Sudden Destruction: Why Did HMS Hood Explode? 

Hope you enjoyed the video! Join me online in World of Warships! Visit wo.ws/OceanlinerDesigns to get a whole bunch of goodies including 7 days free premium, a Tier IV premium ship with 6 point captain and 500 Gold Doubloons! No kidding, I have been playing this game for years. If you use my link to sign up, let me know in the comments and maybe we can sail some time! ~Mike

This one is very close to my heart. My grandfather was stationed up in Iceland as part of the merchant navy. His tug was out looking survivors, but they found nothing just wreckage. He never mentioned the details about floating detached limbs and dead bodies until about 1-year before he died. It was like he'd been holding it in all the years (65+) and finally had to let it go. It had obviously traumatized him. He saw the horrors of war and it's devestation and the full price others had to give with their lives. Never even liked wearing his medals was far too humble a man.

My Uncle Percy went down with the Hood aged just 18 years old. Can you really imagine being 18 years old with your whole life in front of you aboard the pride of the British Navy, only to have your hopes, your dreams, and your future snuffed out in a blast of high explosives and an obscene wall of crushing water and tangled metal? I can't, the thought of it has horrified me for decades. Before she died, my grandma told me that on the morning of the sinking she woke very early and needing the toilet, which was at the bottom of the garden, she unlocked the back door to find my Uncle sitting on the back door step. Apparently he looked up at her and said "I won't be coming home, Mum." Thinking that she was still half asleep and imagining things she used the toilet and went back to bed. Later that day she received the telegram and the newspapers hit the streets...

I wasn't born when this happened but this story was retold by my mum. My grandfather served on the Hood as a radio operator and when the news reached my grandmother everyone feared the worst that my grandfather was dead. It wasn't until a week later that they found out that he had been transferred off the Hood before it set sale to confront the Bizmark. My grandfather apparently was never the same.

My grandfather was on the German cruiser Prinz Eugen and was a part with the Bismarck, of the Operation "Rheinübung." He did saw the sinking of the H.M.S. Hood with his own eyes.

Anyone ever heard of Ted Briggs story from how he survived the sinking of the Hood? He did a documentary in 2001about it and it was so emotional when he was on camera talking about it, especially when he talked about leaving the bridge and running into his commanding officer, who put his hand forward and said "After you." As Briggs left the bridge first and the officer behind him. Even I still remember that story all these years later.

Drachinfel did a 42:36 long video about this. The color of the flames around the aviation fire, just before the big explosion, indicated a Cordite fire (British smokeless propellent at the time was called Cordite). Also, the way the HMS Hood's bow wave behaved at that speed would allow a shell from the KMS Bismark's 15" guns to hit the Aft 4" AA ammo magazine, the aft bulkhead of which was right next to the magazine of Y turret... So his hypothesis is that a 15" (38cm) shell hit in an Afterward Machinery Space, penetrated the aft bulkhead of that space, which was also forward bulkhead of the aft 4" magazine as it exploded. Then in the fraction of a second for the pressure to build up high enough to shove in the bulkhead 'tween the 4" and 15" magazines, the flames escaped through the ventilation ducts of the machinery room....

My GrandDad didn't have to join the war as he was a farmer and older. But he took the sinking of the Hood personally and left his pregnant wife and 2 young sons and joined the navy. You see my GrandDad, Clifford Hood, was descended from Admiral Hood which the ship Hood was named after I believe. That's the story in our family anyway.

My father was in hospital when they found the Hood, and he related a story of his good friend telling him he was so lucky to get the Hood, he would be SAFE. The loss of the hood touch so many people, Such a good looking ship i have a print of her at speed on my study wall.

Here's a bit of trivia for everyone about the movie "Sink the Bismarck!" Captain John Leach of the Prince of Wales is played by Esmond Knight, who actually served on PoW during the battle with the Bismarck! Knight was wounded and blinded during the battle, but sight was eventually restored to one eye. He had a fine acting career in the post-war years as well.

Fellow RU-vid naval historian Drachinifel proposed a near-identical theory regarding Hood's destruction (to the point that I question why Mike did not credit or at least mention him) with two slight differences. In Drach's theory, Bismarck's one-in-a-million hit was the result of the shell striking Hood's hull while she was turning and thus the trough of her wake left a section of hull right around the aft end of her engine rooms exposed, exactly where the shell would have to have hit to have caused the explosion. Had the shell come in seconds earlier or later, Hood would have completed her turn and the water would have settled and knocked the shell off-target or simply shattered it on impact. The other difference, as I recall from Drach's own documentary, was that rather than going straight into the 15in propellant magazine, Bismarck's shell instead passed through the corner of the engine room and ended up in the 5in secondary gun magazine, causing that ammunition to explode, which in turn tore through the neighboring bulkhead into the 15in magazines. From there on both theories play out the same; rapid internal build-up of pressure ends in Hood popping like a fiery balloon.

