HMS King George V was the lead ship of her class of four dreadnought battleships built for the Royal Navy in the early 1910s.

Aside from participating in the failed attempt to intercept the German ships that had bombarded Scarborough, Hartlepool and Whitby in late 1914, the Battle of Jutland in May 1916 and the inconclusive action of 19 August, her service during the First World War generally consisted of routine patrols and training in the North Sea.

King George V was reduced to reserve and used as a training ship until late 1926 and was sold for scrap later in the year in accordance with the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty.

[3] During her sea trials on 4 November 1912, King George V reached a maximum speed of 22.4 knots (41.5 km/h; 25.8 mph) from 33,022 shp (24,625 kW).

She carried enough coal and fuel oil to give her a range of 5,910 nautical miles (10,950 km; 6,800 mi) at a cruising speed of 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph).

[4] Like the Orion class, the King George Vs were equipped with 10 breech-loading (BL) 13.5-inch (343 mm) Mark V guns in five hydraulically powered twin-gun turrets, all on the centreline.

[5] The King George V-class ships were protected by a waterline 12-inch (305 mm) armoured belt that extended between the end barbettes.

That same year, the spotting top was enlarged and the foremast was fitted with full-sized tripod legs to handle the additional weight.

[13] Princess Irene of Hesse and by Rhine and her sons visited King George V on 24 June, followed by Kaiser Wilhelm II the next day.

An "at home" was held on board on the 26th to which all the notables of Kiel were invited, with Admiral Warrender's wife, Maude, acting as hostess.

The squadron departed for gunnery practice off the northern coast of Ireland on the morning of 27 October and her sister Audacious struck a mine, laid a few days earlier by the German auxiliary minelayer SS Berlin.

They mustered the six dreadnoughts of the 2nd Battle Squadron, including King George V and her sisters Ajax and Centurion, and stood with the main body in support of Vice-Admiral David Beatty's four battlecruisers.

Jellicoe's ships, including King George V, conducted gunnery drills on 10–13 January west of Orkney and the Shetland Islands.

Almost three weeks later, King George V participated in another fleet training operation west of Orkney during 2–5 November and repeated the exercise at the beginning of December.

On the night of 25 March, King George V and the rest of the fleet sailed from Scapa Flow to support Beatty's battlecruisers and other light forces raiding the German Zeppelin base at Tondern.

On 21 April, the Grand Fleet conducted a demonstration off Horns Reef to distract the Germans while the Imperial Russian Navy relaid its defensive minefields in the Baltic Sea.

They enforced strict wireless silence during the operation, which prevented Room 40 cryptanalysts from warning the new commander of the Grand Fleet, Admiral Beatty.

The British only learned of the operation after an accident aboard the battlecruiser SMS Moltke forced her to break radio silence to inform the German commander of her condition.

[32] The ship was present at Rosyth, Scotland, when the High Seas Fleet surrendered there on 21 November[33] and she remained part of the 2nd Battle Squadron through 1 March 1919.

While passing between Mytilene and the Turkish mainland during the night of 2/3 September 1922, the ship struck an uncharted rock that flooded one of her boiler rooms.

She was present during the Great Fire of Smyrna in mid-September and evacuated 130 refugees to Malta on 16 September as she proceeded there for permanent repairs.

On 28 September 1926, the ship was taken out of service and was listed for disposal on 1 December to meet the tonnage limitations of the Washington Naval Treaty.