The 7 Longest Recorded Hits in the History of Naval Gunfire

The history of naval warfare is marked by remarkable feats of precision and firepower, and among them are the long-range hits delivered by ships' guns. These historic long-range hits that left an indelible mark on naval warfare. Without further ado let’s dive right into the top 7 longest range hit by a surface warships Gun on the enemy’s ship to date.
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[@davidlauder-qi5zv]

The Prinz Eugen was pronounced "Oy-gen" (hard "G"), not "You-jean".

[@bingbong7316]

That bugged the hell out of me.

[@johndickie5577]

Me too, why is learning correct pronunciation not considered an important part of the creation of a video, kinda like getting your facts airtight.

[@brucesim2003]

@@johndickie5577 Especially considering it was (originally) someone's name. Not learning how to pronounce a name correctly shows a lack of respect toward the person or object.

[@mikewilson631]

Not the only mispronunciation.

[@davidlauder-qi5zv]

@@mikewilson631 Explain...

[@TTTT-oc4eb]

Massachusetts fired at Jean Bart at a distance of 20,000-22,000 meters. The first spot should be shared by Scharnhorst and Warspite - the former possibly slightly ahead.

[@emonhunter8107]

Completely agree here with exactly what you said. It is agreed that the top spot is joined by Warspite and Scharnhorst though there is little concrete evidence to point exactly which. Good comment.

[@niclasjohansson4333]

Massa did open fire at the range you claim, but she was a lot closer when hitting the stationary JB, in fact she missed her intended target with so many shells that some of them hit other ships moored in the harbor by coincidence, like transports and an old ferry ! massachusetts performance at the battle of Casablanca is vastly exagerated by the US propaganda!

[@balli7836]

I think Scharnhorst and Warspite are credited with the longest range hits on MOVING TARGETS. Jean Bart was incomplete and stationary in harbour as it was hit by Massachusetts.

[@biorecords1506]

@@HighlanderNorth1 I'm no historian or expert in the matter, but I do believe they were intended for convoy raiding. smaller guns have a better chance at not over penetrating the hulls of convoy ships. as for getting hammered down, that's exactly what happened to Scharnhorst: went to intercept a convoy and found themselves being chased down by several cruisers, destroyers, and a battleship (Duke of York, if I recall. I just remember it was a King George V class)

[@highlanderknight]

​@@biorecords1506I heard that as well, and of course as I'm sure you, they also were designed to be able to swap out the triple turrets for twin 15 inch ones.

[@notsureyou]

Prinz Eugen: Hit Hood with their second salvo (first salvo was a straddle), The fire wasn't quickly extinguished, yes it did start to die down after a few minutes (and the photo at the 1:23 mark is Bismarck opening fire), but Admirral Holland ordered them not to fight the fire until it had died down. The multiple hits were from BISMARCK (as Prinz Eugen had switched targets to HMS Prince Of Wales at that time), With Hood blowing up after Bismarck's fifth salvo (3rd salvo hit Hoods spotting mast, 4th Salvo straddle with a POSSIBLE hit (from memory the mess hall was hit??), 5th salvo hit Hood with devastating results)

[@gybb1868]

My Grandfather (an 19 yr old Midshipman) was in WARSPITE at the time. I recall that he and his shipmates were all somewhat surprised as it was supposed to be a ranging shot.

[@johncunningham4820]

Well as " Range-Finders " go , that was pretty good . Gunnery Officer knew his shit............

[@denzle83]

Mine was on the warspite too. I've loads of pictures from his time on the ship and during the war

[@johnshepherd9676]

The most amazing thing about West Virginia's first salvo hit on Yamashiro was that she had not yet acquired her opponent visually. It was a blindfire hit demonstrating the effrctiveness of the Mk 8 FCS. The reason that West Virginia did not engagge Yamashiro sooner was a shortage of AP ammunition. The Standards were use primarily for shore bombardment and carried mostly High Capacity rounds.

[@HighlanderNorth1]

That kinda reminds me of the time in 1944 when my battleship(USS New Hampshire, BB-70) hit a Japanese PT boat at 42,000 yards, at night, in a cyclone, aiming manually.

[@notsureyou]

@@HighlanderNorth1 You forgot: Whilst using the force since you didn't have radar contact.

[@ryanstuckey8677]

i guess you are not aware that ship was never even built right?@@HighlanderNorth1

[@HighlanderNorth1]

@@ryanstuckey8677 I was joking.

[@georgesheffield1580]

The battle of Matapan was l out of visual range .

[@geetarz1]

Source: Guinness World Records... "The greatest range at which one ship's guns have successfully hit another vessel is 24 km (15 miles), a feat that occurred twice during the second world war. On 8 June 1940 the German battleship Scharnhorst hit the British aircraft carrier Glorious at that range in the North Atlantic, while a month later on 9 July, during the battle of Calabria the British battleship HMS Warspite hit the Italian flagship Guilio Cesare at a similar distance. Both are remarkable feats of gunnery considering that in each case both vessels involved in the exchange were moving at high speed."

[@hajoos.8360]

High speed is necessary to calm the ship as a gunnery-platform. A slow BB swerves & rolls.

[@pavlovshouse77]

@@hajoos.8360 thanks.

[@Arltratlo]

nothing stops an American to invent new facts...!

[@jasonhartley1305]

Glorious was only capable of 19 knots as she was caught with low steam.

[@gbreslin6635]

Somewhere I read that Yamato or its sister hit a dd at great range in the region of Truk.

[@zzirSnipzz1]

During the battle Warspite achieved one of the longest range gunnery hits from a moving ship to a moving target in history, hitting Giulio Cesare at a range of approximately 24 km (26,000 yd), the other being a shot from Scharnhorst which hit Glorious at approximately the same distance in June 1940.

[@emonhunter8107]

It's a very common knowledge that Warspite joined with Scharnhorst should be first here having the longest ship to ship hit in history.

[@user-nv1gm2zj7y]

i always thought it was the bismark

[@HighlanderNorth1]

😉 I once hit a target that was 40,000 _________ away, using my ________. (answers: millimeters & BB gun)..

[@scottgromoshak7118]

Laughs in USS Massachusetts. Which holds 1st alone.

