King George V took part in Operation Husky (the allied landings in Sicily) and bombarded the island of Levanzo and the port of Trapani.

King George V was made flagship of the British Home Fleet on 1 April 1941, she remained so during the rest of the war and became a training battleship in November 1947.

[1] King George V was built by Vickers-Armstrong at Walker Naval Yard, Newcastle upon Tyne; she was laid down on 1 January 1937, launched on 21 February 1939 and commissioned on 11 December 1940.

This made King George V the fastest battleship in the British fleet but slower than the German, French or the new Italian capital ships,[8] or the battlecruisers HMS Hood, Repulse and Renown.

To avoid the class being outgunned by the new ships of foreign navies, especially as by the mid-1930s the Treaty had been renounced by Japan and Italy, Churchill wrote to the First Lord of the Admiralty in 1936, voicing strong objections to the proposed armament of ten 14-inch guns.

Due to insufficient clearances and slightly distorted link mechanisms, failures in the intricate safety interlocks in the loading sequence for antiflash precautions caused jams during drills and practice firing.

The first model, tested in 1927, was superior to anything developed in other countries at the time and in 1938 the Mark VI* had a muzzle velocity of 2,400 feet per second, a 1.594-inch bore and a barrel length of 40 calibres.

[17][18] The first of her class to be completed, King George V was commissioned at her shipyard and sailed for Rosyth in Scotland on 16 October 1940; there she took on board her ammunition and began her sea trials.

She crossed the Atlantic early in 1941 to take Lord Halifax, the Ambassador to the United States, to Annapolis and covered the east-bound convoy BHX 104 on her return, arriving back at Scapa Flow on 6 February.

King George V left Halifax the next day to search with HMS Rodney for the German battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau who were attacking convoy ships south of Cape Race, Newfoundland as part of Operation Berlin.

King George V was still 260 to 350 nmi (480 to 640 km) away on the morning of 24 May, when sister ship Prince of Wales and Hood engaged both Bismarck and Prinz Eugen.

[21] The British re-located Bismarck at 10:30 on 26 May, when a Catalina flying boat of RAF Coastal Command sighted her, heading for the French port of Brest.

The aircraft carrier Ark Royal was ordered to launch an air attack, and at 22:25 her torpedo bombers, a flight of Fairey Swordfishes damaged Bismarck, slowing her down and jamming her rudder, forcing her to turn back out into the Atlantic, away from the safety of port.

[21] Admiral Tovey signalled his battle plan to Rodney just before sunrise on 27 May; she was free to manœuvre independently as long as she conformed generally to the movements of King George V. Both ships were to close the range to 15,000 yards (14,000 m) as quickly as possible, then turn for broadside fire.

After firing steadily for over 30 minutes, without any problems, King George V, by 09:27, began having trouble with her main battery, and from that point onward every gun missed at least one salvo due to failures in the safety interlocks for antiflash protection and from ammunition feed jams.

As both Rodney and King George V were low on fuel they returned to port at 19 knots (35 km/h),[24] escorted by eleven destroyers to guard against German air or submarine attack.

On 1 May 1942 she was operating with USS Washington as an escort to Convoy PQ 15, and collided with the destroyer HMS Punjabi, which had manoeuvred to avoid a mine and crossed her bow in dense fog.

King George V entered the Gladstone Dock in Liverpool on 9 May for repairs by Cammell Laird, and returned to Scapa Flow on 1 July 1942.

The two ships bombarded Trapani in Sicily on 12 July and also helped defend against an air raid whilst in Algiers prior to departing for Operation Avalanche, (the Allied invasion of Italy).

[19] The two ships also bombarded the islands of Levanzo and Favignana, after which they were in the reserve group for the Salerno landings (Operation Avalanche) which began on 9 September.

King George V escorted part of the Italian Fleet, including the battleships Andrea Doria and Duilio, to Malta after the armistice and with Howe provided cover for the 1st Airborne Division who were transported to Taranto in support of Operation Slapstick from 9 to 11 September by the cruiser USS Boise and the fast minelayer HMS Abdiel.

[25] King George V was in Liverpool for an overhaul from March to June, 1944; it included the installation of additional radar gear, more anti-aircraft guns, improved accommodation, and ventilation.

On 28 October 1944 King George V sailed from Scapa Flow under the command of Admiral Sir Bruce Fraser to join other Royal Navy units assembling at Trincomalee in Ceylon.

The flotilla, known as TF 63, comprised King George V, the aircraft carriers Illustrious, Indomitable, Indefatigable and Victorious, four cruisers and ten destroyers.

[29] The first stage of the voyage was covering the 11,000 nautical miles to Sydney; en route the force attacked oil refineries on Sumatra in Operation Meridian.

As the Allies approached the Japanese homeland, King George V was dispatched in mid-July to join the US battleships in a bombardment of industrial installations at Hitachi.

[30] King George V's active naval career was terminated by the Royal Navy in June 1950, when she and her surviving sister-ships went into reserve and were mothballed.

The following year King George V was moved from her berth in Gareloch to the ship breaking firm of Arnott Young and Co. in Dalmuir to undergo dismantling.