HMS Ark Royal ( 1914 ) HMS " Ark Royal " was the first ship in history designed and built as a seaplane carrier . She was purchased by the Royal Navy in 1914 shortly after her keel had been laid and the ship was only in frames ; this allowed the ship ' s design to be modified almost totally to accommodate seaplane s . In World War I , " Ark Royal " participated in the Gallipoli Campaign in early 1915 with her aircraft conducting aerial reconnaissance and observation missions . Her aircraft later supported British troops on the Macedonian Front in 1916 , before she returned to the Dardanelles to act as a depot ship for all the seaplanes operating in the area . In January 1918 , several of her aircraft unsuccessfully attacked the German battlecruiser when she sortied from the Dardanelles to attack Allied ships in the area . The ship left the area later in the year to support seaplanes conducting anti - submarine patrols over the southern Aegean Sea . After the end of the war , " Ark Royal " mostly served as an aircraft transport and depot ship for those aircraft in support of White Russian and British operations against the Bolsheviks in the Caspian and Black Sea regions . She also supported Royal Air Force ( RAF ) aircraft in British Somaliland in the campaign against the Mad Mullah in 1920 . Later that year , the ship was placed in reserve . " Ark Royal " was recommissioned to ferry an RAF squadron to the Dardanelles during the Chanak crisis in 1922 . She was reduced to reserve again upon her return to the United Kingdom the following year . " Ark Royal " was recommissioned in 1930 to serve as a training ship for seaplane pilots and to evaluate aircraft catapult operations and techniques . She was renamed HMS " Pegasus " in 1934 and continued to serve as a training ship until the beginning of World War II in September 1939 . Assigned to Home Fleet at the beginning of the war , she took on tasks as an aircraft transport , in addition to her training duties , until she was modified to serve as the prototype fighter catapult ship in late 1940 . This type of ship was intended to defend convoys against attacks by German long - range maritime patrol bombers by launching fighter s via their catapult to provide air cover for the convoy . " Pegasus " served in this role until mid - 1941 when she reverted to her previous duties as a training ship . This lasted until early 1944 when she became a barracks ship . The ship was sold in late 1946 and her conversion into a merchant ship began the following year . However , the owner ran out of money during the process and " Anita I " , as she had been renamed , was seized by her creditors in 1949 and sold for scrap . She was not broken up until late 1950 . Design and description . The Royal Navy had conducted trials in 1913 with a modified cruiser , , to evaluate the ability of seaplanes to work with the fleet . They were successful enough that the Admiralty allocated £81 , 000 in the 1914 – 1915 Naval Programme to purchase a merchant ship for a more thorough modification than had been possible with " Hermes " to better accommodate seaplanes . A tramp steamer was purchased in 1914 that had just begun construction at the Blyth Shipbuilding Company so it could be easily modified to suit its new role . " Ark Royal " was laid down on 7 November 1913 by the Blyth Shipbuilding Company in Blyth , Northumberland , as a freighter , probably intended for the coal - for - grain trade in the Black Sea . She was purchased in May 1914 and was launched on 5 September 1914 . The ship was commissioned on 10 December 1914 . Extensive changes to the ship were made in converting her to a seaplane tender , with the superstructure , funnel , and propulsion machinery moved aft and a working deck occupying the forward half of the ship . The deck was not intended as a flying - off deck , but for starting and running up of seaplane engines and for recovering damaged aircraft from the sea . The ship was equipped with a large aircraft hold , long , wide and high along with extensive workshops . Two steam cranes on the sides of the forecastle lifted the aircraft through the sliding hatch of the hangar onto the flight deck or into the water . She carried of petrol for her aircraft in standard commercial tins . She could carry five floatplanes and two to four regular , wheeled aircraft . The latter would have to return to land after launch , but the seaplanes would take off and land in the water alongside the carrier , lifted on and off the ship by the cranes . Her original complement of aircraft consisted of a Short Folder , two Wight Pushers , three Sopwith Type 807 seaplanes and two to four Sopwith Tabloid wheeled aircraft . " Ark Royal " had an overall length of , a beam of , and a draught of . She normally displaced , with a displacement of at deep load . The ship had one vertical triple - expansion steam engine driving one propeller shaft . The ship ' s three cylindrical boilers generated enough steam to produce from the engine . The ship had a designed speed of , but she made a speed of during her sea trials with in December 1914 . " Ark Royal " carried of fuel oil , enough to give her a range of at . The ship was armed with four QF 12 - pounder 12 cwt guns and two machine guns . Including 60 aviation personnel , her crew totalled 