One of the ships in the National Maritime Museum at Portstmouth is the monitor, HMS M33. In the lead up the First World War, the British Navy recognized that it would require special, low draft monitors for service in a prospective Baltic invasion and for close shore bombardment. The M29 class of monitor was designed for coastal bombardment duties in 1915. She was built by Harland and Wolfe shipyards in Belfast, the same shipyard who built the Titanic in 1912. Her construction was completed in record time - ordered in March 1915 and launched in May. She was armed with two six inch guns in single mounts fore and aft.
No sooner was the M33 was launched than she was dispatched to the Dardanelles in August 1915 to provide shore bombardment support for the Gallipoli invasion. She would continue to serve in the Mediterranean throughout the war.
In 1919 she was dispatched to Murmansk in Russia, where she supported the British effort to support the White Russians in the civil war. She returned to Britain later that year. Being a small and rather versatile ship, she was easily converted to a supporting role. In 1925 she was disarmed and converted into a mine layer training ship. She was renamed HMS Minerva at this time. In subsequent years she became a floating office / workshop before ending up as a hulk. She was sold in 1984 and purchased by the Hampshire city council with the intention of restoring her to her 1915 specifications.
The purchase by Hampshire city council was somewhat controversial and so the ship was eventually donated to the National Maritime Museum. A lengthy restoration has been undertaken with crowd and state funding. The ship can now be visited. When we visited in 2015 the restoration had only just been completed and the ship was not yet officially open to the public. It was dedicated later in August 2015 to commemorate the centenary of the Gallipoli campaign. The M33 is one of only three surviving British warships of the First World War.
Portsmouth National Maritime Museum website: https://www.nmrn.org.uk/our-museum/portsmouth
And https://www.nmrn.org.uk/exhibitions-projects/monitor-hms-m33
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