With already several 15-inch guns ready to go in storage, Royal Navy planners decided to convert one of the Lion-class ships into the King George V-class battleship. The result was the HMS Vanguard.

It had lain underwater after accidental magazine explosions sank the battleship HMS Vanguard at Scapa Flow in 1917.

Ultimately, HMS Vanguard was commissioned in 1946, a year after WWII had ended. What makes the Vanguard so memorable for the British is the fact that she was the last official battleship the Royal ...

A bell, a gun badge, and a tampion were recovered from the wreckage of HMS Vanguard and will be loaned to the Scapa Flow ...

Key Improvements Among the notable improvements included replacing the planned 20mm anti-aircraft mounts with 40mm guns – of which HMS Vanguard carried seventy-three.

He had been Vanguard’s navigating officer and had seen the last firing of her 15-inch guns. Vanguard eventually made it to the warships' graveyard at Faslane after the drama off the Cornish coast.

No dreadnoughts were lost to enemy guns during the war, though the HMS Audacious was sunk by a mine off the coast of Scotland, and the HMS Vanguard was destroyed by a magazine explosion.

Sub-Lieutenant Antonio Jardim told Royal Navy superiors he was opposed to the use of a nuclear deterrent due to his Christian beliefs just days after being assigned to HMS Vanguard.

It had lain underwater after accidental magazine explosions sank the battleship HMS Vanguard at Scapa Flow in 1917.

Two other artefacts from HMS Vanguard - a metal badge from one of the the main guns and a protective plug from a gun barrel, known as a tampion - have also been brought to the surface.