180 officers and men . " Her truly unique feature was the steadying sail on the mizzen to help keep her head to the wind ; she remains the only aircraft carrier to have been fitted with a sail . " Service . World War I . The ship proved to be too slow to work with the Grand Fleet and for operations in the North Sea in general , so " Ark Royal " was ordered to the Mediterranean in mid - January 1915 to support the Gallipoli campaign . Under the command of Commander Robert Clark - Hall , the ship sailed on 1 February 1915 and arrived at the island of Tenedos on 17 February . She attempted to fly three of her seaplanes on the day of her arrival to reconnoitre the Straits , but two of them had engine troubles and the third could not take off despite the calm water . A Wight Pusher eventually managed to get into the air and discovered new fortifications down the Straits ; it dropped a single bomb on the Asiatic side of the Dardanelles and returned with seven bullet holes in its skin . Two days later , the ship ' s aircraft attempted unsuccessfully to spot for the fleet as they bombarded the Ottoman fortifications defending the Straits . They conducted more aerial reconnaissance and observation missions in support of the fleet later in the month and in early March as it moved further up the Straits . " Ark Royal " lost her first aircraft on 5 March as the propeller of one of her Sopwiths splintered into pieces at . Both of the aircraft ' s crewmen were recovered by the destroyer . Later in the month , the ship ' s aircrew learned to spot mines from the air and were moderately successful , although they failed to detect the minefield that sank one French and two British predreadnought s and damaged a British battlecruiser on 18 March . Later in the month , " Ark Royal " and her aircraft were relieved by No . 3 Squadron of the Royal Naval Air Service ( RNAS ) . In preparation for the squadron ' s arrival , the ship ' s crew cleared a vineyard on the island to serve as an airfield and unloaded its crated aircraft on 26 – 27 March . From 31 March to 7 April , " Ark Royal " and her companions made several fake landing attempts and her aircraft bombarded the port of Smyrna with little effect . When she returned to Tenedos on 8 April , she exchanged her Tabloids , which had never flown from the ship , for a pair of Sopwith Schneider single - seat floatplanes . In addition , she received two Sopwith Type 860 s , another Wight Pusher , and a Short Type 166 , all two - seat floatplanes , as replacements . The ship had no room for all these aircraft and she used the collier " Penmorvalt " to store them and for additional workshop space . Her aircraft resumed reconnaissance and observation missions over the Dardanelles ; aircraft discovered a large ammunition dump on 12 April , and provided corrective data to direct gunfire from onto the target . " Ark Royal " s aircraft provided support to the Australian and New Zealand troops at Anzac Cove as they landed on 25 April on the Gallipoli Peninsula . Two days later , the ship was taken under fire by the Ottoman predreadnought , firing across the peninsula , and she had to move in a hurry to avoid being hit . A month later , the battle on the peninsula had bogged down and the success of the German submarine in sinking two British predreadnoughts forced " Ark Royal " to move to a safer anchorage at Imbros at the end of May . There she became a depot ship for all the seaplanes in the area , while her own aircraft continued to support operations at Gallipoli . On occasion , aircraft were loaned out to other ships for reconnaissance or observation missions . The ship left Imbros on 1 November for Mytilene , from where her aircraft flew aerial reconnaissance missions over Smyrna , before she continued onwards to Salonika , where she arrived on 8 November . While based there , her aircraft supported British troops fighting the Bulgarians , spotted for British ships conducting shore bombardments , and conducted anti - submarine patrols . At this time , " Ark Royal " operated five Short 166s and a couple of Sopwith seaplanes . In 27 March 1917 , the ship was transferred to Mudros to serve as a depot ship for all the seaplanes assigned to No . 2 Wing RNAS , which controlled all RNAS aircraft in the area . By the end of 1917 , she operated a mixture of Short Type 184 and Sopwith Baby aircraft . On the morning of 20 January 1918 , the Ottoman battlecruiser , together with the light cruiser , sortied from the Dardanelles to attack British warships based at Mudros . " Goeben " struck a mine shortly after they exited the mouth of the Dardanelles so they switched targets and sank two British monitors off Imbros Island . As they were returning to the Dardanelles , the two ships were attacked by two of " Ark Royal " s Sopwith Babies with bombs . One Baby was quickly shot down and the other was forced to make an emergency landing with engine problems off Imbros ; the pilot was able to taxi the aircraft onto a beach and it was recovered several days later . " Breslau " struck five mines and sank on the return whilst " Goeben " struck two more mines and then ran aground inside the Straits . " Ark Royal " s Short 184s attempted to bomb her at dawn on the following morning , but all ten bombs missed , and an attempt to attack the ship with a Short 184 modified to carry a torpedo failed when the weight of the torpedo proved to be more than the aircraft could lift . On 3 April , the ship was transferred to the island of Syros , where she could support the seaplanes of No . 