HMS Conway

[Admin (Matt)]

HMS Conway was built in 1839 as a 92 gun wooden battleship. Becoming a naval training school or "school ship" in 1859 with a Cadet School on the Straits. The ship was originally stationed on the Mersey near Liverpool, then moved to the Menai Strait during World War II.

While being towed back to Birkenhead for a refit in 1953, she ran aground and was wrecked, and later burned down. The school moved to purpose-built premises on Anglesey where it continued for another twenty years.

In 1941, with air raids on the Liverpool docks taking place, Conway had already survived several near misses. It was decided to move the ship from the Mersey to Bangor in North Wales. This being wartime there was no official announcement of the move and local residents were startled one evening to see a picturesque Nelson-era battleship, a "wooden wall", coming up the Menai Strait. She was moored near the pier in Bangor and became something of a local tourist attraction.

There was great controversy over the loss of the ship. Some claimed that the advice of local pilots had been ignored, or that a ship the size of Conway should never have been taken through such a narrow and dangerous passage in the first place. It certainly seems true that two tugs were not enough to keep control of such a large unpowered vessel in the grip of such powerful and unpredictable tidal currents.

http://www.hmsconway.org/history_menai.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Conway_%28school_ship%29
http://www.hmsconway.org/
http://www.hmsconway.org/images/loss_01_map_swellies.jpg
http://www.conwaymntrust.info/html/the_trust.html
http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/maritime/collections/hmsconway/









1964 School Hms Conway, Bangor Hewitt, C-apt E