Very interesting analysis. My Dad, who is 91, was a schoolboy in Canada when the Hood was reported sunk. He has told me that he cried inconsolably at the loss of the Mighty Hood. Thanks for a great video!

Drachinifel did an extremely good video on the sinking of the Hood. There are two aspects to the lucky hit by Bismark. First, Hood was doing a sharp left turn, which would have rolled the ship to port, exposing more of the starboard hull beneath the armor belt. Second, a peculiarity of Hoods hydrodynamics caused the wake to draw down several feet at exactly this spot, at the engine room adjacent to the 5" magazine. It is likely that Bismarck's shell hit this region of Hood's hull, entered the aft engine room and hit the bulkhead between the engine room and 5" magazine. The 5" propellant charges then "cooked off", and much of it vented upwards, creating the spear of flame seen from Prince of Wales. This preliminary explosion then set off the 15" ammunition in the main magazine directly astern of the 5" magazine. It was, as Drach said, a "golden BB shot".

I've watched a documentary covering HMS Hood and the historian summed about this, "Why is it that only 3 men survived? When you consider the whole ship exploding, no wonder only 3 survived. "

I appreciate the longer videos! The hood is a horrible story that will haunt later generations too. Many forget the tragedy of the Bismarck, many young men died there too.

As a fellow maritime historian, although I’m much much older I just love to see young people keeping the torch burning. You do a great job and I can tell a great passion for maritime history. I helped on documentaries and a variety of books in my life especially on the Great Lakes and ww1 and 2. I have 3 generations of officers on the Great Lakes starting in the 1880’s. I have many great first hand accounts passed down from the “White Hurricane” over the Great Lakes in 1913. A great idea for a video for you. If you want some accounts from written record of my great grandfather I have descriptions from his actual diary as he was out in that storm and his bulk freighter, which was over 500 ft was tossed aground and later repaired to sail another day. His account is nothing less than horrifying. So much so he got a day job for 2 years after before the lakes called him back for 15 more years. Let me know. PK

Very very good production. You deserve your own series on a major network - your stuff is far better than the rubbish we usually get. My grandad was in the Royal Navy during WW2 and served on the Russian convoys, at D-Day and in the mediterranean. He never really talked about his experiences on the convoys unless he'd had a drink or two, or three and I can only imagine the horrors of what the brave men of all sides experienced.

Just putting this out there for those who don't know. The likely cause of Hood's destruction, being that of a subsurface penetration of the hull, is made more likely by the fact that, when traveling at speed, Hood's wake would expose the unarmored waterline in a trough right near the aft magazines. This would have given Bismarck's shell even more power to punch through the belt and detonate in the hood's magazine. This fact is also proven by pictures and was well known by the Royal Navy at the time. All together great video, 10/10 would watch again.

Such a tragedy, so many lost not just on the Hood or the Bismarck, but in the whole war. So many, many, lives lost. Never take a moment for granted ladies and gents, for life is so often short.

Have you ever researched the USS Texas? She served in both World Wars and is currently a museum ship. I visited her a few years ago before they dry-docked her for repairs. It was an interesting experience, like a trip back in time.

In elementary school, I read Robert Ballard’s scholastic book about finding the Bismarck, which also included stories from some of the Kriegsmarine sailors and how even they were shocked that the Hood had so dramatically exploded and sunk. There were plenty of expedition facts and wreck images. No matter what the exact cause was, Bismarck scored a lucky hit that tore through the Hood and detonated a magazine. Will always be the most famous engagement of warships during the first half of the second world war.

Fantastic Mike, such a tragic story. Oceanliner Designs just keeps getting better & better. Well done.

Hey Mike; here's an interesting bit of trivia for you- there's another survivor of sorts from the Hood who was transferred off the ship just before she sortied against the Bismarck, who became rather famous later on. His name was John Devon Rowland Pertwee, best known for, among other things, being the third actor to play The Doctor.

