HMS Caroline

A Calliope Class Cruiser & a fine little Ship. I spent a weekend's RNR training on her. The unit are justifiably proud of her although her profile has been spoiled somewhat by the additional superstructure. Onboard however the atmosphere is wonderful as you would expect aboard a Jutland veteran.

She is also still a commissioned warship and as such her Commanding Officer is entitled to be piped aboard any other of HM Ships, I believe the only RNR Officer with that priviledge apart from perhaps the Commodore RNR.

Always thought she was the lead ship of the Caroline class - Caroline,Carysfort,Cleopatra,Comus, Coqueror and Cordelia, still Jutland ships though ( Caroline & Cordelia) but I did not know the old girl was still afloat - grand pic

I stand to be corrected, but I'm sure that was what they told us...I'll check out my facts.

A

As you say, I now find she is indeed a CAROLINE Class Light Cruiser.

I'll give myself a damn good thrashing!!!

A

Careful now! glad to see the old lady is still afloat, given that we were a world leader ( once) we seem to be very remiss in keping historic ships, perhaps we Brits are not the historians we think we are.

She is great isn't she? There is talk of de-commissioning her in 2011 ( can you imagine the length of the pennant? ) then taking her to London or Portsmouth or somewhere as a museum thingy. Personally I dont see why they have to de-commission her...VICTORY is still a commissioned ship, they could at least leave it until she has completed 100 years of service. I'm sure the Ulster RNR will be less than pleased as they will lose a magical HQ and may have to rename the unit.

If you check out the National Historic Ships Register there are actually quite a few under their watchful eye but what we / they need is money to get most of them back into operation or even back to good / original condition.

Heritage Lottery have done a fair bit but there should be more Central Gov't. funding to keep some of our Nautical history alive.

Great shot of her, I have a lot of her history around 1922-24 when my Father was serving onboard her as a Sick Berth Steward. The entire ships company transferred from her sistership H.M.S. Comas in India for the Prince of Wales grand tour of the far-east. He was lucky as he went with the Royal party as a photographer and I still have his photo album covering a lot of the events.
He joined the Royal Navy in 1903 at Portsmouth (Victory) so two of his ships are still around, not bad going !!

The Caroline is due to be de-commissioned in December ? A lot of people in Belfast
will be sorry to see her go. She has been here since 1924? The 2 possible ports where she might go were either Hartlepool or Portsmouth? However that is just speculation? Surely she should be retained as one of the few survivors of an era gone by.
Regards.
Alex.