[@emonhunter8107]

@@scottgromoshak7118 Depends if you regard hitting a non moving ship as ship to ship it also might I point out that it took the Massachusetts several salvos to even get close to jean bart. She was so inaccurate that she even hit several other stationery vessels before hitting the one she intended on hitting.

[@scottgromoshak7118]

@emonhunter8107 Milan and the cruiser where moving. Scharnhorst hit a Carrier, Warspite hit a Battleship. Two large targets. Massachusetts not only hit the Milan further than both of those but it was a destroyer being half the size of those huge targets. So further and smaller. It's ok I got a towel for you to cry into.

[@markforster6457]

The USS West Virginia, and the other USN battleships that participated in the Battle of the Surigao Strait were recovered from the mud of Pearl Harbor and given a second life. The only exception was the USS Mississippi, which was on convoy duty in the north Atlantic on December 7, 1941. An excellent account of this and the other Leyte Gulf battles can be found in "The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors" by the late Dr. James D. Hornfischer. The "Wee-Vee" was a former USN gunnery champion. Thank you for this video!

[@ut000bs]

My father was a destroyerman his entire time in the Navy from 1937 - 1957. Dad was at Surigao Strait and his destroyer fired torpedoes. He would laugh, "They didn't hit a damn thing." He received two Purple Hearts at Okinawa. Nice scar on the back of his thigh to impress my friends with when I was a boy. That was the generation.

[@DISGUYROX]

Taffy 3 was manned by LEGITIMATE AMERICAN HEROES.

[@niclasjohansson4333]

The damage to Jean Bart at 9:12 is caused by 1000 lbs bombs from Dauntless divebombers, not 16" shells.

[@Thurgosh_OG]

All photos I can find show damage to forward and stern decks, no damage to a funnel.

[@nissan300ztt]

I dont know every account I can find about the Jean Bart was a US 16" gun not a bomb. Dont know which is accurate.

[@niclasjohansson4333]

@@nissan300ztt Its obvious to anyone (unless they are totaly clueless) that the damage is caused by large bombs ! That is what happen when your "all or nothing" armoured ship is hit in its non armoured areas. The 5 or so, hits by 16" shells caused much less damage.

[@Nacho2002b]

During the Spanish Civil War Heavy Cruiser "Canarias" sank Republican destroyer "Almirante Ferrandiz" from 20 km... Considering the various examples given by other people, there should be no ship on the list with a hit short of 20km.

[@diegoferreiro9478]

Furthermore, the Canarias had not her projected fire control installed as the start of the Civil War prevented the delivery of the planned Dutch Hazemeyer fire control. She had instead an improvised fire control by adapting one 6" Vickers coastal artillery fire control unit in place of the Hazemeyer. And the target was quite difficult, a small, 36 kt capable destroyer which was running away as soon as her crew realized whom they were dealing with.

[@patrickrose1221]

Lost me at Prince ' Eugene' 😅😂🤣

[@mikeeckel2807]

I always thought that it was pronounced as "Oy-gun" but could be wrong. My grandparents on my Dad's side of the family, were 1rst generation Americans. Supposedly my Great-grandmother couldn't speak English and my Dad's mother only spoke German when she was older and a bit senile. They stopped speaking German because of WW 1.

[@patrickrose1221]

@@mikeeckel2807 that's the way I've always heard it too lol 👍

[@bobroberts6155]

Yes, the pronunciation is roughly ‘Oigen’.

[@user-xq2zn8bu9q]

I know, this is the worst channel on KZbin. I couldn't get to my phone quick enough to turn it off.

[@camelsac]

My grandfather was gunnery officer on this ship. It’s pronounced Oygen not Youjean.

[@niclasjohansson4333]

Gneisenau also did hit Glorious at similar distance as her sistership just a minute later, and she was trailing behinde Scharnhorst at the time. There is also reports of Italian cruisers scoring single hits on different occasions at ranges over 20k meters.

[@historynerd88]

One unconfirmed (the Gorizia on HMS Kipling during the First Battle of Sirte), and two confirmed beyond doubt (Fiume on HMS Berwick at Cape Teulada, and Raimondo Montecuccoli on HMS Hebe at Pantelleria). This video is a joke.

[@aaroncarter4089]

Italian "record" is doubtable to say the least, gonna need some kind of proof for that one. 😉

[@paoloviti6156]

The 203 mm cannon had a range of 31,324 metres so why is it doubtful?

[@guray722002]

Probably “Italians hitting anythin with a gun” part?

[@paoloviti6156]

@@guray722002 remember that the Italians are not only good in making pizza or spaghetti! In truth generally speaking the Regia Marina but also other arms suffered from mediocre leadership and also if the a battleship was sunk it was impossible to build a new ship in such a short time not to mention lack of resources especially chronic shortage of fuel that "grounded" the main battleships between 1942 and 1943 until the armistice...

[@ENGBriseB]

HMS Warspite hitting Giulio Cesare. A moving target a 24km hit. Most battle honours of any Royal Navy Ship.

[@Thurgosh_OG]

I've never heard anyone from any nation call the Prinz Eugen, 'You-Geen'. In German it should be 'Eyegn'. In English it's 'Oygen'. Where is this video host from or is it a bad AI?

[@samuelgordino]

If I read it in Portuguese It sounds almost like in this video. But you are right, never heard anyone else reading this way

[@richardm3023]

My thoughts exactly. If the other ships saw a ship named "Eu-gene", they'd tease it, and call it names.

[@KK-hw7od]

The narrating lady always sounds as if speaking with several strips chewing gum in her mouth. She butcher - like Americans often - foreign names. That‘s disgusting! Please use a translation app and listen to the pronounciation! Btw, the last „e“ in Kriegsmarine has to be sounded like the „a“ in „american“. The way you pronounce it, the written word looks like „Kriegsmarin“.

