A History of Royal Navy Aircraft Carriers
On 19th January 1912 Lieutenant Charles Samson flew a Shorts S27 biplane off a platform constructed on the stationary battleship H.M.S Africa. Four months later Samson flew a plane of a moving ship, Hibernia, during the Royal Fleet Review at Weymouth. The development of naval air power had begun.
Early Days
Before the development of aircraft carriers came the development of seaplane tenders. These vessels were able to transport Seaplanes and then lower them into water where they could take off and when they returned they could be hoisted back onboard the ship. The first such vessel converted for this role was the cruiser Hermes and after the start of the First World War more ships were taken up form trade and converted into this role. These vessels and their aircraft distinguished themselves during the Great War (1914-1918) and perhaps the most successful was the Ark Royal. In 1915 she participated in the Gallipoli campaign. Thankfully her actions were more successful than the operation itself. Three of her sea planes attacked three enemy ships with torpedoes- the first ever torpedo attack. It was during the First World War that the light battlecruiser Furious was converted into an aircraft carrier with a small forward takeoff deck. It was on Furious that the first ever successful deck landing occurred when Squadron Commander EH Dunning landed his Sopworth Pup on August 2nd 1917. Dunning was determined to repeat this achievement two days later but it ended in tragedy: the tire on Dunning’s aircraft burst and the Sopworth went over side of the carrier, drowning Dunning. This disaster proved that for safe and successful landings to occur a deck free of obstructions was needed. Hence the Italian liner Conte Rosso was bought and converted into a ‘flat top’ aircraft carrier named Argus while Furious underwent another modification- this time with a full-length flight deck. In July 1918 Furious launched six Sopworth Cammels against the Tandem Zeppelin sheds on what became the first ever carrier strike.
The first tragedy: The Sopworth unsuccessfully lands on Furious and falls over the side taking the pilot, Dunning, with it.
World War Two
With war clouds on the horizon in the late thirty's the Royal Navy started to rearm. A third Ark Royal entered service in 1938 and originally she was to have been joined by three sisterships, but more of the Illustrious Class were built instead. It was to be in World War Two that the aircraft carrier would come of age, proving its supremacy over the battleship as the modern capital ship. However within the first months and years of the war Britain's carriers suffered terrible losses to U-boats, pocket battleships and enemy aircraft. Courageous was lost on 17th September in the first year of the Second World War when she was attacked by U29in St George's Channel. The two torpedoes which struck Courageous sent her to the bottom within quarter of an hour. Sister ship Glorious was lost a year later when she and her escorts, Acasta and Ardent, were attacked by infamous German battleships Gneisenau and Scharnhorst on 8th June 1940. All three ships were lost, 1500 men along with them- only 46 survived. Meanwhile Eagle’s career was cut short during the Malta Convoys when she was sunk by U-73 with the loss of 160 lives, whilst another early carrier- Hermes- was attacked and sunk by around fifty Japanese aircraft with the loss of 287 lives off Ceylon on April 9th 1942. She and her Australian escort Vampire were among several ships lost in the attack. However tragedy was avoided in September 1939 when Ark Royal was spotted by a German U-boat. U-39 fired two torpedoes at the carrier but fortunately both missed. However the losses didn't end their and despite this lucky escape Ark Royal's days were numbered. On November 10th 1941 she left Gibraltar for the last time. Three days later she was struck by a single torpedo from the German U-boat, U81. Her crew abandoned ship and were rescued by the destroyer Legion and other escorting ships. Despite attempts to tow her to Gibraltar, Ark Royal developed a list as she took on water. Over fourteen hours after she was torpedoed she finally sunk, with the loss of only one life.
However the losses were matched by the enormous success of the carriers. One of the greatest attacks was that on Taranto in November 1940. During this raid the armoured fleet carrier Illustrious, 170 miles away, launched 21 Swordfish in two waves against the heavily defended Italian harbour. The attack was completely unexpected and the Italians suffered heavy losses including three battleships heavily damaged or destroyed. In contrast only two of Illustrious's Swordfish were lost. This attack effectively eliminated the Italian Navy but perhaps more significantly it demonstrated the power, ability and potential of the carrier and the attack was used as a model by the Japanese for their devastating attack on Pearl Harbour. Meanwhile the exploits of Admiral Sommerville’s "Force H" ensured the name Ark Royal earned a place in naval legend. Together with Hood, Valiant and Resolution, Ark Royal headed "Force H" and as part of 'Operation Catapult' , she had orders to attack the French fleet in North Africa.
The British Pacific fleet was formed in 1944. All six Illustrious class ships participated in the Second World War, most notably in the pacific theatre. It was here that they had their greatest triumph- each vessel was attacked at one point or another by Japanese Kamikaze aircraft yet their design, in particular their amour, allowed them to recover and return to operations within a matter of hours.
Despite the chaos and confusion caused by a Kamikaze attack, a carrier could be launching aircraft again within hours.