My Great Grandfather served aboard HMS Hood, but before it left for the Denmark Strait he was granted Paternity Leave and the ship sailed without him, and he survived. I'm not sure which ship he was relocated to but I can only imagine the sheer thought of losing all of your mates in one horrific sinking Edit: He was relocated to the Middle East

Thanks Mike. My Dad was in Britain during that time - he signed up not long after - and he told me how the entire nation gasped at the loss of Hood.

this is one of the most heartfelt videos on the Battle of the Denmark Strait i’ve ever seen. your coverage and knowledge on this subject baffles me as always mike. May all those who perished aboard both Hood and Bismarck rest in peace.

Great video, I’ve known a lot about the Battle of the Denmark Strait since I was 7. Some facts: a British Spitfire photographed Bismarck in Bergen, Norway, the German ships did not top up their fuel and oil reserves in Norway, if they had then Bismarck could have stayed in the Atlantic longer before having to turn to France, according to survivor Ted Briggs, as he left the Compass platform when the bow was lifting vertical, he saw Admiral Holland sitting in his chair, making no attempt to abandon ship and the squadron Navigator was about to leave the platform but stepped alongside to allow Briggs exit first and he never saw the Navigator again.

I remember hearing of the 'below waterline hit' theory from Drachinifel. He did a really good job explaining it.

If you would show the picture of Hood at full speed, you’ll see a trough forms right where the shell hit was received, which is how the shell was able to impact below the belt and not encounter much water first.

The historian Drach came to the same conclusion and added that the shell may have hit in the bow trough as Hood was at speed - the shell skipping under the armor belt

My great great grandfather was part of the aerial reconnaissance crew keeping tabs on the Bismarck. Somewhere, my grandma has a photograph he took of the Bismarck somewhere I believe in the Denmark Strait shortly before her engagement with the HMS Hood.

I could watch content about the Bismarck and Hood all day and night. To magnificent ships that took down mighty men

The Prince of Wales' First Lieutenant, whose job was to watch the Hood for the signals from the Admiral, testified during the Court of Inquiry that he saw a hit on the Hood in the area of the main mast, with debris flying in the air. This is the area where a fire was raging from the previous hit. At the same time Bismarck's gunnery officer also saw the same hit through his rangefinder. On the intercom with his Assistant Gunnery Officer in the Secondary Fire Control he wondered if the shell was a dud. He said: It certainly clawed its way aboard. Just as he said it, the Hood exploded.

I believe they concluded that the shell that hit the PoW would have armed when it hit the water and detonated before penetrating the PoW if it had not been a dud. A shell hitting the side of the Hood should have done the same, but imo a hit below the belt is still the likely culprit.

A brilliant series from you Sir. Education is the best cure for a lack of wisdom. Thank You.

What a powerful video on such a huge piece of old Empire history. New Zealand was proud to have a position in the Royal Navy during WWII.