[@dbyers3897]

This pronunciation is not incorrect. Prince Eugène Francis of Savoy-Carignano was born in Paris in 1663 & went on to become one of the greatest generals of his time. He served the Holy Roman Empire after being refused the opportunity to serve in the French army, likely due to a scandal involving his mother, Olympe. Being a French noble, he often signed his name Eugène (pronounced YOU-jen-ee in French) de Savoie. He would have been conversant in French, German & Italian. YOU-jean in English is a correct pronunciation. But since his name is most often spelled Prinz Eugen, from his long service with Austria, OY-gen is more popular. German warships are referred to in the masculine gender unlike many other nations. They were as often named for army officers, as in Blucher, Scharnhorst & Gneisenau, all Prussian officers from the Napoleonic Wars. Eugène fought against France of the side of Austria & the German states in several great wars during the 17th century, notably the Nine Years' War, The War of the Spanish Succession, & the War of the Polish Succession.

[@KK-hw7od]

@@dbyers3897 Why should an GERMAN ship (it‘s predecessor was Austrian) pronounced french? Also most German ship have a feminine gender (standard) the only exceptions I‘m aware of are „Der Bismarck“ und „Der Prinz (Eugen)“. Blücher, Scharnhorst, Gneisenau, Tirpitz, Adm. Graf Spee, Adm. Scheer, Gorch Fock, Lützow (ex „Deutschland“), Z 12 Erich Giese, Z1 Leberecht Maas are of feminine gender, so „Die Tirpitz“, die Lützow asf. This includes the names of ships of the Deutsche Marine (today): Die Schleswig-Holstein, die Hessen, die Rheinland-Pfalz, die Braunschweig, die Erfurt, die Oste.

[@drivinginluton5745]

1) Longest shots go to HMS Warspite (against Guilio Cesare) and Scharnhorst (against HMS Glorious). 2) It was a shot from Bismarck that hit the float plane on HMS Hood and not Prinz Eugen. Also HMS POW actually got the 1st hit in the engagement with a shot hitting the bow of Bismarck and passing clear through the ship damaging fuel lines.

[@crabfat1494]

@drivinginluton5745 Hood did not have a float plane.

[@zekeurielebueza2089]

Actually The ship which sunk the Hood was the Battleship Bismarck when Bismarck fired her 5th Salvo to the HMS Hood on of the Shells struck Hood's magazine detonating Hood and destroying her, Prinz Eugen only assisted Bismarck in sinking HMS Hood not the one which sunk Hood

[@michaelhirst4191]

Indeed. Prinz Eugen wasn’t even firing armour piercing shells, because she had misidentified the British ships as cruisers and had loaded with high explosive shells

[@smferreiro2610]

Brits will never conceed that honour to Battleship Bismark... that's the point!

[@I_Don_t_want_a_handle]

@@smferreiro2610Erm. Never heard it said any other ship but the Bismarck sank the Hood. Plunging fire through the unarmoured decks of an ageing and out of date ship, is about as exculpatory as it comes.

[@zekeurielebueza2089]

@@michaelhirst4191 Yes Prinz Eugen used High Explosive Shells as the Captain mistakingly thought of HMS Hood and HMS Prince of Wales as cruisers

[@jamieduff1981]

​@@I_Don_t_want_a_handleplunging fire through decks has been completely debunked. The logs from HMS Prince of Wales put the range of kill shot at 16500 yards, or approximately 15000 metres, and the ballistics charts for the German 380mm guns for that range make the angle of fall less than 11 degrees below horizontal, i.e. it was a near-horizontal hit. Plunging fire is a myth, and it's time it was put to rest.

[@andrewsansom4798]

One thing to note for that longest hit, the jean bart was stationary, She was being used as a floating gun platform in Casablanca harbor. so was a significantly easier target. She was stripped of anything they could use on shore, and its difficult to even call her a ship at this stage.

[@paulfisher3e]

The difference is are we discussing combat gunnery or practice?😮

[@olivierrorif6028]

@@paulfisher3e shame on this killing allies ship

[@michaelprobert4014]

@@olivierrorif6028 It wasn't an ally. It was an ex ally.

[@olivierrorif6028]

@@michaelprobert4014 i not agree with this ! :)

[@thisherehandleIdospout]

@@olivierrorif6028 If only the crew of Jean Bart had been of the same opinion :(

[@terrydouglas5008]

If Glorious's captain had its Air group fly observation missions it could have avoided the Germans but the Captain wanted to hurry and court martial the air wing commander.

[@highlanderknight]

Yeah, serious negligence on the part of the captain.

[@notsureyou]

I think that there were numerous things at play, Not merely the Captain of Glorious stupidity. I wonder if the real reason that Glorious was in that location, had more to do with a ship (HMS Devonshire) that didn't come to their aid (and the reason why) even though they were nearby. From some different "sources" a.k.a websites (HMS Devonshire sailed to Britain with Norway's king, prince, government ministers, and the country's gold reserve, its crew did receive a June 8th distress signal from aircraft carrier HMS Glorious, just 40 miles away.) (Devonshire evacuated King Haakon VII, Crown Prince Olav, and Norwegian government officials, including the Prime Minister, Johan Nygaardsvold, from Tromsø on 7 June. On board were 461 passengers. The ship passed within 50 miles (80 km) of the action in which the aircraft carrier Glorious and two destroyers were sunk by Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. Although an enemy sighting report had been received in Devonshire, Cunningham's orders were to get Haakon VII to safety, and the cruiser sped up and continued on her course.) (Some 32 miles away, the radio report was recieved by the cruiser HMS Devonshire on a secret mission under radio silence.The HMS Devonshire was transporting the Norwegian royal family and government to the safety of England. The captain of the Devonshire decided to ignore the request for assistance and continued on with his mission.) (The Navy’s cursory board of enquiry into the loss of the ships was marked closed until 2041. The Admiral who ordered the three ships home was not interviewed nor is his RoP (Report of proceedings) anywhere to be found. The enquiry concluded the dead Captain of HMS Glorious was to blame, had he survived he would almost certainly have been court-martialled. The Admiralty turned a deaf-ear to anyone who asked questions.) Or due to little known planned operation called "Operation Paul" (Whilst Churchill recounts Operation Catherine at length in his memoirs, strangely, he makes no mention of Operation Paul. In fact, Operation Paul seems to have been almost entirely forgotten by historians. Only two have ever written about it; Professor Thomas Munch-Petersen and Captain Peter Hore RN. Neither account connects Operation Paul to the loss of Glorious, Ardent & Acasta.)

