HMS 'Renown' leaving Portsmouth with HRH The Prince of Wales on board, 16 March 1920<br><p>The battlecruiser ‘Renown’ was  built by Fairfield, at Govan on the Clyde, and completed in September 1916. She served with the Grand Fleet in the North Sea during the remaining two years of the First World War. In 1920, following a refit, she took the Prince of Wales (later Edward VIII) on a tour to Australasia and the United States and after further active service in the Second World War was sold for scrapping in 1948. This watercolour sketch was almost certainly made in March 1920 as the ship left Portsmouth with the Prince on board, since she is shown with lines out to tugs (out of the picture) to pull her away from the South Railway Jetty. (The bow tug was the 'St Just (1918).)  Note the royal coat of arms fitted above the bridge for the tour, the Royal Standard at the main and the flight of aircraft, top left . This drawing - minus the tug lines but including the aircraft - is the basis of the view of the ship leaving Portsmouth in Wyllie's large oil painting recording her departure, now in the Royal Naval Museum at Portsmouth.   PAE2654  is a related sketch showing her from astern, dressed overall, just before departure, and in both drawings he suggests the ship's complex superstructure in a manner that is almost abstract, without the slavish rendering of too much detail.  PAF0734 is a separate etching by Wyllie also recording her departure, but from a different viewpoint.<br></p>
HMS Renown
<bdi><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/en:William_Lionel_Wyllie" class="extiw" title="w:en:William Lionel Wyllie"><span title="English painter of maritime themes (1851-1931)">William Lionel Wyllie</span></a>
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1920<div style="display: none;">date QS:P571,+1920-00-00T00:00:00Z/9</div>
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