The Armourer

NEXT MONTH – JUNE 2021 ISSUE

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We’re all at sea next month, with the epic story of the German battleship Bismarck and the British determinat­ion to sink her. The story starts with the Bismarck and heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen setting out into the Atlantic to raid Allied shipping but encounteri­ng the British battleship­s HMS Hood and HMS Prince of Wales in the Denmark Straight. A firefight broke out, but it was short lived as a 38cm armourpier­cing shell from the Bismarck crashed through the thin deck armour of HMS Hood and hit an ammunition magazine. The resulting explosion ripped the ship in half, killing all but three of the 1,419 men on board. The Prince of Wales suffered serious damage, but managed to inflict a few blows herself before retreat. The loss of the Hood shocked the Admiralty, setting the scene for a determined British effort to hunt down and sink the Bismarck.

As well as a feature on naval collectabl­es to go with the cover story we also have articles on collecting German dress swords, the Iraq medal, the Home Service Helmet, the British in the Crimea and the American Marine Raiders.

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