[@akula9713]

The file on Glorious’s sinking is closed under the 100 year rule. It is rumoured that she was part of an operation inspired by Winston to fly off aircraft across Norway to Sweden to mine a Swedish iron ore port. Depriving Germany of iron ore imports. It was known as operation Paul. The rush to get back to port to court martial the air officer is the “official “ version of accounts.

[@doommonger7784]

The British upper crust military (must do everything by navy and army regulations) were renown for gigantic foul ups.

[@paulbradshaw4511]

Always wondered why an aircraft carrier captain neglected to have recon flights out to cover his azz!

[@korbendallas5318]

During the Battle off Samar, the Yamato opened fire on the fleeing USS White Plains at a range of ~32km. One shell of her third salvo struck water just short of the White Plains and exploded under the Ship, doing heavy damage. Now from memory, because it has been a while since I read the book: Hornfisher (based on another historian's work (Robert Lundgren?)) describes in _Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors_ that the Yamato used shells that were _designed_ to detonate under the keel of the target. This means that the shell was exactly where it was supposed to be. I also found a forum post from some rlundgren (claiming to be Robert Lundgren, author of "The World wonder'd - What really happened off Samar") describing that the shell actually _hit_ the White Plains, bounced off (leaving an 8" gouge) into the water and subsequently exploded as described above. Taken together, and even considering my sketchy sources, I think the crown belongs to the Yamato. Edit: I just found the section I remembered, but it was in Toll's _Twilight of the Gods,_ not Hornfisher. From the White Plains after-action report, quoted on p. 265: "The ship twisted and lifted, chrushing and tearing expansion joints at frame 101 and 146 port and starboard." Toll continues: "The shock of the blast tore hull plates asunder beneath the waterline, cut the steering control leads, warped interior decks and bulkheads, and spring oil and aviation gasoline leaks throughout the ship. [...] Two of the ship's four boilers suffered a sudden reduction in steam pressure." Toll then talks about the Yamato's projectile: "The Type 1 armor-piercing projectile [...] had been purposely designed to dive under a ship [...] This round had functioned as intended, maintaining a linear underwater trajectory and detonating 0.4 seconds after the surface impact. Though it did not make physical contact with the ship, its blast force was directed upward into the vulnerable part of the hull. [...] The Type 1 projectile had behaved like a mine or a [...] torpedo fused with a magnetic detonator."

[@alandowney5851]

That's a very interesting comment. I had always thought that Scharnhorst on Glorious was the longest hit (I don't think firing at a static target is comparable). After evaluating the battles of WW1, the Japanese became very interested in so-called swimming shells in the 1920's due to the difficulty in defeating modern protection systems and the side armour belt in particular. And the most devastating torpedo hits are those that explode under the under and use the water pressure from the explosion to punch a hole through the bottom or simply break the back of the ship. The problem with using a shell to do this is that the explosive content is generally not high enough to cause sufficient damage considering the shell has to be strong enough to survive impact with water. So I'm not sure if the IJN was using special shells off Samar or just HE shells (for carriers) that had a fair bit of explosive content (they were 460mm big to be fair). At the Battle of the Denmark Straight, the POW was hit by a shell from Bismarck that landed short and penetrated under the belt by the bilge keel near Y turret. It failed to explode and was not found until the ship returned to dock.

[@YamatoForever]

Yeah. Good Ol Yamato that couldn't hit anything. She sunk 2 CVLs and a DD. When you straddle a target at over 30km with your first salvo you have good FC. Yamato probably had the longest damaging hit of WW2.

[@mystikmind2005]

I never knew the Yamato was ever given an opportunity to fire at enemy ships, and like, help win the war?? I thought It was just supposed to be held back until the war was all but lost and then become a target drone for Allied aircraft? Was that not the brilliant plan for this ship??

[@YamatoForever]

@@mystikmind2005 If Japan had won Midway you would have seen a lot of Yamato. But they lost and were on their heels for the rest of the war. That along with her lack of speed (to keep up with carrier groups) and the amount of oil she used (Japan had limited amounts of fuel) They kept her back for a large surface battle that never happened.

[@korbendallas5318]

@@mystikmind2005 Well, it _was_ supposed to be a last stand, but Kurira turned home instead of suiciding his fleet.

[@patl709]

Every other source I’ve looked at as a result of watching this video says Warspite and/or Scharnhorst achieved the longest range hits with gunfire on a moving ship. How is it that this video comes up with a different answer ie what’s your source?

[@mpetersen6]

Hits at long range depend on good fire control systems, accurate guns and LUCK

[@Eric-kn4yn]

Practice

[@crownprincesebastianjohano7069]

The video does not pass historical muster by presenting unverified claims as fact. The USS Massachusetts' claims, while possible and plausible, have never been verified due to large inconsistencies with regard to 1) Range, 2) Time of engagements and 3) Disagreement on which ships were hit by whom, and 4) Inconsistency between the BB59's own logs, AAR and other notes, 5) Contradictory reports and discrepancies between US and French reports and damage assessments. These issues mainly stem from the ship's own AAR, to unverified range due to equipment failure (FCS radars down), conflicting timing and narrative of reports. The consensus amongst naval historians is that the ranges at which the Mass hit destroyer targets was well below 25,000 meters and that it is unverified of who hit Milan and when, but if it was Mass, the timing and range of the engagement indicates it was at around 21,000-19,000 meters. Mass' own AAR reports possible hits on French destroyers while engaged with them coming within and then outside 18,000 meters, that is to say within the range of 130mm guns of 18,500 meters. In sum, we have: 1) No verified ranges, 2) No verified time of hits, 3) No agreement on who hit what, 4) Disagreement between logs and AAR and French reports. For these reasons the USS Massachusetts' claims have never been accepted. This has been the case almost since 1942. The longest verified ranges are Scharnhorst and Warspite.

