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HMS ''Bellona'' was one of two scout cruisers built for the Royal Navy in the first decade of the 20th century. She led the 2nd Destroyer Flotilla from completion until 1912. During World War I, she was assigned to battleship squadrons of the Grand Fleet. She was present at, but did not fight in, the Battle of Jutland in mid-1916. The ship was converted into a minelayer in mid-1917 and made four sorties to lay her mines before the end of the war. ''Bellona'' was paid off in 1919 and sold for scrap in 1921. ==Design and description== Designed to provide destroyer flotillas with a command ship, ''Bellona'' proved too slow in service from the start of her career. Her speed was barely capable of matching the speeds of the destroyers she led in her flotilla in 1909 and proved inadequate to match the speed of later destroyers.〔Gardiner & Gray, p. 50〕 Displacing , the ship had an overall length of , a beam of and a deep draught of . She was powered by two sets of Parsons steam turbines, each driving two shafts. The turbines produced a total of , using steam produced by 12 Yarrow boilers that burned both fuel oil and coal, and gave a maximum speed of . She carried a maximum of of coal and of fuel oil.〔Friedman 2009, p. 295〕 Her crew consisted of 317 officers and enlisted men.〔 Her main armament consisted of six breech-loading (BL) four-inch Mk VII guns. The forward pair of guns were mounted side by side on a platform on the forecastle, the middle pair were amidships, one on each broadside, and the two remaining guns were on the centreline of the quarterdeck, one ahead of the other.〔 The guns fired their shells to a range of about .〔Friedman 2011, pp. 75–76〕 Her secondary armament was four quick-firing (QF) s and two submerged 21-inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes. During the war, four additional four-inch guns were added amidships to increase her firepower. A QF three-inch 20 cwt〔"Cwt" is the abbreviation for hundredweight, 20 cwt referring to the weight of the gun.〕 anti-aircraft gun was also added. In 1918 it was replaced by a four-inch gun.〔 As a scout cruiser, the ship was only lightly protected to maximize her speed. She had a curved protective deck that was thick on the slope and on the flat.〔 Her conning tower was protected by four inches of armour.〔 ==Construction and service== ''Bellona'', the sixth ship of that name,〔 was laid down at Pembroke Royal Dockyard, on 5 June 1908 and launched on 20 March 1908. She was completed in February 1910 and became the leader of the 2nd Destroyer Flotilla through 1912.〔 She was assigned to the 1st Battle Squadron of the Grand Fleet in Scapa Flow at the start of the war.〔Corbett, Vol. I, p. 439; Vol. II, pp. 412, 417〕 On 17 December 1914, ''Bellona'' collided with the destroyer leader . Although both ships were seriously damaged, no lives were lost.〔Jellicoe 1919, pp. 180–181.〕 ''Bellona'' was at the Battle of Jutland but was assigned to a position at the rear of the squadron and did not fire her guns.〔Corbett, Vol. III, p. 345〕 She was converted to a minelayer in June 1917 and laid 306 mines in four missions.〔 After the war she was in 1919 and sold for scrap on 9 May 1921 to T. W. Ward at Lelant.〔Colledge, p. 37〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「HMS Bellona (1909)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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