JUTLAND SURVIVOR ENJOYS NEW LEASE OF LIFE HMS Caroline is an iconic ship, a World War I survivor, and well known in Belfast, her home for 95 years. She is the last survivor of the Battle of Jutland and has recently undergone a restoration so that she is fit to welcome visitors.
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he light cruiser HMS Caroline, built by Cammell Laird & Co in Birkenhead in 1914, is one of the most significant preserved warships in the British Isles. She is one of only three surviving Royal Navy warships from World War I, together with the 1915-built HMS M33 and the Flower class sloop HMS President (ex-HMS Saxifrage),
which was moored on the Thames for many years but is now at Chatham. Caroline’s opening to the public in 2016 for the first time in her history was the culmination of much effort and hard work on the part of various organisations to ensure her future was secure, and she has become a major exhibit within the city’s famous Titanic Quarter. Caroline was launched on 21 September 1914 by
HMS Caroline in service, pictured prior to her 1917 refit at Fairfield’s Yard, Govan, when the four-inch guns were removed and replaced by a single six-inch gun on the centre line just forward of the bridge.
28 • February 2020 • www.shipsmonthly.com
Lady Lawrence Power, wife of Admiral Sir Lawrence Power KCB CVO. She was commissioned into service on 4 December 1914, becoming one of the most speedily built major warships ever. Caroline was one of a class of six light cruisers ordered in 1913, her sisterships being HMS Carysfort, HMS Cleopatra, HMS Comus, HMS Conquest and HMS Cordelia. The Caroline class was designed for
