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Re: Who/What had the most intersting career?
Wow, what a question. My answer this week would probably be different next week but here we go.
HMS Warspite is my choice for an interesting career. Starting from the First world war right through the second, Warspite was a true survivor with more real actions to her credit than any other Battleship. Entering service as one of a class of five, Warspite was the sixth Royal navy ship to carry the name, the first being in Elizabethan times in the wars against Spain. There was a bit of controversy over the class (Queen Elizabeth) as it was the first in the navy to be oil fired rather than using coal, which was the standard fuel for industry at the time.
From Norway to the Mediterranean , then the Indian Ocean, Warspite fought and suffered along with others.
Warspite's seaplane was the first to sink a U-Boat in the war when it surprised one at Narvik. Warspite appropriately took the surrender of the Italian fleet in 1943 and escorted it to Malta.
Successful actions such as Narvik and Matapan were balanced by severe wounding at Crete and the dubious honour of being the first Allied ship to be hit by a glider bomb at Salerno. The bomb blew a hole the size of a bus through the stern area but Warspite stayed afloat - after filling the damage with forty tons of concrete, the Navy then employed her for the Normandy landings and again at Walcheren island.
Warspite was scrapped in the fifties after 35+ years of service.
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