62 Wing of the Royal Air Force ( RAF ) on anti - submarine patrols ; part of the former No . 2 Wing RNAS redesignated when the RNAS and the Royal Flying Corps were merged to form the RAF . " Ark Royal " was transferred to Piraeus in October and was still there when the Armistice of Mudros with Turkey was signed on 31 October . The ship joined the Allied fleet that occupied Constantinople after the surrender . Interwar years and World War II . After the war , " Ark Royal " transported aircraft across the Black Sea to Batumi , where they were ferried across the Caucasus to the British naval forces supporting White Russian forces fighting the Bolsheviks in the Caspian Sea during the Russian Civil War . The ship was withdrawn from the Black Sea in late 1919 and disembarked her seaplanes at Malta to load a dozen de Havilland DH - 9 bombers and 181 personnel of ' Z ' Squadron , Egypt for transport to British Somaliland . The ship arrived in Berbera on 30 December and the squadron was unloaded to support the air and land campaign against the Mad Mullah . " Ark Royal " served during this campaign solely as a depot and repair ship for the RAF . She was withdrawn before its conclusion and transferred to the Black Sea to support the White Russian forces there as they began to collapse . The ship twice ferried refugees from the Caucasian coast to the Crimea and , after the second voyage , had to be fumigated at Constantinople after an outbreak of typhus among her passengers . During the summer of 1920 , " Ark Royal " ferried RAF aircraft and personnel to Basra . She then returned to Britain for a refit and was put into reserve at Rosyth in November . She was recommissioned in September 1922 to transport 4 Squadron , equipped with a dozen Bristol F . 2 Fighter s , out to the Dardanelles during the Chanak crisis . The aircraft were ferried semi - assembled and then transferred to the aircraft carrier where they were fully erected . On 11 October , the F . 2s flew from the carrier to an airfield at Kilya on the European side of the straits . The ship remained in the area until she was given a brief refit at Malta in early 1923 . Now equipped with Fairey III D seaplanes , " Ark Royal " returned to the Dardanelles until she was transferred back to the United Kingdom late in the year . Upon her arrival , the ship was placed back in reserve and became the depot ship for the reserve of minesweeper s at Sheerness until 1930 . In 1930 , " Ark Royal " was recommissioned again as a training ship and an aircraft catapult was installed on her forecastle , forward of her cranes . For the next nine years , the ship conducted trials and evaluations of catapults and seaplane launch and recovery equipment and techniques . On 21 December 1934 , she was renamed HMS " Pegasus " to release her name for a new carrier that was then beginning construction . The ship was assigned to Home Fleet when World War II began and was mostly used to train seaplane pilots in catapult launching and shipboard recovery techniques , using the Fairey Seafox , Supermarine Walrus es and Fairey Swordfish of 764 Squadron . She also served as an aircraft transport and was present in Scapa Flow , having just delivered some aircraft , on 14 October when the battleship was sunk by the . As the closest ship to " Royal Oak " , " Pegasus " was able to rescue some 400 survivors . " Pegasus " was converted to the prototype fighter catapult ship in November 1940 , carrying three Fairey Fulmar fighters from 807 Squadron between 1 December and 10 February 1941 , which were replaced by aircraft from 804 Squadron between 10 February and 23 July . These fighters were supposed to defend convoys against attacks from Focke - Wulf Fw 200 maritime patrol bombers and to prevent them from radioing location reports to U - boat s . If out of range of land , the fighters would have to ditch at sea and hope to be recovered by a ship from their convoy . The ship escorted nine convoys between December 1940 and July 1941 . At some point during the war , the ship ' s anti - aircraft armament was supplemented with a pair of Oerlikon 20 mm light anti - aircraft gun s mounted in the bow , the ship ' s bridge was enlarged and the mast was replaced with a tripod mast bearing a Type 291 air warning radar . The ship then became a seaplane training ship again , hosting 763 Squadron aboard from 20 April 1942 to 13 February 1944 . " Pegasus " then became a barracks ship until May 1946 and was then listed for disposal in June . She was sold to R . C . Ellerman on 18 October , renamed " Anita I " , and registered under the Panamanian flag . Under the management of the Compania de Navigation Ellanita , the ship sailed from Cardiff to Antwerp in October 1947 to begin conversion to a freighter . The work ceased in early 1948 and " Anita I " was seized by her creditors and auctioned off to a Dutch shipbreaking firm on 16 June 1949 . She was resold once more before the ship was purchased by the British Iron and Steel Corporation in October 1950 . Later that year , the ship was broken up for scrap at Grays , Essex .