Five Best Battleships of WW II

From the December 5, 2022, 19fortyfive by Peter Suciu.

More than sixty battleships, including 23 from the United States took part in World War II.

These were the five best of the lot.

This did not include these battleships since they were sunk:  Yamato, Musashi, Bismarck, Tirpitz or Prince of Wales.

I am just listing them.  Go to the site to find out the reasoning for their inclusion.

1.  USS Texas  (BB-35)

2.  USS Alabama (BB-60)

3.  USS Iowa  (BB-61)

4.  USS New Jersey  (BB-62)

5.  USS Missouri  (BB-63)

What!   No USS North Carolina?

--GreGen

The Navy's Most Unwanted Ship, the USS Prinz Eugen-- Part 1: Formerly a German Warship

From the January 4, 2019 Hampton Roads Naval Museum blog  "The Navy's 'Most Unwanted' ship and the instruments that escaped  its fate."

On January 5, 1946, the U.S. Navy commissioned a heavy cruiser into its fleet.  What was strange about this ship was that, a year earlier, it had been an enemy ship, the German KMS Prinz Eugen.  It was the German Navy's largest and most heavily armed remaining ship.  The United States had gotten the ship by drawing lots from a hat.

It had originally been commissioned into the Kriegsmarine in Kiel, Germany, August 1. 1940.  It was the second of three Hipper class heavy cruisers to see action in World War II.  It almost didn't survive its first mission, which was escorting the KMS Bismarck in its dash out to the Atlantic in late May 1941 for commerce attacks.    They encountered the HMS Prince of Wales and the HMS Hood.  The Prinz Eugen landed some of the first hits on the Hood before the Bismarck sank the ship.

The Bismarck was later damaged by carrier-based aircraft and destroyed a few days later.  The Prinz Eugen made it back to to occupied France.

--GreGen

Chinese Pirates Plunder British Shipwrecks 'War Graves'-- Part 2

The battleship HMS Prince of Wales and battle cruiser HMS Repulse were both sunk 10 December 1941. This incident is often referred to as Britain's Pearl Harbor.  These two ships were part of Force Z which also included four destroyers sent out to stop the Japanese invasion of Malaya.  They had no air cover.

Earlier in 1941, the Prince of Wales had participated in the sinking of the German battleship Bismarck and had also ferried Winston Churchill across the Atlantic for a secret summit where he and FDR signed the Atlantic Charter, a document that paved the way for the United Nations.

The HMS Repulse was a World War I battle cruiser.

--GreGen

Chinese Pirates Plundering British Shipwrecks-- Part 1: HMS Repulse and Prince of Wales

From the August 18, 2018, Daily Mail (UK)  "Desecration of British war graves:  Chinese pirates plunder ten shipwrecks carrying remains of UK's Second World War heroes."  Abul Taher and Nick Craven.

**  Ten ships
**  Final resting place of more than 1,000 British sailors
**  Defence (British spelling) Secretary Gavin Williamson demands an immediate investigation

The ten ships are off the coasts of Malaysia and Indonesia.

HMS Prince of Wales
HMS Repulse

These two ships were part of Britain's Force Z.

835 men died on these two ships

Half of the Prince of Wales' hull has been plundered, mostly in the past two years.  Some 327 died on this ship, including Admiral Tom Phillips, the highest-ranking British military figure to die in the war.

--GreGen