HMS Liverpool

HMS Liverpool

These photos are from Dad's photo album ...

HMS Liverpool - 1950

HMS Liverpool ~ 1950

HMS Liverpool - 1950

HMS Liverpool ~ 1950

I'm indebted to Ray Holden for the following information . . .

In April 2002, Ray Holden wrote saying "In the spring of 1951 I was drafted to HMS Liverpool, she was Flagship of the 1st Cruiser Squadron in Malta. Although I enjoyed my stay with her I didn’t really take to big ship routine, I got on well with my mess mates and a few weeks after picking up my Able Seaman's rate I was recommended for a Leading Rates course. Part of the way through this course, after eight months service on Liverpool I was drafted to HMS Chevron, she was tied up alongside in Malta dockyard."

In November 2002, Ray very kindly sent me the following ...

HMS Liverpool - 1951

HMS Liverpool ~ 1951

Oiling at sea

HMS Glasgow is on the left, Liverpool on the right.

In September 1951, she took Lord Louis Mountbatten to Split in Yugoslavia to meet Marshall Tito who had just broken away from the Cominform.

Cominform was an acronym for the Communist Information Bureau. The information agency organized in 1947 and dissolved in 1956. Its members were the Communist parties of Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, France, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Romania, the Soviet Union, and Yugoslavia. The Cominform attempted to reestablish information exchanges among the European Communist parties that had lapsed since the dissolution of the Comintern in 1943. Its decisions were not binding, nor was membership obligatory for Communist parties. It was not a reconstitution of the Comintern, only a setting up of information contacts. Its chief function was the publication of materials designed to demonstrate the unity of its members. In 1948 the Cominform expelled the Yugoslav Communist party because of the defiance by Marshal Tito of Soviet supremacy. In 1956, as a gesture of reconciliation with Tito, the Cominform was dissolved.

Marshall Tito

The tall gaunt officer second behind Marshall Tito is the commander of Liverpool, Captain Luce.

Royal Marine guard

Marshall Tito

Christmas 1951

Christmas morning 1951

Coach tour of Nice, France

The coach party one was taken when we called in at Nice on our way back from Split, just a day out in the French Alps to break up the monotony, I am seventh from the right front row just to the left of the driver.

I can't thank Ray Holden enough for letting me use these photographs.

There seems to be some confusion over which class of ship HMS Liverpool belonged in. I'm not a naval historian so have to rely on what others have written for a lot of the information presented here. Some sites say that she belonged to the Southampton Class of cruiser. Because there were several classes of light cruisers named after various British towns and cities, such as the Gloucester, Edinburgh, London, York classes, these are sometimes also known collectively as the Town Class. At least one site (http://www.btinternet.com/~a.c.walton/navy/rn-cr4.html) says that HMS Liverpool was a Gloucester Class, which was also known as the Southampton Group 2 Class. Another site (http://www.wwiitechpubs.info/dock/nv-uk/nv-uk-lc-southampton/nv-uk-lc-southampton-ftr.html) says that HMS Liverpool was a Liverpool Class cruiser.

This page created 14th December 2002, last modified 18th April 2005

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