What is Hms Lance (1914)?

Information about Hms Lance (1914)

For other ships of the same name, see HMS Lance.


HMS Lance was a Laforey-class destroyer of the British Royal Navy. In company with HMS Landrail, she fired the first British shot of the First World War on August 5, 1914. This action resulted in the sinking of the German minelayer Konigin Luise in the North Sea. Both Lance and Landrail were part of the British 2nd Destroyer Flotilla (based at Harwich), which had been deployed at dawn on the first day of the war as part of a squadron of destroyers doing a sweep of the North Sea. As World War One officially started at 2300 GMT on August 4, 1914, this first British shot occurred within twelve hours of the commencement of hostilities.

The target of the Lance and Landrail was the converted excursion steamer Königin Luise, which had been pressed into service of the Imperial German Navy as a minelayer. It was while she was laying mines that the two Royal Navy Destroyers encountered her. The Königin Luise was scuttled when her captain realized that escape was impossible.

The actual gun from Lance (QF 4 inch Mark IV L/40) that fired this shot is on display in the Imperial War Museum, London. However, the name of the gunlayer who fired the first British shot has been lost to history.

References

Phoebus (1973), Warships and Sea Battles of World War I, BPC Publishing Ltd, ISBN 0-7026-0004-0


Laforey or L-class destroyer
Laertes | Laforey | Lance | Landrail | Lark | Lassoo | Laurel | Laverock | Lawford | Legion | Lennox | Leonidas | Liberty | Linnet | Llewellyn | Lochinvar | Lookout | Louis | Loyal | Lucifer | Lydiard | Lysander

List of destroyers of the Royal Navy
Two British Royal Navy warships have been called HMS Lance after the spear.
  • The first Lance was a destroyer launched at Thornycroft in 1914, and fired the first British shot of World War I on 5 August 1914 when she intercepted the German

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Laforey class (redesignated in October 1913 as the L class) was a class of 22 torpedo boat destroyers of the Royal Navy, twenty of which were built under the Naval Programme of 1912 - 1913 and a further two under the War Emergency Programme of 1914.
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destroyer is a fast and maneuverable yet long-endurance warship intended to escort larger vessels in a fleet or battle group and defend them against smaller, short-range but powerful attackers (originally torpedo boats, later submarines and aircraft).
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Motto
"Dieu et mon droit" [2]   (French)
"God and my right"
Anthem
"God Save the Queen" [3]
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Naval Service

Components
Royal Navy
  • Surface Fleet
  • Fleet Air Arm
  • Submarine Service
  • Royal Navy Regulating Branch
  • Royal Naval Reserve
  • Queen Alexandra's Royal Naval Nursing Service
Royal Marines
  • (includes Royal Marines Reserve)

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Clockwise from top: Trenches on the Western Front; a British Mark IV tank crossing a trench; Royal Navy battleship HMS Irresistible sinking after striking a mine at the Battle of the Dardanelles; a Vickers machine gun crew with gas masks, and German Albatros D.
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August 5 is the 1st day of the year (2nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 0 days remaining.

Events

  • 642 - Battle of Maserfeld - Penda of Mercia defeats and kills Oswald of Bernicia.

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19th century - 20th century - 21st century
1880s  1890s  1900s  - 1910s -  1920s  1930s  1940s
1911 1912 1913 - 1914 - 1915 1916 1917

Year 1914 (MCMXIV
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Anthem
"Das Lied der Deutschen" (third stanza)
also called "Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit"
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minelayer is a naval ship used for deploying sea mines.[1] The term also sometimes refers to an army's special-purpose combat engineering vehicles used to lay land mines.

Naval minelayers

Submarines can also act as minelayers.
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The North Sea is marginal, epeiric sea of the Atlantic Ocean on the European continental shelf between Norway and Denmark in the east, Scotland and England in the west, and Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and France in the south.
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Harwich

Harwich ()
|240px|Harwich (

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August 4 is the 1st day of the year (2nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 0 days remaining.

Events

  • 70 - The destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem by the Romans.

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Kaiserliche Marine or Imperial Navy was the German Navy created by the formation of the German Empire. It existed between 1871 and 1919, growing out of the Prussian Navy and Norddeutsche Bundesmarine.
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Imperial War Museum

Established 1917
Location Lambeth Road, London SE1
Visitor figures 712,000 (2006) [1]
Director Sir Robert Crawford
Nearest tube station(s) Lambeth North, Waterloo, Southwark, Elephant & Castle
Website www.iwm.org.
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London
Canary Wharf is the centre of London's modern office towers
London shown within England
Coordinates:
Sovereign state United Kingdom
Constituent country England
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Laforey class (redesignated in October 1913 as the L class) was a class of 22 torpedo boat destroyers of the Royal Navy, twenty of which were built under the Naval Programme of 1912 - 1913 and a further two under the War Emergency Programme of 1914.
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HMS Laforey, the name ship of the Laforey class destroyers, was launched at Govan in 1913 following construction by the Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Company.
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HMS Lydiard was a Laforey class torpedo boat destroyer of the Royal Navy. She was launched on 26 February 1914.

She served in World War I with the 3rd Destroyer Flotilla, and fought at the Battle of Heligoland Bight in 1914 and the Battle of Jutland in 1916.
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This is a list of destroyer classes of the Royal Navy of the United Kingdom, organised chronologically by entry into service.

For further information on naming conventions, please see the article naming conventions for destroyers of the Royal Navy

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