HMS Ark Royal was an aircraft carrier of the Royal Navy that was operated during the Second World War.
The Fairey Swordfish is a biplane torpedo bomber, designed by the Fairey Aviation Company. Originating in the early 1930s, the Swordfish, nicknamed "Stringbag", was principally operated by the Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Navy. It was also used by the Royal Air Force (RAF), as well as several overseas operators, including the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) and the Royal Netherlands Navy. It was initially operated primarily as a fleet attack aircraft. During its later years, the Swordfish was increasingly used as an anti-submarine and training platform. The type was in frontline service throughout the Second World War.
HMS Argus was a British aircraft carrier that served in the Royal Navy from 1918 to 1944. She was converted from an ocean liner that was under construction when the First World War began and became the first aircraft carrier with a full-length flight deck that allowed wheeled aircraft to take off and land. After commissioning, the ship was involved for several years in the development of the optimum design for other aircraft carriers. Argus also evaluated various types of arresting gear, general procedures needed to operate a number of aircraft in concert and fleet tactics. The ship was too top-heavy as originally built, and had to be modified to improve her stability in the mid-1920s. She spent one brief deployment on the China Station in the late 1920s before being placed in reserve for budgetary reasons.
German submarine U-47 was a Type VIIB U-boat of Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine during World War II. She was laid down on 25 February 1937 at Friedrich Krupp Germaniawerft in Kiel as yard number 582 and went into service on 17 December 1938 under the command of Günther Prien.
HMS Biter was a Royal Navy escort carrier during the Second World War. She was laid down as a merchant ship at the Sun Shipbuilding & Drydock Company yard at Chester, Pennsylvania. Laid down on 28 December 1939, she was converted to an escort carrier and commissioned in the Royal Navy on 6 May 1942. She was returned to the United States in 1945 and subsequently lent to France.
Operation Juno was a German sortie into the North Sea during the Norwegian Campaign. The most notable engagement of the operation was the German battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau sinking the British aircraft carrier HMS Glorious and its two escorting destroyers. Several Allied vessels were sunk in other engagements.
The Battle of Dakar, also known as Operation Menace, was an unsuccessful attempt in September 1940 by the Allies to capture the strategic port of Dakar in French West Africa. It was hoped that the success of the operation could overthrow the pro-German Vichy French administration in the colony, and be replaced by a pro-Allied Free French one under General Charles de Gaulle.
HMS Swordfish (61S) was a first-batch S-class submarine built for the Royal Navy during the 1930s. Commissioned in 1932, she was given the pennant number 61S and was assigned to the 2nd Submarine Flotilla.
Operation Substance was a British naval operation in July 1941 during the Second World War to escort convoy GM 1, the first of the series from Gibraltar to Malta. The convoy defended by Force H was attacked by Italian submarines, aircraft, and Motoscafo armato silurante.
Convoy PQ 18 was an Arctic convoy of forty Allied freighters from Scotland and Iceland to Arkhangelsk in the Soviet Union in the war against Nazi Germany. The convoy departed Loch Ewe, Scotland on 2 September 1942, rendezvoused with more ships and escorts at Iceland and arrived at Arkhangelsk on 21 September. An exceptionally large number of escorts was provided by the Royal Navy in Operation EV, including the first escort carrier to accompany an Arctic convoy. Detailed information on German intentions was provided by the code breakers at Bletchley Park and elsewhere, through Ultra signals decrypts and eavesdropping on Luftwaffe wireless communications.
The Nairana-class escort carrier was a British-built class of three escort carriers. They were constructed one each in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland to the same basic design during the Second World War for service with the Royal Navy.
HMS Laforey was an L-class destroyer of the Royal Navy. She was commissioned in and served during the Second World War, and was torpedoed and sunk by a U-boat in 1944. She had been adopted by the civil community of Northampton in November 1941.
803 Naval Air Squadron was a Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm squadron.
821 Naval Air Squadron was a Royal Navy Fleet Air Arm carrier based squadron formed on 3 April 1933 with the transferral and amalgamation of the Fairey III aircraft from 446 and half of 455 Flight Flights Royal Air Force to the newly formed Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Air Force. The squadron operated during the Second World War.
The SS Nerissa was a passenger and cargo steamer which was torpedoed and sunk on 30 April 1941 during World War II by the German submarine U-552 following 12 wartime voyages between Canada and Britain. She was the only transport carrying Canadian Army troops to be lost during World War II.
812 Naval Air Squadron was a Naval Air Squadron of the British Royal Navy's Fleet Air Arm. It was active between 1933 and 1956, and saw service in both World War II and the Korean War.
Operation Hurry was the first British operation in a series that have come to be known as Club Runs. The goal of the operation was to fly twelve Hawker Hurricane Mk Is from HMS Argus to Malta, guided by two Blackburn Skuas.
I-37, originally numbered I-49, was a Japanese Type B1 submarine in service with the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War II. Commissioned in 1943, she made three war patrols, all in the Indian Ocean, during the last of which her crew committed war crimes by massacring the survivors of the merchant ships she sank. Subsequently, converted into a kaiten manned suicide attack torpedo carrier, she was sunk during her first kaiten mission in 1944.
Pegaso was a torpedo boat and an escort aviso of the Italian Regia Marina. She was one of the most successful Axis anti-submarine warships of World War II.
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