[@UthurRytan]

Also we have severe doubts on which shells hit Massachusetts, Massachusetts records two hits and one ricochet during the battle. Massachusetts's AAR ascribe both to El hank battery, but this is clearly not the case, based on the penetration angles alone. One came in from 20 degrees from horizontal, and penetrated the deck 60# STS layer, the other came in at 40 degrees to horizontal and did not penetrate the deck 60# STS layer, instead bouncing off the layer. The first hit came from El hank, however, the second hit must have come from either Primaguet, the light cruiser, or one of the destroyers, based of angle of fall. Their guns have a range of 20 k yards, meaning that Massachusetts could have only hit them at a similar range

[@curtiscroulet8715]

"Prince Yu-jen!" You have a great sense of humor!

[@michaelkearney5562]

A salvo from the Bismarck caused the huge explosion on the Hood which lead to her sinking within a minute. The impression given by the commentator is that the Prince Eugen did the damage. Anyway, the hits from Bismarck were at least as long if not longer than those of Prince Eugen.

[@535phobos]

Well, no, as the distance was closing all the time, and Eugen hit first, that means that Eugens first hit was at a greater distance than all of Bismarcks.

[@ickisdogg3779]

My dad served on HMS Vigilant, His group of 5 destroyers, set out to intercept the Haguro, the ship was surrounded and eventually sunk, was the last major surface action by the Royal Navy in the East Indies

[@stuartwiner7920]

HMS Hood was sunk by the Bismark, not the Prinz Eugen.

[@alpearson9158]

Eugen

[@Richnineteenseventyone]

Nobody is certain who or what sank hood

[@erebus8579]

It must also be said that the French battleship "Jean-Bart" was in no way undeserving during the artillery duel with the American battleship "Massachussets". The remarkable aspect of the French battleship which is not reported in this video is that the unfinished "Jean-bart", which had only four 15-inch guns, was not equipped with fire control with radar , while standing still, still managed to hit the American battleship with a 15-inch shell also fired from very far away! (even if the damage caused was slight and did not cause any casualties). The image of the damage suffered by the French battleship shows that the ship is damaged at the rear (seaplane hangar visible). There is no evidence that the shots from the American battleship directly hit the only operational quadruple turret of the "Jean-Bart": it stopped working due to lack of electrical energy. Note that the battleship "Jean-Bart" survived the war, it was towed to France where it was repaired and modernized and served in the French navy until the 1970s.

[@MFrrFrr]

How's that allied battleships attack each other? Or that French vessel was captured by Germans and used against Americans? I don't get it?

[@Diadema033]

No, they did not it 'directly' but damaged the barbette. No 380 mm hit on the Massachussets, that probably happened by Richelieu vs HMS Barham(?)

[@Arthatius]

HMS Warspite first off has the longest recorded shot from a warship and it was against the Italian Navy you can happily look the facts up and get the fine details right. Finding the battleship Giulio Cesare off the port of Calabria, Warspite scored a direct hit at a range of 26,000 yards. It was the longest-range gunnery hit on a moving target ever recorded and the Italian ship was put out of action for the rest of the war.

[@markhindmarsh2811]

If I remember correctly it was a first salvo hit as well

[@scottfarley3644]

No, it was not the first salvo.@@markhindmarsh2811

[@scottfarley3644]

The Hit did not put the Italian out of action for the rest of the war. It did not effect the fighting or sailing ability in any way.

[@historynerd88]

Did you see that in the recent video of this channel? It's completely wrong, she just had to go to a shipyard for two weeks. So much for "looking the facts up"...

[@historynerd88]

@@markhindmarsh2811 You remember wrong. Not a first salvo hit either.

[@jorgechang7426]

I read on Robert Ludgren's "The World Wonder'd: What really happened off Samar" that Yamato hit Gambier Bay (or another Taffy 3 aircraft carrier, I really don't remember) with his first salvoes at very long distance.

[@CaptCondor]

From what I read it was a near miss, but the concussion was enough to knock out Gambier Bay's electrical systems. Also at the time Gambier Bay was targeted by at least 2 ships, Kongo and Yamato.

[@metaknight115]

@@CaptCondorNo, it was a hit at 20,000 yards. Numerous shells from Yamato were misattributed to other ships, not just on Gambier Bay but on USS Johnston as well (three 18.1-inch shells that hit her early on in the battle were attributed as 14-inch shells from Kongo, who as it turns out was blinded by a rain squall and much farther than attributed)

[@CaptCondor]

Interesting. I had read in various sources, the one possibility was a near miss from Yamato and another was hits from different ships. Could you disclose where you got the information from? I would really like to read it.@@metaknight115

[@metaknight115]

It was from a distance of 22,000 yards on her first salvo. The shell punched through her hanger bay. Yamato hit Gambier Bay at least two more times as she closed to 20,000 yards, and likely hit her with more, specifically scoring a hit which flooded her engine room, leaving her dead in the water.

[@Frost_x_NB]

As someone who was born and raised in Massachusetts this makes me very proud of the USS Massachusetts

[@jasonhartley1305]

It's unfortunate that's it's bullshit

[@barryguerrero6480]

It's pronounced "Printz Oygen", not "Eugene"

[@vstrangejames]

It bugged me so much I couldn't listen past the first 90 seconds :D

[@klesmer]

It is pronounced ' Prince OY-Gen'.

[@johngregory4801]

OY-gen is how my last GPS pronounced Eugene, as in Eugene, OR. It was a moment of slight amusement on a bad day when I first caught that.

[@DefaultName-vt2ih]

Eugen is pronounced as äu-gen (oyg-en), you-gene.

[@historynerd88]

There are several Italian claims missing here: The Fiume hit HMS Berwick at Cape Teulada just short of 22'000 m. The Gorizia likely hit HMS Kipling at ca. 22'400 m at the First Battle of Sirte The Raimondo Montecuccoli hit HMS Hebe at ca. 21'000 m at the Battle off Pantelleria (Operation Harpoon).

[@raverdeath100]

"likely" doesn't cut it.

[@TimDyck]

The Italians were well known to be the least likely to hit anything they shot in WWII.

[@HighlanderNorth1]

Some of the Italian battleships had the potential to hit targets at greater distances than that of most other ships from other navies. That's because they designed the main guns of several of their ships to accept significantly larger propellant charges, thereby firing their projectiles at higher velocities. But in some cases they weren't as accurate.

