HMS Glorious - World War I

World War I

Her keel was laid down on 1 May 1915 by Harland and Wolff at their Belfast shipyard. Glorious was launched on 20 April 1916 and completed on 14 October 1916. During her sea trials in November 1916, Courageous sustained structural damage while running at full speed in a rough head sea and had the damaged areas stiffened shortly afterwards to prevent a recurrence. Glorious did not suffer any similar damage and did not receive her stiffening until 1918. Upon commissioning, Courageous served with the 3rd Light Cruiser Squadron of the Grand Fleet. After most of the 1st Cruiser Squadron was sunk at the Battle of Jutland, the squadron was re-formed with Courageous as flagship along with her sister ship Glorious. She cost £1,967,223 to build (costs to 23 Nov 1916). Glorious received a half a dozen torpedo mounts, each with two tubes in mid-1917: one mount on each side of the mainmast on the upper deck and two mounts on each side of the rear turret on the quarterdeck.

On 16 October 1917 the Admiralty received word of German ship movements, possibly indicating some sort of raid. Admiral Beatty, the commander of the Grand Fleet, ordered most of his light cruisers and destroyers to sea in an effort to locate the enemy ships. Courageous and Glorious were not initially ordered to sea, but were sent to reinforce the 2nd Light Cruiser Squadron patrolling the central part of the North Sea later that day. Two German Brummer-class light cruisers managed to slip through the gaps in the British patrols and destroyed a convoy bound for Norway during the morning of 17 October, but no word was received of the engagement until that afternoon. The 1st Cruiser Squadron were ordered to intercept, but were unsuccessful as the German cruisers were faster than expected.