Love your videos. My uncle was supposed to go on the Bismark but he had caught the flu and was in a German hospital. He survived the war along with my other uncles. Another was on the Russian front and he was installing field telephone wire on a telephone pole & he told me he looked out upon the horizon and where moments before their was nothing suddenly he saw what looked like all the Russian T34's in the world from horizon to horizon when suddenly one of the Russian tanks fired a tank shell at the phone pole his equipment was attached to at the waist. It blew the pole out from under him and that was the last thing he knew until he woke up in a field hospital. Shrapnel from the shell took a large chunk of his skull off and doctors put a metal plate in his head. He was sent back to Germany to recuperate and that was the end of the war for him. He wound up going to Germany after the war as did my other uncle and he worked as a truck mechanic for 20 years, had a retirement dinner and went home, sat down on the couch and had a massive heart attack that killed him instantly in front of his family. My other uncles were in the Wehrmacht and the Luftwaffe. One became a high ranking official in the German government after the war. The other became a vice president of a retail store chain. My Mother married a Wehrmacht officer and he was lost missing in action in Poland. I have an email from the German state military archives of his service record but I have not gotten it translated into English. After they were married he and my Mother went to Berlin and they met Adolf Hitler. My Mother was a very astute woman and told me she was NOT impressed with the Fuhrer and when I pressed her further all she would say was : That Man ! " With a tone of total disgust. Our family on her side came from Tilsit, East Prussia and were very Prussian. My Mother was a nurse for 50 years. When the Russians moved into Tilsit, Russian soldiers came into her home and got mud all over the marble entryway floors. She was a forceful woman and told them to get out of her house. Shortly afterwards a Russian officer who knew German came to the house and rang the bell and when she opened the door he apologized and said this no further intrusions on her privacy would be made and that his soldiers would not enter her home again. Realizing that eventually the Russians would confiscate her home she gathered up family papers and what valuables she could and took her and my sister and WALKED the rail lines into Poland and then Berlin and it was around 600 miles. She later moved to Nurnberg and met my Father there when he was a master sgt in the US Army after the war, married him and he, my sister and her moved to the US in 1950. My grandfather on my Mother's side was an officer in the Kriegsmarine in WWI. He was a gunnery officer on a ship & I have a picture of his which is very old style showing the guns, him in his uniform and his ship. He died in 1959. Members of my family served in their respective armed services tracing back 800 years. My Father enlisted in the US Army in 1937. On my Fathers side we also had Japanese relatives. We found out after the war that one of our relatives was in the IJN and his plane bombed my Father at Pearl Harbor while he was supervising food supplies being removed from a truck for the kitchens and the plane blew blew up the truck with people running for their lives but he was unhurt. He had just been transferred from the Phillipines shortly before the war began and he said it was the best duty he ever had and he hated the Japanese for starting the war and never forgave them. His first job in the Army was taking care of mules. He told me years later that the one regret he had was that he missed his mules and he treated them very well and they acted more like beloved pets than beasts of burden. He took artillery training at Fort Lewis Washington but decided he wanted to go to cooking school as he was a very good cook. He completed those courses after his time in artillery school and became a very good cook and was promoted to Master Sgt. and was then sent back stateside, then to England. His services as a personal cook were wanted by various generals and in England he would cook meals for them and he cooked a meal for General Patton. He was in on the invasion of North Africa, then Sicily, D Day and once Patton''s 3rd Army Patton asked for him to be one of his personal chefs and he would cook for him and also supervised the kitchens of the 3rd Army. He went across Europe and was one of the men who moved to relieve Bastogne. He told me that he was cold in the Bulge but he froze his ass off in Korea. In the Bulge his jeep hit a land mine and he was sent to a field hospital and had a huge gash in his forehead and one of his fingers was hanging by a thread and they sewed it back on but the only painkiller they had were APC's which was basically aspirins. He had the scar on his finger and the gash wound on his forehead for life. He was one of the German occupation troops in Bavaria after the war and supervised kitchens there and also had something to do with the former SS Kaserne there and met my Mother and married her. In 1950, he was sent to Korea and said it was terrifying with waves of troops coming from everywhere & said he was scared to death. He returned to the US in 1951 suffering from combat fatigue and after a time he retired from the Army with a 100% service disability and later got a job as a civilian at Fort Belvoir but kept up contacts with those he knew high up in the Army. He was in the Army for 17 years as they called him up briefly during the Cuban Missle Crisis & he was assigned to the Pentagon. We lived at that time at an apartment building on 16th Street about 2 miles from the White House. In the garage there had been constructed a fallout shelter. It was full of supplies but was only intended to really protect residents from fallout and there was wooden cage made out of chicken wire. A friend of mine and I climbed the structure and being curious we broke open one of the cases of food there and found out the rations were already stale. During the crisis things came very near to nuclear war so much so that at one point we were at Defcon 1 and he called my Mother and told her that the crisis had escalated so much that he knew we were likely to go to war and that there was no reason to try to take me and her and flee to another city as DC was the number one target for attack and we would be dead. It got so bad that we were 15 minutes from nuclear war before Kennedy and Kruschev made peace. He was retired again and became a supervising chef in a major Washington hotel near the White House. In 1964, the Army briefly called him back to active duty but by that time his health had suffered due to years of smoking and he was sent home. They were short of NCO''S' and wanted to send him to Vietnam. We moved back to Pittsburgh, then San Francisco and he died at the age of 62. My Mother worked as a nurse in San Francisco and injured her arm and shoulder and had to retire. He loved being a nurse and was a very good one. She died at 94 in 2014. On my Father's side his family can trace their ancestry back to 1820 when a member of the family came to the US from Sendai Japan, became a butler for a rich family and married the maid. Members of my Fathers family still live in Pittsburgh and my Fathers 3 brothers all worked in the steel mills. My sister and her children and I am an uncle and great uncle to their children and I hope to finally to be able to return to my beloved Pittsburgh next year. Go Bucs.

