HMS Tiger

There have been 15 ships of the Royal Navy called HMS Tiger, the first being in 1546 in the reign of King Henry 8th the year before he died. The ship in the photograph was laid down in 1941 in the John Brown shipyard, Clydebank in Scotland, and as part of the Minotaur class of light cruisers and was originally called HMS Bellerophon.

There were three ships built at this time, namely HMS’s Tiger, Lion and Blake, all 550ft in length with a beam of 64ft, and weighing in at 12080 tons deep load. She had at that time 4 x QF 6 inch Mk N5 guns and 6 x 3 inch guns.

On completion in 1945, HMS Bellerophon was renamed HMS Tiger. She was actually laid up in 1946 and in 1954 she was recommissioned as a Tiger class guided missile cruiser. A helicopter deck was added to the rear between 1968-1972.

HMS Tiger took part in the Indonesian Troubles in the beginning of the 1960’s and also took part in talks between Harold Wilson and Rhodesia’s Ian Smith. She was put on the disposal list in 1979 and was finally scrapped in Spain in 1986.

This print is the first in a new series of recolours by Ceegie, who has two books available on Blurb:

Escort of Convoy PQ17 and British Ship of WW2