HMS Bulwark
Captain Clive C C Johnstone, Royal Navy, HMS Bulwark, BFPO 243

History of HMS Bulwark

The Royal Navy's first ship to bear the name BULWARK was ordered to be built as a 74 gun line-of-battle ship at Portsmouth Dockyard in February 1777, and re-ordered in June 1778 - but the keel was never laid, and the project cancelled.

In November 1805 the French 74-gun ship LE SCIPION was captured in the sea-fight off Cape Ortegal known as 'Strachan's Action'. She was taken into the Royal Navy as HMS SCIPION, retaining her French name as a defiance to the enemy. However, this meant there had to be a change to the name of the SCIPIO, a 74-gun ship being built at Portsmouth, which was renamed HMS BULWARK by Admiralty Order of 28th April 1806, the date of the Admiralty Order to establish the SCIPION as one of His Majesty's ships.

The BULWARK (ex-SCIPIO) had been first ordered in 1794, but work on her construction only began in April 1804. Measuring 1940 tons burthen, she was 181ft. 10in. on the gun deck, 49ft. 3in. beam, with complement of 590 officers and men. She was launched on 24th April 1807 and later that year sailed for the Mediterranean and the blockade of Toulon. Over the next few years the BULWARK, commanded by the Hon.

Charles Fleeming, was often to be found off the coast of Spain, providing supplies to and cooperating with Spanish irregular forces in their guerrilla against the French. After repair at Plymouth in 1811 she sailed as flagship of Rear Admiral Sir Philip Durham for the blockade of France's Biscay ports, shifting billet in 1813 to the North Sea to deny the Schelde to enemy shipping. After another refit at Plymouth she sailed under the command of Captain Farmery Predham Epworth for the North America station, where she formed part of the force blockading the New England coast. Part of the coastline of Maine was taken and occupied until the end of the war, and the American corvette ADAMS was driven up the Penobscot River and burned.

The first U.S. line-of-battle ship, USS INDEPENDENCE, was blockaded within the Boston harbour, and American privateers and merchant ships were taken at sea.With the end of 'War of 1812' - in 1815 - HMS BULWARK convoyed British troops from Canada to Portsmouth, arriving just as Napoleon's escape from Elba meant they were required for the '100 Days' campaign which culminated at Waterloo. Her next years of peacetime service were spent on home stations, and she was broken up at Plymouth in 1826.

The next HMS BULWARK was laid down in March 1859 at Chatham Dockyard as lead and name ship of a projected class of twelve 91 gun line-of-battle ships. This class of two decker steam screw ships were, at 252ft. length overall and 58ft. beam, approaching the practical limits for wooden construction. But it was the introduction of the ironclad frigate (the French GLOIRE in 1859, and the much more successful HMS WARRIOR in 1860) that spelled the end of the 'wooden walls', the two and three decked ships of the line.

Construction was well advanced when the order to suspend work on the BULWARK and her sister ship ROBUST was given in March 1861; seven other ships of the class already under construction were hastily (and not entirely successfully) cut down a deck and converted to ironclad frigates. The BULWARK remained on the stocks for a further twelve years, through several more-or-less limited proposals to convert her, but the incomplete and eventually unwanted hull was finally broken up in March 1873.

In December 1885 HMS HOWE (built at Pembroke Dockyard 1860 as a 'Victoria' CLass 121 gun screw line-ofbattle ship) was renamed HMS BULWARK. As the HOWE she had only once gone to sea, for her initial steam trials, and since 1861 had lain in reserve in the upper Hamoaze at Plymouth. She was HMS BULWARK for only nine months, until September 1886, when she was renamed HMS IMPREGNABLE and became Boys' Training Ship at Devonport. After more than thirty years in this static role she was replaced in 1919 by the obsolete armoured cruiser POWERFUL, which now took on the name IMPREGNABLE. The older wooden ship then reverted to the name BULWARK, and in 1921 she was sold for breaking.

The next HMS BULWARK was a 'London' Class battleship, 15,000 tons displacement, built by R & W Hawthorn, Leslie & Co. at Newcastle. Laid down in March 1899, she launched only 7 months later in October that year and completed in March 1902. She carried a main armament of four 12in. and twelve 6in. guns, with four fixed torpedo tubes. Her triple expansion engines gave her a designed speed of 18 knots. From March 1902 to February 1907 she was flagship of the Mediterranean Fleet, and then flagship of the Home Fleet for some months before going into dockyard hands for refit.

From 1908 she served with various divisions of the Home Fleet, until she joined the 5th Battleship Squadron in June 1912. On 26th November 1914 she was lying at a mooring in the River Medway, taking on ammunition, when she was blown apart by an internal explosion: only 12 men from her complement of 750 survived.

A 'Centaur' Class light fleet carrier was the next ship to have the name BULWARK. Her keel was laid at Harland & Wolff 's Belfast yard on 10th May 1945, two days after VE Day, and she was launched in June 1948. However, like her sister ship HMS ALBION, there was a delay of several years before she was completed and she was not commissioned until October 1954.

In November 1956 during the Suez Crisis she flew off nearly 600 sorties, attacking Egyptian airfields and supporting Anglo-French paratroop drops. In early 1958 the BULWARK joined the Far East Fleet, but was diverted in July and August to ferry British infantry battalions, complete with stores and vehicles, from East Africa to the Middle East in response to a short-lived crisis in Jordan. She was converted at Devonport Dockyard to be a commando carrier in 1959, able to embark a Royal Marines Commando, its equipment and transport, and to project them ashore by her own helicopter squadron and outfit of LCAs (Landing Craft, Assault).

The first of the Navy's carriers to be converted for this role, she had a less complete conversion than her sister ship HMS ALBION, which was taken in hand for the work in 1961. HMS BULWARK's deterrent presence at short notice helped avert a threatened Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in July 1961, and during her second commission in 1964/5 her helicopters provided support throughout the height of the Malaysian Confrontation. In November 1967 she and her helicopters played a vital role in the withdrawal from Aden; this, apart from one exercise off Malaysia in 1970, was her last time 'East of Suez'. throughout the early 1970s she operated in the NATO area, often in co-operative exercises with amphibious forces of other NATO countries, in the Atlantic, the Caribbean and in the Mediterranean.

She reduced to reserve status at Portsmouth in May 1976, but recommissioned in February 1979 with an additional role as anti-submarine support carrier, as a stop-gap until the new 'Invincible' Class came ready. For a couple of months in early 1980 she was the only carrier the Royal Navy had in commission.

In March 1981 she paid off at Portsmouth for the last time, and was placed on the Disposal list for scrapping on 1st April 1981. She was broken up at Cairnryan in 1984.

The latest vessel to bear the name BULWARK is an Amphibious Support ship which was launched on 15th November 2001 at BAES Marine Shipyard, Barrow in Furness. The Master, David Almond and his wife, were present at the ceremony when it was officially announced that the Worshipful Company of Coachmakers & Coach Harness Makers would be affiliated with the vessel. The new HMS BULWARK has a displacement of some 20,000 tons with a ship's complement of some 400.When operational in 2003 this new ship will add very considerably to the Royal Navy's amphibious warfare capability, not only in terms of size, but also in terms of versatility, being equipped as a Command and Control ship. In 'fleet terms' the BULWARK with her sister ALBION will be second only in military significance to Aircraft Carriers.