Vital Statistics
Class: Monitor
Length: 177 Feet
Beam: 31 feet
Weight: 580tons
Speed: 9.6 Knots
Crew: 72
Guns: 6Inch
Battle Honors : Dradanelles, North Russia
M33 History
M33 is not a big battle ship like HMS Victory and HMS Warrior, but she was still just as important to the Royal Navy. It was on 15th March 1915 that the Admiralty ordered the construction of five new monitor. A monitor was a ship that carried heavy guns, the only different to normal ship was that the monitor have shallow draft which allowed them to get close to shore to bombard land targets. The monitor were cheap and quick to build. It took 7 days to build M33 at Workmen Clark and Co in Belfast, this was a subcontractor of Harland and Wolff , who built the Titanic. To show you how quick these ships were to build M33 Kneel was laid on the 1st April, Launched on the 22nd May and the crew was joining the ship on 17th June.
Gallipoli
The Idea for this campaign was Winston Churchill, who was The First Sea Lord of the Admiralty and in my view was the blue print for D Day in The Second World War. The First World War was a stalemate particular on the Western Front where there was terrible casualties. Churchills idea was to push Turkey back to Constantinople ( Modern day Istanbul); Churchill thought that if he could do this it could forces Turkey out of the war, it would end the war earlier. Churchill hope to open the Dardanelles to the Royal Navy. This was meant to weaken Germany on the Eastern Front fighting Russia. The doomed campion took places on the 25th April 1915 and with five division of ANZAC The Australian and New Zealand Army Crops. The Royal Navy was very active thought; landing troops, ensuring supplies reach the shore and so on the problem was the German U-Boats and when the 12,000 ton battleship HMS Triumph was torpedoed and made it too risky to position such valuable ships offshore entry M33.
The Gallipoli Campaign was at stalemate and on the 24th July M33 arrived at the Aegean Sea at the allied base
Nelson's Historical Tours 