[@dariomasi9]

@@raverdeath100 They are not likely, nor are they claims, these are famous shots basically anyone who read something on ww2 knows about. It would be like making a video on the biggest battleships and not mentioning Yamato.

[@dariomasi9]

@@TimDyck Wrong, italian gunnery in ww2 is famous for almost always being better than british gunnery in day battles, and these are famous shots that basically anyone who read something on ww2 knows about, so i guess not you. It would be like making a video on the biggest battleships and not mentioning Yamato.

[@akula9713]

Warspite the GOAT!

[@peterlovett5841]

The pronunciation of several ships names in this video leave a lot to be desired.

[@Ingulf_The_Mad]

Guilio Cesare. Guilio. Jesus Christ, americans live in their own bubble of ignorance.

[@jeromemagquilat3050]

damn, that 19,000m 8in hit from a cruiser.

[@mikemillward1805]

The Warspite had quite a few notable actions other than the longest ship-to-ship strike recorded; the only ship at Puget Sound with functional armaments when Japan attacked Pearl Harbour (RN defending USN), survival of a "Fritz X" remote guided bomb (the Roma, a brand new warship from the Italian Navy was blown apart by one, Italy having swapped sides by then), the first shots of D-Day, the ONLY warship to have a tank in its record of hits (took out a dug-in German tank in Normandy after the US Marines asked for cover), the first ship through the Straits of Dover in WW2 (too dangerous before then from German shore batteries) and the last naval 'assist' in WW2 at Walrechen to keep the German guns busy. One hell of a ship, sadly lost to time....

[@Sammy-lw1ns]

What a sight it would be today if Warspite was kept as a museum, shame.

[@mccleod6235]

It also has the best name of any ship, ever.

[@fredgilbert2032]

I love the Warspite. Fantastic ship with a fantastic record over 2 world wars. Small correction the US Army has to ask for cover in Normandy as there were no US Marines involved in the D-day operation.

[@GeorgiaBoy1961]

@mikemillward1805 - Re: "the ONLY warship to have a tank in its record of hits (took out a dug-in German tank in Normandy after the US Marines asked for cover)" The HMS Warspite deserved better after a career in which she saw service in two world wars, and gained fifteen battle honors, but she was broken up for scrap for her trouble. Whoever asked for help against that tank, it wasn't U.S. Marines, because there were none ashore at Normandy. At Omaha and Utah beaches, it was a U.S. Army show once they hit the beaches. Very few U.S. Marines served in the ETO or in the Med-North Africa in the first place, and those were mostly afloat - such as Marine detachments aboard men-of-war. A few also saw deployment in Iceland when the Germans tried to establish a series of weather stations and signals outposts there. That was pretty much it for the U.S.M.C. - who stayed plenty busy in the Pacific. I hope the men on the Warspite chalked that tank on her list of enemy "vessels" engaged and destroyed. It isn't every day a navy man gets to do that!

[@jasonhartley1305]

​@@GeorgiaBoy1961not much difference between the us army and us marines.. both not much cop.

[@kennethkellogg6556]

There were actually only three Colorado class battleships: Colorado, West Virginia, and Maryland. The keel was laid for a fourth, Washington, but she was cancelled under the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty.

[@psychguy2838]

Washington was designated for target practice while her pace of construction was ahead of the other ship building in Newport News . Even then the government wasted tax payer money.

[@HorribleHarry]

That WeeVee hit might have also been Tennessee or California, who’s 14” guns had similar range. The timing of the rounds fired vs the other 2 ships could have overlapped. ALSO, I always heard Duke of York had a very long range hit… had this been disproven?

[@Will_CH1]

Wrong. Scharnhorst hit Glorious with the third salvo. The targeting was done via the optical rangefinder which had the range at just on 24000 meters. The Warspite struck the Giulio Cesare also using optical rangefinder with an indicated reading of 26400 yards just edging out Scharnhorst by about 140 meters. This is a virtual draw. These are the two longest range hits scored on a moving target at sea.

[@notsureyou]

I've read but unable to corroborate, That during the battle Scharnhorst and or/ Gneisenau did use their radar for firing due to the smoke screen / smoke from the burning carrier obscuring their view. But like a number of things, information is hard to come by. From memory, the range of Warspite's hit was known due to it being a recorded radar range, Whereas with Scharnhorst it was determined post battle when for want of a better term "working it all out". But I could be wrong, or that could be old information that has since been superseded.

[@hajoos.8360]

A sailor of the comradeship Gneisnau said in an interview that the 2 German ships shot behind the horizon.

[@Will_CH1]

@@hajoos.8360 The glorious was not visible from deck level. But high up in the fire control director, they were able to see the flight deck of glorious. A calculation taking into account, the curvature of the earth confirms at 24000 meters, line of sight can be made.

[@hajoos.8360]

@@Will_CH1 Yes, of course, the rangefinder up in the tops, will defer the horizon backwards...

[@Pehmusica]

I did'nt expect the last one 👀

[@usernamesreprise4068]

I do wish people would take extra care to pronounce things more carefully, the german pocket battle ship Prinz Eugen pronounced in its correct german is Prins oiygen not eugene

[@grolfe3210]

The title indicates it is the longest recorded hit by a ship. I think that this should be furthest not longest and also the examples are then limiting the target to a ship. As part of the support for the Normandy Landings the ship HMS Rodney was used to carry out precision shelling of targets. Castanell gun battery was hit with 16" shells from a distance of 17 miles (30,000 yards) while US troops were only 500 yards away.

[@georgedavidson957]

RN history between 1916 and 1947 involved the warspite doing stuff. It seems every after action report included the sentence " ... and then warspite ... " gotta love that ship.

[@andrewhayes7055]

Prinz "Eugene" that's a new one🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

[@grathian]

" West Virginia detected the...Japanese formation at 40,000 meters, Opening fire approximately one minute later West Virginia's first salvo achieved a direct hit on Yamashiro at 20,000 meters" Crikey, Yamashiro was closing at 20,000 meters per minute?

[@desthomas8970]

OK. Who is Eugene?

[@rogervincent8314]

at 8:57 there is a helicopter in the upper left corner, so what ship is this and when was the photo taken? when did the navy first use helicopters. and what helicopter was it?

