Early 20th Century Silver Bosuns Whistle Battle of Jutland Provenance

An early 20th century silver Bosuns Whistle (or boatswain's call), with plain buoy, keel and pipe. Complete with suspension ring.
Engraved on each side - J.Wood Harrington & H.M.S."Princess Royal" Jutland 31-5-16.

By J Hudson & Co, Birmingham, 1928.

James Wood Harrington was a Royal Navy Warrant Engineer, the Royal Naval Reserve. He served on HMS Princess Royal at the Battle of Jutland 31 May/1 June 1916.

The Battle of Jutland
The Germans opened fire first at 3:48, followed by the British. The British ships were still in the process of making their turn as only the two leading ships, Lion and Princess Royal, had steadied on their course when the Germans opened fire. The two battlecruisers engaged Lützow, the leading German ship, while Derfflinger targeted Princess Royal. The German fire was accurate from the start, with two hits on Princess Royal within the first three minutes. British gunnery was less effective; the range was incorrectly estimated as the German ships blended into the haze. Princess Royal‍ '​s 'A' turret stopped working effectively early in the battle: the left gun was rendered inoperable when the breech pinion gear sheared, and the right gun misfired frequently.About 6:22, Princess Royal was hit by two 305-millimetre (12.0 in) shells fired by the battleship Markgraf; one of these disabled 'X' turret and the other penetrated the ship's side armour. Along with the rest of the battlecruisers, Princess Royal reached Rosyth Dockyard in Scotland on the morning of 2 June, and she immediately received temporary repairs over the next eight days. She then sailed for Plymouth, where permanent repairs were completed on 15 July, and returned to Rosyth by 21 July. Princess Royal was hit nine times during the battle—six times by Derfflinger during the "Run to the South", twice by Markgraf during the "Run to the North", and once by Posen just after II Battle Squadron appeared—with 22 killed and 81 injured. The battlecruiser fired only 230 13.5-inch shells during the battle, as her visibility was often impaired by the funnel smoke and fires aboard Lion. She was credited with three hits on Lützow and two on Seydlitz.


HMS Princess Royal was the second of two Lion-class battlecruisers built for the Royal Navy before the First World War. Designed in response to the Moltke-class battlecruisers of the Imperial German Navy, the ships significantly improved on the speed, armament, and armour of the preceding Indefatigable class. The ship was named after Louise, The Princess Royal, a title occasionally granted to the Monarch's eldest daughter.
Completed in 1913, Princess Royal participated in the Battle of Heligoland Bight a month after the start of World War I in August 1914. She was then sent to the Caribbean Sea to prevent the German East Asia Squadron from using the Panama Canal. After the East Asia Squadron was sunk at the Battle of the Falkland Islands in December, Princess Royal rejoined the 1st Battlecruiser Squadron (BCS). During the Battle of Dogger Bank, the ship scored only a few hits, although one crippled the German armoured cruiser Blücher. Shortly afterward, she became the flagship of the 1st BCS, under the command of Rear-Admiral Osmond Brock.
Princess Royal was moderately damaged during the Battle of Jutland and required a month and a half of repairs. Apart from providing distant support during the Second Battle of Heligoland Bight in 1917, the ship spent the rest of the war on uneventful patrols of the North Sea. She was placed into reserve in 1920, then was sold for scrap in 1922 to meet the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty.

£420.00