Navires de guerre (2e GM) - Grande Bretagne : livres

The Ships of Scapa Flow

The islands surrounding Scapa Flow made one of Britain's best natural harbours, while the location at the north of Scotland protected the approaches to the North Sea and Atlantic.

The naval base was important during both wars but what makes Scapa Flow famous is its wrecks, the remains of a German fleet, which once numbered some 74 vessels, most of which were scuttled in 1919, as well as the war graves of HMS Royal Oak and HMS Vanguard.

The wrecks of the navy ships still survive, along with eight German warships for which a second war came and prevented salvage. Now a divers' paradise, the wrecks of Scapa Flow bring divers from all over the world and employ many in Orkney itself.

This is the story of the ships of Scapa Flow, their sinking and their salvage, using many previously unseen images of the recovery and subsequent removal of many of the German battleships and cruisers to Rosyth dockyard in Fife for breaking up.

British Warships of the Second World War : Detailed in the Original Builders' Plans

This volume reproduces a representative selection of official plans depicting the main types of warship with which the Royal Navy fought the Second World War. Carefully chosen from the incomparable collection at the National Maritime Museum, these range from battleships and fleet aircraft carriers, through cruisers, destroyers and submarines, to examples of the vast array of specialist vessels built during the war.

Concentrating on 'as fitted' drawings which show the warships as they first entered service, this collection offers an unprecedented wealth of detail on the equipment and fittings of some of the Royal Navy's most famous ships.
It also documents how their appearance changed over time, since many of the plans include alterations and additions made in different shades of ink and wash, and here printed in full colour for instant understanding of the modifications.

With an accompanying text and detailed individual captions by one of the leading experts in the field, this book provides an insight into the warship design process itself, and explains for the benefit of ship modellers and technical historians which types of plan contain the most valuable information.
For anyone with more than a passing interest in warship design and construction, this book will be a revelation.

Capital Ships at War, 1939-1945 - Despatches from the Front

First time full collection of Despatches reports have been published. Despatches in this volume include those relating to:
- the sinking of the German battleship Graf Spee in the Battle of the River Plate in 1939,
- the loss of the battleships HMS Prince of Wales and HMS Repulse in the Far East,
- the sinking of the German battle cruiser Scharnhorst in 1943,
- the attack on Tirpitz by midget submarines,
- the contribution by British Pacific Fleet to the assault on Okinawa in 1945 (which included four Royal Navy battleships),
- and the sinking of Bismarck in 1941.

This unique collection of original documents will prove to be an invaluable resource for historians, students and all those interested in what was one of the most significant periods in British military history.

Dunkirk Little Ships

In May 1940, following the rapid advance of German troops through Holland, Belgium and France, the British Expeditionary Force and French army retreated to Dunkirk. Operation Dynamo was instigated in an attempt to rescue as many of them as possible. With the harbour at Dunkirk severely damaged, much of the evacuation would have to take place from the beaches; only small, shallow-draught boats could do this.
After appealing to boatyards, yacht clubs and yachtsmen throughout the south east of England, the Admiralty managed to round up around 700 small craft which, along with 200 military vessels, were able to rescue an astonishing 338,226 troops over nine days.

In 1965, forty-three vessels which had taken part in the evacuation commemorated the twenty-fifth anniversary by crossing from Ramsgate to Dunkirk, and the Association of Dunkirk Little Ships was formed soon afterwards. A further fifty years on, over 120 Little Ships are still in commission and it is thought that hundreds of others may still survive.

British and Commonwealth Warship Camouflage of WW II - Destroyers, Frigates, Sloops, Escorts, Minesweepers, Submarines, Coastal Forces and Auxiliaries

During the Second World War navies developed low visibility camouflage for their ships, on both the vertical and horizontal surfaces, in order reduce visibility by blending in with the sea, or confuse the identity of a ship by applying more obtrusive patters.

In this book by maritime artist Mal Wright both the official and unofficial paint schemes that adorned ships of the Royal Navy and Commonwealth are depicted in detail, along with discussion on changes of armament and electronics that effected the outward appearance of each ship.

Starting with destroyers from WW1 still in service during WW2, the book progressively covers ships below cruisers, class by class, to provide a detailed and easy-to-use guide to paint schemes in use. In some cases individual ships are shown in the several schemes they wore thus providing a source that covers various periods of service.

With 740 full colour illustrations, all of named vessels, this book concentrates information into a single volume to provide a one-stop reference source, and, for the first time in a single volume, it covers not just the well-known ships, but also escort vessels, minesweepers, trawlers, coastal craft and auxiliaries in sequential format.
Many schemes would be difficult for the reader to have found other than with the most intensive research so that historians, collectors, modelmakers and wargamers will find this unique reference source absolutely invaluable.

J. Samuel White & Co., Shipbuilders

J. Samuel White & Company was the oldest firm on the Admiralty List and built 252 ships for the Royal Navy alone. The yard's closure in 1966 ended 300 years of shipbuilding during which time the company had gained acclaim from mercantile and naval customers alike.
Famed early on for fast Revenue cutters and naval brigs, in its final years Royal Navy destroyers earned it great distinction. Highly innovative, it developed and patented many pioneering products while other innovations included semi-diesel engines, heat exchangers, air conditioners and compressors, besides a range of marine thruster units.

Not only did the company build ships and boats but it also constructed a range of marine aircraft. During the First World War, White's production accounted for 100 ships, including twenty-seven destroyers, and 201 seaplanes. Production during the Second World War added up to 317 ships, among them twenty-six destroyers and a large minelayer.

Illustrated with photographs of these and many of the company's other products, this book tells the story of J. Samuel White and its subsidiary concerns, a business built on a reputation of quality which earned it the slogan: "White's-built - well-built!".

A Shipyard at War - Unseen Photographs from John Brown's, Clydebank 1914 - 1918

Although best known for large liners and capital ships, between 1914 and the completion of the wartime programmes in 1920 the Clydebank shipyard of John Brown & Sons built a vast range of vessels - major warships down to destroyers and submarines, unusual designs like a seaplane carrier and submarine depot ship, and even a batch of war-standard merchant ships.
This makes the yard a particularly good exemplar of the wartime shipbuilding effort.

Like most shipyards of the time, Clydebank employed professional photographers to record the whole process of construction, using large-plate cameras that produced pictures of stunning clarity and detail; but unlike most shipyard photography, Clydebank's collection has survived, although relatively few of the images have ever been published.

For this book some 200 of the most telling were carefully selected, and scanned to the highest standards, depicting in unprecedented detail every aspect of the yard's output, from the liner Aquitania in 1914 to the cruiser Enterprise, completed in 1920.
Although ships are the main focus of the book, the photos also chronicle the impact of the war on working conditions in the yard and, perhaps most noticeable in the introduction of women in large numbers to the workforce. With lengthy and informative captions, and an authoritative introduction by Ian Johnston, this book is a vivid portrait of a lost industry at the height of its success.