A very similar take to one of Drachinifel, though there is one difference in that Hood had a bow wave which meant such an under waterline hit much more likely. This is a difference between the hit that PoW took and Hood likely took: The one that hit PoW hit too short, of the fuse had not been a dud then it would have exploded before it hit the ship. But unfortunately, in just the right place, a shell would have had to hit the water much closer or might not even have had to hit the water at all. All told a very good video for a non-warship channel especially! You clearly learned your stuff and I do enjoy that you spent such a time discrediting the myths around the event

Superbly detailed production, Mike, with really great visuals. The final hypothesis about the shot penetrating below the armour belt is given weight when looking at photographs of Hood travelling at very high speeds - many of those pictures show that the dynamic of Hood's wake created a deep declivity , or dip, just in the region of the mainmast, which partially exposed the area below the waterline, so the fatal shell may not even have had to hit the water, but just gone straight in. Still the "chance in a million", but like you say, it seems like the most likely scenario.

I think that the most eerie thing about wrecks whether it's the Hood, the Bismarck or Titanic etc., is the boots and shoes on the seafloor!

At 14,000 meters, Hood was outside of her immune zone against Bismarck's main guns. The shortest range at which the belt could NOT be penetrated was estimated at 22,500 yards (20,580 meters), so at 14,000 meters, it was entirely plausible that a shell impacting Hood's main belt could have punched through and detonated at or near a magazine--probably the 4-inch magazine just forward of the the after main gun magazines.

I was surprised just how much this video affected me: the Hood/Bismarck battle had fascinated me for years and I understood most of the content of this already. However: the last few minutes of this seemed to bring home the reality. Well written, well presented.

Fantastic Mike ....you should do more warships .. I have watched and read a lot about the Hood over the years as I'm fascinated by her ...both her amazing size and speed but especially her grace and style. I was under the misapprehension that she was sunk by plunging fire to the magazine ....your well researched presentation has set me right .. Off to watch your equally good film on the Sydney again now ... PS love your liner stuff too ❤️❤️❤️💕💕

The case could be made that Hood was the first 'fast battleship' of which classes like South Dakota, North Carolina, and Iowa in the USN. They had similar displacements and had speeds close to or over 30 knots.

I learn something new every time I watch this. Yes I’ve come. Back many times. I love history and enjoy learning more about it

For me, This video is probably one of the most understandable theory I've ever watched, and I truly appreciated your graphics Sir when it comes to between history and theories. Your animations of Warships like Hood, Bismarck, and others are far more realistic. :)

This channel has quickly become one of my absolute favorites. Thanks for all the interesting history Mike. Can’t wait to see what else your channel has in store. Keep it up my friend👍

Drachinfel had a video about Hood as well, and brought up the way the ship's bow wake affects the waterline further down the hull. It seems plausible that the part of the hull that Bismarck's shell hit was actually exposed to open air, not underwater. He also discusses a theory that the shell didn't hit the magazine directly but started a fire in a neighboring compartment which spread to the magazine, as an explanation for the delayed blast.

A magnificent analysis of this tragedy..my grandfather was Royal Navy during WW2 and I remember him talking about the sinking of the Hood . The horrific loss of life is very sobering and subsequently the large scale loss German sailors on the Bismark . When we put the politics aside ,the majority were just ordinary men ,doing their duty for their country,and paid the ultimate sacrifice.

My father was born in Motherwell, Scotland and was very upset when he learned of the sinking of the Hood. My German uncle was having a party with his nazi friends and my father grabbed him by his lapels and said things I can't write here. Revenge came a week later. Seven months later we were attacked at Pearl Harbor and the rest is history. Thanks, Mike.

Ironically it was probably this very encounter that led people to get an impression of Bismarck being some kind of monstrous powerhouse despite how, as pointed out, many of its contemporaries actually outperformed it.

When I was a kid, my dad gave me an illustrated book about the history of Bismarck and the sinking of Hood always fascinated me. It still does today. All that to say I thoroughly enjoyed this video. Well done.

One of my Dad's clients was on the "Bismarck" and at first they thought it was a battle exercise. His battle station was in the ship. When their Officer said No it's for real and it is 'unbelievable" she just blew up.

Your history videos are always compelling and interesting. Your videography is wonderful and your voice, as narrator, is superb. I love to watch your work. And, as a side-note, I enjoy the suit and tie.

Excellent video as always. If anyone watching wants a lot more detail in this incident, Drachinifel does a wonderful video which explains how the underwater hit is the most likely theory in great detail.

Hood: *exists* Bismarck: I’m about to end this man’s whole career

I enjoyed this as my dad always told me stories of the Hood when I was a lad. My Great Grandfather was lost on the Hood - he was a chief petty officer stoker. Albert George Frederick Assirati.

