HMS Belfast
HMS Belfast
VO: If you want to do some sightseeing in London then a good place to start is on the river Thames. A trip along the river will take you past landmarks like the London Eye, Tower Bridge and the tower of London. You’ll also come across London’s only floating museum…HMS Belfast
Nick Hewitt, Ship’s Historian
HMS Belfast is a cruiser. She’s actually a medium sized warship in the great span of royal navy warships. She’s nearly 900 feet long. She’s 10,000 tonnes in weight. Her main armament is 12 six inch guns. She also carries 8 four inch guns as secondary armament. She was built to carry about 850 men but by the end of the Second World War with all the extra equipment she was actually up to nearly 1,000 which is quite staggering.
VO: HMS Belfast was built in 1938 and served the royal navy until her retirement in 1965, but she is best remembered for her role in the D-Day landings during the Second World War.
Nick Hewitt, Ship’s Historian
She achieved a great deal. She’s interesting for her own history and also as a representative of her type. She had a pretty distinguished war history.
Nick Hewitt, Ship’s Historian
She intercepted a German ship called the SS cap nord which was coming back from South America absolutely full of German reservists flocking back to join the colours and she intercepted the ship in a classic Nelsonian manner, fired a shot across the bows and boarded her, they sent a little boat over with a boarding party and captured the ship and bought it back to the UK.
Nick Hewitt, Ship’s Historian
She’s the last real warship of this size of the many thousands that the royal navy had during the first and second world wars. She’s the only one left so her own story is important but what she represents to the history of the country is enormously important too.
VO: These days HMS Belfast is a floating museum playing host to more than 250,000 visitors a year.
Nick Hewitt, Ship’s Historian
HMS Belfast is a time capsule. This is not one of those attractions that are entirely fake. When you step onto this ship you’re stepping onboard an original artefact. You’re walking inside an historic artefact. There is nowhere else in Europe where you can see a historic ship of this size.
Nick Hewitt, Ship’s Historian
What we’ve got is a mix of recreated areas, original fabric of the ship and then exhibition and gallery spaces. One of the amazing things about ships of this size is that they really have to function as a floating town so it’s not all about battles and war. It’s about trying to live in an isolated environment and necessarily thousands of miles from home at some points. There a little shop, the naffi canteen where the sailors could buy their luxuries. There’s a postman onboard, the mail office, so it really is a small floating town and not many people expect that when they come on board