Post War Run Down
By the end of the Second World War in 1945, Britain's economy was in a severely weakened state and she was no longer able to support a wartime navy. The carriers were no exception to the subsequent cuts. Of the vessels planned under the wartime building programmes many were cancelled and of those that were already under construction many were launched and then laid up, often within days of taking to the water- the emphasis had switched to the building of civilian vessels in an effort to rebuild the merchant navy. The carriers were simply using up valuable slipways. Within a year of the war coming to the end Britain had disposed of her entire fleet of American built Escort carriers: One (Biter) had been lent to the French navy as Dixmude and the remainder had been returned to the US navy or to merchant service. Of the ships planned under wartime building programmes the planned Malta class large fleet carriers, which would have been similar to the American Midway class, were cancelled. Of the Centuar class Monmouth, Polyphemus, Arrogant and Hermes were cancelled while Elephant, Centaur, Albion and Bulwark were launched and laid up with work not resuming to the 1950s. Similarly of the Audacious Class, Africa and Eagle were cancelled while throughout the 1950s and 1960s units of the Colossus and Majestic classes provided carriers for the navies of France, Canada, Australia, Indian Brazil and Holland and through resale Argentina, and of those that remained with the RN two were converted to aircraft maintenance ships, one to a heavy repair ship and one used as a source of spare parts. The others were all discarded during the 1960s after brief careers that included service in the Korean War. As for those carriers which had served Britain through the war only one, Victorious, saw significant post war service.
New Technology
On 4th December 1945 the first deck landing of a jet aircraft was made by a De Havilland Vampire onboard Ocean. Despite the cutbacks and rundown of the carrier fleet the 1960's saw three new British technological innovations introduced:- the angled flight deck, steam catapults and mirror landing sites. The mirror landing site did away with the need for a batsman and therefore made landing safer. A sequence of lights would be reflected in a mirror on the carrier's flight deck. This was safer in two main ways- firstly there was less chance of human error as there was no batsman, secondly the pilot could concentrate on the flight deck rather than be distracted by the batsman. Steam catapults utilised steam from a carrier's boilers in the launching of aircraft while the angled flight deck reduced the risk and danger of unsuccessful launchings and landings. If an incoming plane missed an arrester wire it could make another attempt and if the landing should go wrong and the aircraft end up in the sea, it would be out of the path of the carrier.
It was during the 1960s that several Royal navy Carriers were converted into 'Commando' or 'Assault' vessels. Royal Marine Commandos and Assault helicopters took the place of jet aircraft, providing the Royal Navy with enhanced amphibious and assault capabilities.
Further Cutbacks
The carrier force continued to shrink in the years and decades after the Second World War. However the greatest blow to the Royal Navy carrier fleet and the Fleet Air Arm as whole came in the 1960's. The Labour government, convinced by the Royal Air Force that a situation would never arise where there wasn't a friendly airfield capable of hosting British aircraft during a conflict, cancelled Britain’s fleet carrier replacement programme. The cancellation of CVA-01 and CVA-02 (to be named Queen Elizabeth and Duke of Edinburgh) not only wasted money, time and effort but it also lead to the cancellation of seven of the eight Type 82 destroyers designed to escort these carriers. After this terrific blow to the Royal Navy, designers started to work on a helicopter cruiser designed to counter the threat of soviet submarines. These cruisers evolved in design and size until they became 'through deck cruisers' capable of carrying around nine sea king helicopters. The development of sea harrier aircraft had heralded a new era in aviation and technically something as small as a Rover Class tanker was capable of hosting these aircraft. The through deck cruiser design was modified yet again this time to carry sea harrier aircraft. However the term 'cruiser' remained in place as aircraft carrier had become a politically sensitive term since the cancellation of the CVA project. But the survival of even these ships was by no means guaranteed and fears were confirmed when the sale of the first through deck cruiser, Invincible, was announced. However events in the south Atlantic were set turn the situation in favour of the RN for change. The involvement of Hermes and Invincible was paramount to the Falklands operation and after the war the sale of Invincible was cancelled to the relief of many.
An artists impression of the CVA: cancelled by the Labour Government.
Full Circle
After the Falklands war Bulwark was disposed of followed a little later by Hermes who was refitted and now serves in the Indian Navy joining another former RN carrier Hercules. Invincible and Illustrious were joined by sister ship Ark Royal in 1985. Due to the severe manpower problems that the navy faced it was decide d that only two carriers could be kept operational at any one time with the third either in reserve or long refit. During the 1990s Ark royal was out of action for seven years being in reserve between followed by refit at Rosyth. During this period her sisterships were extremely busy. Invincible was in the headlines first when she participated in air strikes against Iraq as part of Operation Desert Fox and then bombing raid on Kosovo and Serbia as part of Operation Allied Force. These kind of operations have proved that there is still a need for aircraft carriers despite the end of the cold war. Hence ships originally designated as cruiser to combat the threat of Soviet submarines have had to diversify and fulfil the role of the carriers they replaced. It is now generally accepted in both the Navy and the government that larger carriers will be needed in the future. When two new carriers promised in the 1998 strategic defence review come into service the Fleet Air Arm will have come full circle since the 1960s.
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© Written and researched by Jeremy Olver. First uploaded 3rd September 2000. Disclaimer.