My Grandad was on the King George VI when it sunk the Bismarck after it had sunk the Hood! He was in the Royal Marines during WWII. He told me funny things that would happen on the ships, but never the bad stuff. I know they had to sail through any survivors as they weren't able to take on POW's as it made them a target themselves, and this weighed heavy on them. I can't even imagine being in a position where you have to knowingly take another person's life and I am immensely proud of my Grandad. (I'm also proud of my Great Uncle John who was in the Navy at the same time. He was my Nan's brother and that's how my grandparents met! Also my Great Grandfather, my Nan's dad, was in the trenches in WWI. He went on to become a Chelsea Pensioner! This bit isn't really relevant to your video but I would feel remiss if I didn't mention my pride for them too!)

Great video as always! Fanatic work on making the visuals, incredible effort. The fact that Prince of Wales was hit in the same location under the armor belt is pretty much a solid case here. THE USS Boise took a hit under the water line and it hit one of the front turrets which started a powerful powder fire that disabled all 3 front turrets and caused large damage, perhaps this is what happened to Hood, a turret hit and large power fire leading to strange smoke coming out of the front turret. The fire may have been raging for a while before it reached the magazine. The USS Boise as usual for the US navy had a powder hoist system using an endless conveyer belt that is offset that is probably what saved USS Boise.

I absolutely love your channel. I have a perticular love for longer form content, today with scroll algorithm setups we've been training out attention span to reduce under 15 seconds now. So I embrace the deep dives trying to counter some of the attention span I've lost. I'm sure there's a ton of rabbit holes to travel down. If you ever consider longer form content, I'll be there immediately sir. I know these videos take a ton of work and it's mostly thankless. So, thank you for your content and hard work sir and I look forward to seeing more.

Being hit at "Frame 220", directly above the torpedo room, an unbenosed to most, the "Deck Armor Plate" ( 6" ) had been REMOVED, an not replaced during the instalation of her aft deck 4" Twin mounts . . . with no deck armor, only the 1" decking, as well as the fire spreading from her "Ready Use 4" shells", the 15" hit at this spot made setting off her ( 8 ) torpedos almost effortless . . .

I'm a Melbournite too mate and it was great to see the military aspect of the ships. More of these would be great.

Mike, great video. I really enjoy your presentation style. Thank you for sharing the stories of these ships and those who served aboard them.

Your videos seem to only get better and better. The WOW CGI adds a lot to the presentation. This particular subject has been my personal favorite since 1960 when I first saw "Sink the Bismarck," narrowly edging out R.M.S Titanic from then on. You and Drach should partner up and do a series for the BBC, or perhaps The History channel. Your historical accuracy is absolutely matchless, and it continues to present me with facts I didn't know about after studying them for years. Thank You and keep up the great work! George B. White, Scituate, MA, USA

Thank you Mike for covering this iconic battle in our world history. Bismarck's training leading up to this operation was primarily focused on encountering HMS Hood and they trained tirelessly playing war games on how to properly attack the mightiest warship that Britain had at the time, so this was a fully worked up crew on Bismarck, as well as Prinz Eugen.

Can you please do a video on the career of hms warspite? Things like her damage history and battle honors. Truly an incredible story

HMS Prince of Wales’ forward gun turret wasn’t quite completely out of action from the start as you state, if I recall correctly. It was having some pretty severe problems but did give off intermittent fire. The only gun which fired only one round was the first gun, A1, of PoW, where as the whole A turret wasn’t completely out of action

To this day, the loss of the HMS Hood and that 3 men survived still shocks me today.

Hands down, best hood content to date

Thank you Mike, another compelling piece of history told with stunning animations. Your talents and hard work ate greatly appreciated.

I think a video on the sinking of the SS Pendleton and the subsequent rescue would be interesting. Perhaps also explaining the engineering behind the T2 tanker's habit of breaking in two.

in the late 70,s i was working in a telecom office in sydney. a new clerk started work . after a few weeks we got to know her fairly well, she was english. i cant remember how the topic came up but we were at morning tea and a couple of staff were interested in military issues. this young girl remarked , her dad was in ww2. in the navy. interest grew , then she said her dad was on the hood and he was one of the 3 who survived.... silence at morning tea. it followed , he never told her much about it but knew that he was very fortunate.

