World War

 

At the beginning of the Second World War, Repulse was part of the Battlecruiser Squadron of the home fleet. She patrolled off the Norwegian coast and in the North Sea in search of German ships, as well as to enforce the blockade for the first couple months of the war. Early in the war, the aft triple 4-inch gun mount was replaced with an 8-barrel 2-pounder mount. In late October, she was transferred to Halifax with the aircraft carrier "Furious" to protect convoys and search for German raiders. Repulse and Furious sortied from Halifax on 23 November in search of the German Battleship "Scharnhorst" after it had sunk the armed merchant cruiser "Rawalpindi", but Repulse was damaged by heavy seas in a storm and was forced to return to port. Repulse escorted the convoy bringing most of the 1st Canadian Infantry Division to Britain from 10 to 23 December 1939 and was reassigned to the Home Fleet. In February 1940, she accompanied the aircraft carrier "HMS Ark Royal" on a fruitless search for six German blockade runners that had broken out of Vigo, Spain.

 

Repulse was assigned to support Allied operations during the Norwegian Campaign in April–June 1940. On 7 April, Repulse, along with the bulk of the Home Fleet, was ordered to sea to intercept what was thought to be another attempt to break-out into the North Atlantic. The ship was detached the following day to search for a German ship reported by the destroyer "HMS Glowworm, but the destroyer had been sunk by the German Cruiser "Admiral Hipper" before Repulse arrived and she was ordered to rendezvous with her sister Renown south of the Lofoten Islands, off the Norwegian coast. On 12 April, Repulse was ordered to return to Scapa Flow to refuel and she escorted a troop convoy upon her return. In early June the ship was sent to the North Atlantic to search for German raiders and played no part in the evacuation of Norway.

 

Force Z

Main article: Sinking of Prince of Wales and Repulse

In late 1941 Winston Churchill decided to send a small group of fast capital ships along with one modern aircraft carrier to Singapore, to deter expected Japanese aggression. In November, Repulse which was in the Indian Ocean was ordered to Colombo, Ceylon to rendezvous with the new battleship HMS Prince of Wales. The carrier HMS Indomitable, which was assigned to join them, was delayed when she ran aground in the Caribbean. Prince of Wales and Repulse and their escorting destroyers comprised Force Z, which arrived in Singapore on 2 December 1941. On the evening of 8 December, Force Z set out on an attempt to destroy Japanese troop convoys and protect the army's seaward flanks from Japanese landings in their rear.

Force Z was spotted during the afternoon of 9 December by the Japanese Submarine I-65, and floatplanes from several Japanese cruisers spotted the British ships later that afternoon and shadowed them until dark. Admiral Sir Tom Phillips decided to cancel the operation as the Japanese were now alerted. Force Z turned back during the evening, after having tried to deceive the Japanese that they were heading to Singora. At 00:50 on 10 December, Admiral Philips received a signal of enemy landings at Kuantan and correspondingly altered course so that he would arrive shortly after dawn.

 

The crew of I-58 spotted Force Z at 02:20, reported their position, and fired five torpedoes, all of which missed. Based on this report the Japanese launched 11 reconnaissance aircraft before dawn to locate Force Z. Several hours later 86 bombers from the 22nd Air Flotilla based in Saigon were launched carrying bombs or torpedoes. The crew of a Mitsubishi G3M reconnaissance bomber spotted the British at 10:15 and radioed in several reports. The pilot was ordered to maintain contact and to broadcast a directional signal that the other Japanese bombers could follow. Repulse is at the bottom of the frame, having been hit by a bomb, 10 December 1941

 

The first attack began at 11:13 when 250 kilograms (551lb) bombs were dropped from eight G3Ms from an altitude of 11,500 feet (3,505m). The battlecruiser was straddled by two bombs, then hit by a third which penetrated through the hangar to explode on the armoured deck below. This inflicted a number of casualties and damaged the ship's Supermarine Walrus seaplane, which was then pushed over the side to remove a fire hazard. Anti-aircraft fire damaged five of the Japanese bombers, two so badly that they immediately returned to Saigon. In the ensuing attacks, Repulse was skillfully handled by her captain, Bill Tennant, who managed to avoid 19 torpedoes as well as the remaining bombs from the G3Ms. The gunners on the Repulse shot down two planes and heavily damaged eight more. However, Repulse was then caught by a synchronized pincer attack by 17 Mitsubishi G4M torpedo bombers and hit by four or five torpedoes in rapid succession which proved fatal. At 12:23, Repulse listed severely to port, quickly capsized and went down by the stern with the loss of 508 officers and men. The destroyers HMS Electra and HMAS Vampire rescued the survivors, including Captain Tennant.

Wreck

HMS Repulse came to rest at 183 feet (56 m), almost upside down with her starboard side elevated and her port side buried in the seabed at 3°37′N 104°20′E. The wreck site was designated as a 'Protected Place' in 2002 under the Protection of Military Remains Act 1986, 60 years after her sinking.

 

Survivors described five torpedo hits on Repulse, four on the port side and one on the starboard side. The four portside hits purportedly were: two amid-ship, one abreast of the rear turret and one near the propellers. The starboard side hit was amid-ships. A 2007 diving expedition could confirm only two of the hits by examination of the wreck: the portside hit near the propellers and the starboard hit amid-ship. Unfortunately, at the time of the expedition, the portside midships section of the wreck was buried in the ocean floor thus the claimed hits there could not be confirmed. However, the area abreast of the port rear turret was accessible and no sign whatsoever of a torpedo hit, as described by survivors, was found.

 

Location: National Memorial Arboretum, Alrewas, Staffordshire, UK. 

Location: Teluk Cempedak beach, near Kuantan, Malaysia.