[@samhamsord7942]

Helicopter very likely is Bell 47 Ship on photo is indeed Jean Bart, photo 1955

[@adriencoudert1083]

Richelieu class battleships were actually used until 1967 for the Richelieu ane 1961 for the Jean Bart. Jean Bart was actually finished after WW2 and officially commissioned in 1955. Because during the battle of Casablanca she was actually unfinished. After the end of the north african campaign the JB was used as a source of spare parts for her sister ship the Richelieu which was repaired and modernized in america

[@richardm3023]

@@adriencoudert1083 Jean Bart was the world's last battleship ever commissioned.

[@adriencoudert1083]

@@richardm3023 yeah I know that. A lot of people are saying that the HMS Vanguard was the last one but the Vanguard is the last battleship ever BUILT. The Jean Bart was the last commissioned

[@m.h.b.3828]

Fun fact: Prince Eugene (eng) aka Prinz Eugen (ger) - named after an another mad austrian who defeated the turks at the gates of vienna - is the only ship that survived two nuklear explosions.

[@apis_aculei]

According to German literature, the Scharnhorst class ships are the first battleships that Germany built after the First World War. The main armament of 28 cm caliber, which was relatively weak at the time and was intended as an interim solution, corresponded to the caliber used on the imperial battleships. Why people in the Anglo-Saxon world are constantly talking about battle cruisers remains a mystery. you just have to look at the differences in construction. Maybe it's because such fast battleships were unimaginable for the British at the time.

[@stephenhargreaves9324]

Scharnhorst was neither a battleship or a battlecruiser it lay somewhere between both definitions, just as the pocket battleship class made famous by the Graf Spee blurred conventional distinctions. Bismark and Tirpitz were definitely battleships. My argument would be that the Germans were trying to solve the unsolvable.

[@AndyViant]

@@stephenhargreaves9324 much of it was politics. Capital ships didn't include Cruisers only Battleships, so post WW1 there were restrictions on Battleship ownership and tonnage based on the Washington Treaty.

[@hajoos.8360]

The point is not the arrtillery, it is the hull itselfes. Hood with 15 inch guns (10% longer projectiles as Bismarck's, means 80 KG more heavy) was classified & constructed as a battlecruiser, similar to Repulse & Renown with only 3 turrets. Scharnhorst's hull was constructed as a battle-ship. The 11 inch guns of the Scharenhorst class shoot high velocity projectiles, which could penetrate every armament.

[@lightfootpathfinder8218]

Because scharnhorst wasn't a true battleship. For example scharnhorst and gneisenau were 4 knots faster than the king George V class battleships but they paid for this extra speed by sacrificing armour protection. A king George V had belt armour of 375mm compared to scharnhorsts 350mm. It also had deck armour of 150mm compared to scharnhorsts 105mm. Scharnhorst was faster than a battleship but also less armoured. The word that describes this kind of ship in the English speaking world is "Battlecruiser".

[@korbendallas5318]

Not a mystery to me. People want to put things in clearly labeled boxes to understand them. In a naval context, this was greatly amplified by the various treaties putting all major warships in even more strictly defined boxes. My take is that the Germans built exactly what they needed (commerce raiders) without bothering about ship classes. This is even more pronounced in the Deutschlands, but the Scharnhorsts were similar in this regard. I even think that their armament was exatly what they needed for this role: More than big enough to get rid of heavy cruisers and much less of an overkill against civilian ships than 15" guns would have been.

[@RebeccaCampbell1969]

According to recent discoveries the USS Johnston have three 18.1” hits, USS Gambier Bay should as well, meaning the IJN Yamato was able to hit the Destroyer and also Escort Carrier from a distance greater than 19 miles... while avoiding torpedoes and having already been hit once or twice. Why nobody recognize this? In fact the ammunition used against USS Johnston is proof of how inept the Japanese admiral was (anti armor instead of high explosives vs tin cans)... but a great achievement since it was done 100% using optical sight. All on this list are incredible achievements... from sailors and artillery crews to engineers building and designing the firing computers of each ship.

[@JarViKK_gaming]

Pretty sure Yamamoto had basic targetting radar. Still a very long shot, but thought I'd mention it.

[@metaknight115]

She was nowhere near that range when she sank Gambier Bay. My sources claim the famous fatal hit that flooded her engine rooms occurred when Yamato was 20,000 yards from the escort carrier. She did score a debates hit on the escort carrier white plains at 34,500 yards.

[@icewaterslim7260]

@@JarViKK_gaming No way. Old fashioned smoke markers is how they still set the range. A different color for different vessels and maybe different turrets though I'd have to go back and re-acquaint myself with the battle.to see about the different turrets and Gambler Bay. I was thinking Gambler Bay was the Escort Carrier sunk by Kamikaze out of Clark Field later that day but I'm not taking bets based on faulty memory. Johnson could've been hit on it's charge by the wrong armor piecing ordinance they were using because even their well chosen lookouts couldn't see what they were dealing with at 19 nautical miles..They can't change over that fast as Johnson closes the distance. I've always wondered what the hell they were thinking upon realizing they had been shooting through a tin can with the wrong ordinance and now he was too close to get those 18" guns down on and raking that pagoda they were in with 5 inch guns..

[@535phobos]

1:20 I just want to mention that this is Bismarck firing his aft turrets. The narration makes it sound like its a picture of Hood burning.

[@verrezen]

The question should not only be if a ship was hit but primarily if the ship was the target of that shot.

[@Eric-kn4yn]

Fire control must have improved greatly between ww1 and ww2

[@Mikebumpful]

Propellant technology had improved as well!

[@Hagen823]

It did. Not only the mechanical fire control computers, like the Admiralty Fire Control Table and Ford Rangekeeper, but also the integration with radar.

[@MartyInLa]

I wonder what the longest hit fired by an Iowa class 16" is. Also what the longest range hit by a Yamato class 18.1" gun was.

[@su-57stealthfighter73]

They didn't include Yamato's hit on USS White Plains because it's not a direct hit , what happen is one of 6 18.1"inch shell fired by Yamato at the range of 34,544 yrds land super close at the portside of USS White plains straight through the water and explode underneath the ships keel and broke it in half .. It's not a direct clean hit but if you put it into artillery principle it's a hit ...

