One Day In London - Imperial War Museum

The Imperial War Museum is on most peoples 'must do' list when they visit London, and I think we all know someone who's been and loved it.
The museum opens at 10am, and you may be surprised to see that it's situated inside a park and has it's own beautifully landscaped gardens with roses, lavender, and carefully trimmed lawns. You will instantly know you're in the right place from the imposing double cannons that greet you.

The large main hall that you first encounter contains a 'heady' mix of vehicles and exhibits from a variety of eras, on the ground, hanging in the air, and even perched precariously through spaces in the walls of each floor.

On the floor stands an impressive Soviet T-34 tank, an army field gun, armoured land rover and even the mutilated shell of an Iraqi civilian vehicle destroyed by a suicide bomber on the streets of Baghdad and turned into an art exhibit to demonstrate the horrors of war. All have interesting history and stories surrounding them.
Flying over your head are various suspended planes including the iconic Supermarine Spitfire and Harrier.

Still on the ground floor, I head to the World War I area. It's only been very recently that I have developed an interest in this period, but I'm now fascinated to learn more. Who was fighting who? and why? How did the soldiers live and cope with the hardships they endured? What weaponry and tactics were employed?
 All of these questions and hundreds more are answered in the most engaging way.
I particularly enjoyed walking through a simulated trench with shadows of my comrades around me, a British MK.IV tank appears above me to my left, as a Sopwith Camel flies over all to the battlefield noises of explosions and shouts. It's hard to imagine how the soldiers coped with the noise, disease and horrors.

Moving up to other floors, the exhibitions appear to follow a chronological path. There are extensive  World War II displays. You will see exhibits as diverse as a Rolls Royce Merlin aero-engine, a 25-pounder field gun, BMW R75 motorcycle and sidecar, Clarkair bulldozer to name but a few.
Around the main exhibits are other displays such as photographs by Cecil Beaton, paintings by various war artists, and even a skull and crossbones flag with a homemade 'Shit or Bust' motto used on a Landing Craft.
Further floors have exhibitions of modern conflicts including Suez, Korea, Cypress, Falklands & Yugoslavia
On the forth floor you encounter the Holocaust exhibition. This is an experience you will take away and never forget, as the history of the systematic, bureaucratic, state-sponsored persecution and murder of six million Jews by the Nazi regime and its collaborators is told with photographs, words, and film. The sheer enormity and evil of events is powerfully portrayed. Testimonies from survivors bring a moving perspective to exhibits. At the end of the exhibition, a model of Auschwitz-Birkenau demonstrates the extent of events that occurred.

This is but a taster of the Imperial War Museum, which has many more floors, areas, and exhibits that I simply don't have the time to catalogue here. You really do need a full day here, and even then I guarantee you will leave wishing you had spent longer in certain areas.
Also, there are different ways to view the museum. On this visit I photographed as much as I could, both exhibits and information cards so I could read and view them at my leisure at home on the laptop.

Next time though I might just leave my camera at home and copy the many students who were sketching and writing copious notes about everything that interested them. Photographs, of course, can always be found online. 

Oh and did I mention, admission is free.

On This Day in 1941 the Bismarck Sunk the HMS Hood

On This Day in 1941 the Bismarck Sunk the HMS Hood

HMS Hood

The HMS Hood was one of four Admiral class battle cruisers ordered in mid-1916, HMS Hood was the largest of the her class and the largest warship in the world when launched in 1918.  After the battle of Jutland the design of Hood was modified.  However, as she still had limitations work on her sister ship was halted in 1917, leaving Hood as Britain’s last completed purpose-built battle cruiser.  She was named after the 18th-century Admiral Samuel Hood.

She was launched on 22 August 1918 by the widow of Rear Admiral Sir Horace Hood, a great-great-grandson of Admiral Samuel Hood. Sir Horace Hood had been killed while commanding the 3rd Battle cruiser Squadron at the Battle of Jutland.

Construction of Hood began at the John Brown & Company shipyards in Clydebank, Scotland, on 1st September 1916. Following the loss of three British battle cruisers at the Battle of Jutland. 5,000 tons of extra armour and bracing were added to Hood's design.

In order to make room in John Brown's shipyard for merchant construction, Hood sailed for Rosyth to complete her fitting-out on 9 January 1920. After sea trials, she was commissioned on 15 May 1920, under Captain Wilfred Tompkinson. She had cost £6,025,000 to build. " approximately £179 million today".

With her conspicuous twin funnels and lean profile, The Hood was widely regarded one of the finest-looking warships ever built. She was also the largest warship afloat when she was commissioned in 1920 and retained that distinction for the next 20 years. Her size and powerful armament earned her the nickname of "Mighty Hood" and she came to symbolize the might of the British Empire itself.

Although the Royal Navy always designated Hood as a battle cruiser, Some writers have classified her as a fast battleship, since Hood appeared to have improvements over the fast Queen Elizabeth-class battleships. On paper, Hood retained the same armament and level of protection, while being significantly faster.

She was the pride of the Royal Navy on sailing to intercept the Bismarck in May 1941.  After making contact with the German battleship, she, with HMS Prince of Wales, opened fire.  The Bismarck returned fire and with the fifth salvo hit the Hood a fatal blow and she sunk within two minutes. Only three crew from her total of 1,500 survived

HMS Prince of Wales

HMS Prince of Wales was a King George V-class battleship of the Royal Navy, built at the Cammell Laird shipyard in Birkenhead, England.

She was involved in several key actions of the Second World War, including the battle of Denmark Strait against the Bismarck, operations escorting convoys in the Mediterranean, and her final action and sinking in the Pacific in 1941.

Battle Ship Bismarck

The Bismarck was a famous German battleship in World War II. Construction of the ship commenced in 1936, and it went into service in August 1940.

It had a full-load displacement of 50,000 tons, and was the largest battleship in the world at that time.
Bismarck was a symbol of Nazi Germany's new Navy, well armed and heavily armoured, known as "the unsinkable sea fortress", but it was sunk on its first combat mission.

In its first engagement of the war, in the Denmark Strait, the Bismark sank the Battle Cruiser HMS Hood, the pride of the British fleet and Crippled the HMS Price of Wales forcing it to withdraw. 

Following that battle the Bismarck was pursued for more than two days by ships and aircraft of the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force. Eventually, on the evening of 26 May, her steering gear was crippled by a torpedo bomber attack, and on the following morning she was brought to battle and sunk.

At Hobbies we stock a variety of plastic model kits allowing you to replicate your favourite battleships of WW2 in fantastic a range of popular scales 1/200th and 1/350th. plus we stock all the necessary paints, glues and tools to build these kits or even turn into a radio control model.

Hobbies Supplying Model Makers Since 1895