HMS Belfast

She is the one cruiser in Britain's keeping that still floats. Moored in the Pool of London opposite the Tower, HMS Belfast has been a museum ship since 1971, but before that she was a working warship for thirty-two years, across six campaigns on three oceans.

Early War and the Magnetic Mine

Commissioned in August 1939 — not a fortnight before the invasion of Poland — Belfast had scarcely shaken down before she struck a magnetic mine in the Firth of Forth on 21 November 1939. The explosion broke her keel. She spent the next two and a half years being rebuilt at Devonport, emerging in late 1942 with a wider beam, heavier armour, and a quadrupled anti-aircraft battery.

Arctic Convoys and North Cape

She returned to service as flagship of the 10th Cruiser Squadron and began the work for which she is best remembered: the Arctic convoy run to Murmansk. On 26 December 1943, escorting convoy JW 55B, she made radar contact with the German battleship Scharnhorst and shadowed her through the polar night until the battleship HMS Duke of York could close the range. In the action that followed — the Battle of North Cape — Scharnhorst was sunk with the loss of all but 36 of her 1,968 crew.

D-Day

Belfast was one of the first ships to open fire on the morning of 6 June 1944, supporting the Canadian and British landings at Juno and Gold Beaches. Her 6-inch guns fired in support of the army for five weeks, ranging inland up to sixteen miles. Her first salvo, at 0527, was directed at a German battery at La Marefontaine.

The Far East, Korea, and the Thames

After the war she served in the Far East and returned to combat in the Korean War of 1950–52, firing her guns in support of UN forces along the Korean coast. She was finally paid off in 1963 and was nearly sold for scrap before a trust, led by veterans, saved her for the nation. She has been a museum of the Imperial War Museums since 1978 and is visited by a quarter of a million people every year.