page_title: HMS Royal Oak (08)
section_title: Later actions
hierarchical_section_title: HMS Royal Oak (08) / Construction and service / First World War / Later actions
caption_attribution_description: English: IWM caption&#160;: "A 3 inch anti-aircraft gun in action on board the British battleship HMS Royal Oak".
context_page_description: HMS Royal Oak was one of five Revenge-class battleships built for the Royal Navy during the First World War. Completed in 1916, the ship first saw combat at the Battle of Jutland as part of the Grand Fleet. In peacetime, she served in the Atlantic, Home and Mediterranean fleets, more than once coming under accidental attack. Royal Oak drew worldwide attention in 1928 when her senior officers were controversially court-martialled, an event which brought considerable embarrassment to the world's then largest navy. Attempts to modernise Royal Oak throughout her 25-year career could not fix her fundamental lack of speed and, by the start of the Second World War, she was no longer suitable for front-line duty.
  On 14 October 1939, Royal Oak was anchored at Scapa Flow in Orkney, Scotland, when she was torpedoed by the German submarine U-47. Of Royal Oak's complement of 1,234 men and boys, 835 were killed that night or died later of their wounds.
context_section_description: Following the battle, Royal Oak was reassigned to the First Battle Squadron. On 18 August, the Germans again sortied, this time to bombard Sunderland; Vice-Admiral Reinhard Scheer, the German fleet commander, hoped to draw out the British battlecruisers and destroy them. British signals intelligence decrypted German wireless transmissions, allowing Jellicoe enough time to deploy the Grand Fleet in an attempt to engage in a decisive battle. Both sides withdrew after their opponents' submarines inflicted losses: the British cruisers Nottingham and Falmouth were both torpedoed and sunk by German U-boats, and the German battleship SMS Westfalen was damaged by the British submarine E23. After returning to port, Jellicoe issued an order that prohibited risking the fleet in the southern half of the North Sea due to the overwhelming risk from mines and U-boats. In late 1917, the Germans began using destroyers and light cruisers to raid the British convoys to Norway; this forced the British to deploy capital ships to protect the convoys. In April 1918, the German fleet sortied in an attempt to catch one of the isolated British squadrons, though the convoy had already passed safely. The Grand Fleet sortied too late to catch the retreating Germans, although the battlecruiser SMS Moltke was torpedoed and badly damaged by the submarine HMS E42.
  On 5 November 1918, in the final week of the First World War, Royal Oak was anchored off Burntisland in the Firth of Forth accompanied by the seaplane tender Campania and the light battlecruiser Glorious. A sudden Force 10 squall caused Campania to drag her anchor, collide with Royal Oak and then with Glorious. Both capital ships suffered only minor damage, but Campania was holed by her initial collision with Royal Oak. The ship's engine rooms flooded, and she settled by the stern and sank five hours later, without loss of life.
  Following the capitulation of Germany in November 1918, the Allies interned most of the High Seas Fleet at Scapa Flow. The fleet rendezvoused with the British light cruiser Cardiff, which led the ships to the Allied fleet that was to escort the Germans to Scapa Flow. The fleet consisted of 370 British, American, and French warships. The High Seas Fleet remained in captivity during the negotiations that ultimately produced the Treaty of Versailles. Konteradmiral Ludwig von Reuter believed the British intended to seize the German ships on 21 June 1919, which was the deadline for Germany to have signed the peace treaty. That morning, the Grand Fleet left Scapa Flow to conduct training manoeuvres, and while they were away von Reuter issued the order to scuttle the High Seas Fleet.
caption: An anti-aircraft gun crew aboard Royal Oak
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