That was brilliant, once again. The popularity of your channel is good for everyone it helps lay some of these misconceptions of history to rest. Your case for a lucky shot below the belt armour certainly seems most sensible. Hard to imagine the effect losing the PoW in the same way in the same engagement would have had. At this point, the admiralty still knew very little about the exact power of Bismarck (little beyond her size, as I recall), and if they'd lost two of their most powerful ships in a single engagement with her, they may not have continued with the hunt as they did, who knows. Thanks for the video!

Great video! One small correction: the water would have also triggered the fuse or destroyed it as the shell travelled through the water, as even if the shell didn't fuse, the water would have caused the shell to violently pivot and enter rear first. Drachinifel talks about this on his channel, he also thinks that the shell passed under the belt, but Hood had a very distinct bow wave at speed. This caused the water to dip below the typical waterline... right where you think the shell hit.

Wow: WARSHIP videos! This is quite a departure from the usual format and subject matter, but a worthy and fascinating tale, all the same. Hood's loss is indeed pretty dreadful to hear about: they took almost as many people down with her as the Titanic, but faster, and with fewer survivors by far. It was a deeply tragic day at sea, now matter how you look at it.

My father was a career, American Navy, chief petty officer. His lead chief, when we were stationed on the island of Guam in 1969,and 70, had served his first two years in the Navy, 1939 and 40 aboard the USS Arizona, as a magazine powder handler. He was transferred off the Arizona in early 1941 (he had known many of the men killed on it that December at Pearl Harbor). At a barbecue in 1970, I remember talking to him about the Arizona, and the sinking of the Hood. He told us, he heard American naval officers,at the time of Hoods sinking , stating their opinion, they thought the British were very sloppy in their powder handling. Said a number of American officers thought that was very possibly what caused the catastrophic explosion of HMS Hood.

I disagree that the Bismarck and Prinz Eugen were well-suited to attack convoys. They were tied to their supply ships for ammunition, food, fuel, and repairs. They could certainly sink a few ships, disrupt a few convoys, but they'd have to refuel once a week, resupply once a month, and those supply ships were extremely vulnerable. If Britain really wanted to render the German ships useless on the cheap, all they had to do was sink their supply ships, and send British battleships snooping around; the Germans had to avoid battle at all costs, as the Hood/Prince of Wales battle showed. They were the most inefficient way possible for Germany to attack merchant ships.

The explosion of the WW1 era Queen Elizabeth class battleship HMS Barham is worth watching if you are not familiar with it. This was a 32k ton ship suffering a magazine explosion. Regardless of what you think for Hood, by all accounts it was still an explosion of similar scale. addendum: Barham was sunk in 1941. So the film of its demise is of decent quality. There is also footage of USS Arizona suffering a magazine explosion as well. It too is worth watching. edit: I should point out that Arizona was upright while Barham had rolled over at the times of their respective magazine explosions. So both provide unique glimpses into the ridiculous amount of power in one of these.

Giving away my age here, but when I was a kid in the 70s/80s RAN vessels would quite regularly visit capital cities (I live(d) in Adelaide) and you could board them and take a tour. I went on Vampire, Perth, one of the River class ( maybe Swan), one of the Oberon subs and a larger vessel - maye Port Morseby which I think was a surveying ship. You couldn't visit every space or room, but you could wander around fairly freely and they'd have displays set up, e.g. small arms or survival gear and the like. They even had little glossy pamplets printed up with history, specs etc I ended up joining the Army , but it was a really good recruiting tool - I wanted to join the Army and the Navy.

I remeber Drachinefil covering this, if i remember correctly he said the shell did hit below the waterline, however due to the Hoods sailing characteristics she exposed the low parts of her hull

Ah Bismarck… Last year I was standing on the fantail of North Carolina, BB55, when I struck up a conversation with another guest. He made a comment about Bismarck being the most powerful Battleship ever built. I bit my tongue as I wanted to say “Yamato or Iowa might have something to say about that” or point out that he was literally standing on a ship more powerfully armed than Bismarck. Instead, I tried to politely offer that while Bismarck had strengths, other ships did too.

there is a photo of HMS Hood from the air going at speed and it becomes very obvious, the shape of Hood's Hull leaves a dip of water just forward of the 3rd turret, this means that bismarcks shell would hit below the armor belt without going through water

My paternal grandfather was one of three civilian volunteer crewman transferred off the Hood at the last opportunity (I believe because they only wanted fully professional sailors aboard her), he later rose to Chief Petty Officer (the highest rank civilian volunteers could achieve) and mostly served aboard minesweeping vessels for the remainder of the war (sunk twice and survived).

This is the best forensic pathology I have seen on this, congratulations.

