HMS M33

Monitor HMS M33 (1915) at Portsmouth Historic Dockyard in Portsmouth, United Kingdom.

 

M33 is M29 class monitor used by the Royal Navy during WW2. It was first deployed during the Gallipoli campaign. In August 1915, she provided covering fire to the Brititsh landing at Suvla Bay, a futile attempt to end the deadlock at the Dardanelles. While the battle at Gallipoli took the lives of ten thousands of soldiers from all over the British Empire, the small monitor remained unharmed was even regarded as a "lucky" ship spared from serious damaged despite numerous engagements including the seizure of the Greek fleet in September 1916.

 

In 1919, M33 was send to Murmansk as reinforcement for the North Russian Expeditionary Force supporting the White movement in northern Russia during the civil war. It was later send to Archangelsk from where it supported allied advances along the Northen Dvina. Despite the threats of Bolshevik gunboats and shallow waters, M33 safely returned to Chatham after assisting the evaction of British forces in northern Russia.

 

In 1925, the ship was used as a minelayer with the new name HMS Minerva and after 1939 it was used as a hulk. In 2014, M33 was restored and is now on display at the Portsmouth Historic Dockyard. Once again painted in "dazzle camouflage" she is one of only three surviving British warships from WWI and the only that served at Gallipoli.

 

HMS M33 (1915)

 

Builder: Workman, Clark & Co., Belfast

Propulsion: triple expansion steam engines

Lenght: 52 m

Beam: 9.4 m

Draft: 2.06 m

Displacement: 535 t

Vmax: 10 kn

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