HMS Lion (1910)

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HMS Lion (1910) — a short, easy-to-understand version

Quick facts
- Class: Lion-class battlecruiser, lead ship of the Splendid Cats
- Built for the United Kingdom: ordered 1909–1910; built at Devonport
- Cost: about £2,084,000 (including armament)
- Key dates: laid down 29 November 1909; launched 6 August 1910; commissioned 4 June 1912
- Fate: decommissioned 30 May 1922; sold for scrap 31 January 1924

What Lion was and how she was designed
- Role: a fast, heavily armed ship intended to outrun slower battleships and outgun lighter ships
- Size and power: about 700 feet long, 88 feet wide, and up to around 30,800 tons full load
- Speed and range: designed for 28 knots, with a range of about 5,610 nautical miles at 10 knots
- Machinery: two sets of steam turbines driving four propellers, powered by 42 boilers
- Armament (as built): eight 13.5-inch guns in four twin turrets, sixteen 4-inch guns, and two 21-inch torpedo tubes
- Armor: thickest belt around the midships (up to 9 inches), with heavy turret and barbette armor; magazine protection improved after battles in 1916

Notable features and history in brief
- Lead ship of the Lion class, built to counter Germany’s Moltke-class battlecruisers
- Aircraft: during 1918 Lion carried small flying platforms atop turrets to operate light aircraft
- Early 1910s crew details: about 1,092 officers and men

World War I service
- Flagship duties: served as flagship of the Grand Fleet’s battlecruisers
- Heligoland Bight (Aug 28, 1914): Lion helped sink the German light cruiser Köln
- Battle of Dogger Bank (Jan 1915): part of Beatty’s force; played a key role in the action though the fleet faced complex signals and commands
- Battle of Jutland (May–June 1916): Lion fought intensely, taking heavy damage and suffering significant casualties after a shell hit exposed a turret and magazine
- Notable moment: Royal Marine Major Francis Harvey was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross for flooding the magazine after a turret fire
- Lion was badly damaged, with a large list and power loss, but was towed back for repairs
- After Jutland: repaired and returned to service as Beatty’s flagship; continued patrols in the North Sea
- Second Heligoland Bight (Nov 1917): provided support to British forces
- 1918 actions: part of fleet operations linked to protecting convoys and delaying the German fleet’s movements

Later years and fate
- 1919–1920: reassigned to the Atlantic Fleet and then placed in reserve
- 1922: paid off (taken out of active service)
- 1924: sold for scrap to meet the tonnage limits of the Washington Naval Treaty

Overall
Lion was a state-of-the-art battlecruiser in her time, designed to be faster and more heavily armed and armored than her predecessors. She played a prominent role in several major battles of World War I, suffered severe damage at Jutland, and spent the rest of the war on patrol and escort duties before ending her career as scrap under the postwar arms-control framework.