![]() Barham underway at low speed, mid-1930s
| |
History | |
---|---|
![]() | |
Name | Barham |
Namesake | Admiral Charles Middleton, 1st Baron Barham |
Builder | John Brown & Company, Clydebank |
Cost | £2,470,113 |
Yard number | 424 |
Laid down | 24 February 1913 |
Launched | 31 December 1914 |
Commissioned | 19 October 1915 |
Identification | Pennant number: 04 |
Fate | Sunk by U-331, 25 November 1941 |
General characteristics (as built) | |
Class and type | Queen Elizabeth-class battleship |
Displacement | 32,590 long tons (33,113 t) |
Length | 643 ft 9 in (196.2 m) |
Beam | 90 ft 7 in (27.6 m) |
Draught | 33 ft (10.1 m) |
Installed power |
|
Propulsion | 4 shafts; 2 steam turbine sets |
Speed | 24 knots (44 km/h; 28 mph) |
Range | 5,000 nmi (9,260 km; 5,750 mi) at 12 knots (22 km/h; 14 mph) |
Complement | 1,016 (1916) |
Armament |
|
Armour |
|
HMS Barham was one of five Queen Elizabeth-class battleships built for the Royal Navy during the early 1910s. Completed in 1915, she was often used as a flagship and participated in the Battle of Jutland during the First World War as part of the Grand Fleet. For the rest of the war, except for the inconclusive action of 19 August 1916, her service generally consisted of routine patrols and training in the North Sea.
During the 1920s and 1930s, the ship was assigned to the Atlantic, Mediterranean, and Home Fleets. Barham played a minor role in quelling the 1929 Palestine riots and the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine. The ship was in the Mediterranean when the Second World War began in September 1939, on her voyage home three months later, she accidentally collided with and sank one of her escorting destroyers, HMS Duchess.
She participated in the Battle of Dakar in mid-1940, where she damaged a Vichy French battleship and was slightly damaged in return. Barham was then transferred to the Mediterranean Fleet, where she covered multiple Malta convoys. She helped to sink an Italian heavy cruiser and a destroyer during the Battle of Cape Matapan in March 1941 and was damaged by German aircraft two months later during the evacuation of Crete. Barham was sunk off the Egyptian coast the following November by the German submarine U-331 with the loss of 862 crewmen, approximately two thirds of her crew.