Your production quality is better and better every video, keep it coming!

Excellent presentation. Did you use Drachinfel's piece on the Hood for a reference? Couple of myths to dispel. There was no way that Bismarck could have chased down the Prince of Wales. The hit to the fuel tanks induced a 7° list and there was a second hit to the engineering spaces. This was discovered in the Cameron expedition (this is a correction). These two hits reduced Bismarck's maximum speed to 27 knots and she no longer had a speed advantage over Prince of Wales. While Prince of Wales A turret went down during the engagement it was back on line short thereafter and she traded salvos with Bismarck through the morning hours. Lutjens made the correct call because another penetrating hit doomed the ship. I think a lot of commentators take this position because they know the final outcome but it was by no means certain that Bismarck would be caught at this point. The Bismarck's reputation is a product of British propaganda. How else could she have destroyed the mighty Hood unless she was the most powerful battleship afloat? In May of 1941 the USS North Carolina and USS Washington were the most powerful battleships in commission, sporting 9 16"/45 caliber guns firing the 2700lb Mk 8 AP shelll and was better protected than the Bismarck. The North Carolina took a Long Lance hit it approximately the same location as Bismarck and was still in better fighting shape afterwards. Hood was the victim of an unfortunate lucky shot. In comparison the IJN Battlecruiser Kirishima, which was similar to the WWI Lion Class, took 20 Mk 8 hits from USS Washington without suffering a catastrophic explosion until she had slipped beneath Iron Bottom Sound.

Jon Pertwee, the Third Doctor was supposed to be on the Hood but was transferred to shore duties just before she was called to pursue the Bismarck...

Drachinifel makes an argument I find interesting - that the bow wave created by Hood's high speed lowered her effective waterline aft. Even if it wasn't enough to expose her hull below the belt, it would have reduced the "water armor" between German fire and the magazines, enough to turn a near short into a devastating hit.

I believe the plunging fire theory was more to do with Admiral Holland wanting to close the range as quickly as possible to avoid the plunging fire of Bismarck. Also if you read Alarm Starboard by Geoffrey Brooke, a survivor from the Prince of Wales, you will see how close the Prince of Wales also came to being sunk. After the battle the ship entered drydock in Rosyth where a 15 inch shell was found to have penetrated the armour and laded close to a magazine in the bilge keel. They had to cut the ship open to take it out.

Tremendously well done and respectful video!

Great video. Thank you. One of favorite movies growing up was Sink the Bismarck. Now almost 60 years later I am still obsessed and learning more about this tragic time in history.

During WW2 the germans hunted cargo ships as mentioned but what nobody talks about is that some of them were Norwegian and they made many important supply run like in Malta where many 13 - 16 year olds we're on if they were 16 they had no choice 1 out of 4 Norwegian cargo ships survived

Hood is by far one of my favorite British Fast Battleship/Battlecruiser (depends who you ask) designs, while future British Battleships sacrificed more armor for speed (like their Cruisers) Hood was well balanced akin to an Iowa at the time, she certainly would have been called a Fast Battleship in the U.S. Navy. Popular opinion is if the crew actually followed safety precautions and had all the magazines shut, she probably would have survived to limp away then possibly modernized. And given how Hood was one of the most cherished ships in the Royal Navy, she might have also been saved as a museum ship. But if Warspites fate and how hard the Royal Navy fought the British Government to preserve Belfast are anything to go by, Hood being preserved as a museum if she survived is a bigger debate. She was a fine ship... my respects to her and the men that served on her

Great video! I saw a theory on National Geographic that the Bismarck hit an AA ammo storage (retrofitted into Hood during interwar years) and it was powerful enough to detonate the main ammo storage.

A nicely done video! And I really loved your footage of Hood and Bismarck. Great job!

Good to see people other than Drach remember that there are ways to get past armor that don't involve the impossible yet popular deck plunging fire "theory." Drachnifel did however note that the water level would have been lower than what you note, providing an image that showed that the water line was very... low around that part of the ship when under full speed, and taken from the air on her way out to her final mission. He went with a slightly different penetration location though. I am inclined to go with him too, since passing through just about any water is liable to mess with fuses.

The front fell off...

If looks could kill HMS Hood would’ve sent Bismarck to the bottom of the Denmark Strait faster than you could say “I will not have my ship shot out from under my ass” (in German.)

Rest in peace crew of HMS Hood and as the song goes “The mighty Hood went down”

Certainly put a lot of effort into making this video. Thank you very much, it's truly fascinating.