[@metaknight115]

The longest hit by an Iowa class battleship was when USS Iowa herself hit the training cruiser Katori seven times with her 16-inch guns at 14,500 yards after firing eight salvos, sinking the training ship. The longest confirmed hit by a Yamato class battleship was when she hit the destroyer Johnston three times within a single full broadside at 20,300 yards with her 18.1-inch guns, followed closely by three single salvo hits from her 6.1-inch guns. These hits cut her speed to 17 knots and took out 3/5ths of her main armament, and according to the state of her wreck split her in two while under fire from a destroyer line. It’s likely she hit USS Gambier Bay at longer ranges, but besides the range of her famous fatal hit at 20,000 yards, I have found no sources. An unconfirmed hit at 34,500 yards occurred when on her third salvo, Yamato damaged the escort carrier White Plains with an 18.1-inch shell. The shell exploded underneath the keel, but sources claim it scraped off the hill before exploding underneath.

[@spencereagle1118]

Since the title suggests longest hits in the history of naval gunfire, shouldn't that extreme range shot from a naval barge moored in the English Channel during WW1 count? If I recall the shot at a French viaduct out ranged everything listed here. I believe the barge or monitor was called something like 'General .....' . Anyone fill in the details?

[@christopherconnelly4477]

nice

[@stevengeorge1411]

Jean Bart was a stationary target. Easy to hit with aerial spotting

[@bobns509]

You forgot one not so small detail: In a battle Massachusets vs Jean Bart, Jean Bart was imobilised, laying in Casablanca Harbour. So, taking a shot (5th actually!) is like shooting a sitting duck. Totally opposite is Gneisenau & Scharnhorst vs Gloriuous. Target was moving at about 30knots and beside that, G&S were having 280mm guns which makes their shots (2nd salvo at moving target!) at the end of a range! Massachusets had 406mm and it strike was not at the end of a range. So, this story is like everything in a media: Looks nice, gives data as such, put america first and hides details which are not in a favor of a story. Ugliness in its best.

[@samuilalexiev3642]

Gneisenau has 6 3.8cm guns

[@bobns509]

@@samuilalexiev3642 You have no clue, information and accuracy. You are not in this League and I am not going to provide you with a correct information, ignorant alexiev.

[@joshfritz5345]

Didn't the Yamato also have a very long ranged hit during the Battle off Samar against a US light carrier?

[@metaknight115]

She severely damaged the escort carrier White Plains at 34,500 yards, though it’s been debated whether she scored an actual hit or simply a near miss.

[@tombakabones274]

I spent a weekend at a boy scout jamboree on the battleship Massachusetts

[@finncarlbomholtsrensen1188]

According to the information I have found, HMS Hood became hit from the German Battleship Bismarck, which sank Hood with a hit from its 38 cm canons, and by that made its ammunition blow up? I may be wrong, but that is what is mostly told, when searching? The grenade came from high up and down through the not so well protected wooden deck. Something which also happened during The Battle of Jutland during WW1. But HMS Hood was an old ship from that period.

[@meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee2]

If you read accounts of the battle the British ships in the early stage of the battle of the Denmark Straight steered to close with the Germans to avoid plunging fire hitting Hoods relatively weak armoured deck. However just before the fatal hit they had got close enough to avoid this risk and turned parallel to the Germans, as they were now close enough that any shells lobbed high enough to give plunging fire would go over the top of them and fall harmlessly into the sea beyond the British ships. Hood had quite decent armour on the sides of the hull, so a slugging match with shells fired at relatively flat trajectories was a sensible battle to fight. It seems however that Bismark got in a lucky hit* that landed just short in the trough of a wave and despite it not being a design feature of the shell travelled a short distance through the water to hit Hood below water level and below the armour belt. * Note that the better your gunnery is the more chance you have of a lucky hit, as the shell has to land in about the right spot for there to be a chance of you benefiting from any coincidental circumstance.

[@user-ph8zs6xt8y]

@@meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee2 The deck armour wasn't particularly thin, this is one of the more persistent myths IMO. Not great, but not as bad as rumour has it. Hood was turning in order to get her rear two turrets into play rather than avoid getting too close probably? It does seem like her hydrodynamics left a trough in the water around the quarterdeck area as you say, which left less protected areas exposed. One in a million shot seems the most likely conclusion. Because of the old turtleback armour scheme on Bismarck, the RN were actually better off with long range plunging fire, possibly highlighted by the difficulty in actually getting her to sink from point blank range. Should've let the FAA finish her off anyway.

[@meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee2]

@@user-ph8zs6xt8y I know that is why I said relatively weak it not being up to the standard of more recent ships, as when Hood was designed towards the end of WW1 firing ranges tended to be shorter and hence shell trajectories flatter, and the idea of dropping things that go bang out of aircraft was still in its infancy. Hood also infamously having been too busy between the wars to be sent in for modernisation so remaining in its original now outdated as built state.. Given the way Rodney in particular was used in the final battle I wonder if there was also an element of Admiral Cunningham's thoughts of getting so close that even a Gunnery Officer could not miss as well.

[@user-ph8zs6xt8y]

@@meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee2 My bad, got the first post and yours mixed up there about the deck.

[@meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee2]

@@user-ph8zs6xt8y No problem found the idea of a Battle Cruiser with a wooden deck rather amusing myself.

[@PG-ku9qd]

It's pronounced Prince OY-Gen. Sheesh!

[@maconescotland8996]

Novel pronunciation of Eugen - and a photo of Bismarck when referring to HMS Hood .

[@patrickelliott-brennan8960]

The name of the first ship is pronounced 'Prince Oi-gen'.

[@nathanseda4220]

Prints Oy-gen

[@gjurczyc]

Bismarck's third salvo hit HMS Hood's magazine, and in turn HMS Hood disintegrated.

[@notsureyou]

5th salvo

[@oberstgraf9677]

Never heard of the top 1. Never mentioned in many books.

[@fawnlliebowitz1772]

Yes, I can do division but why not break it into miles as well?

[@frednone]

Scharnhorst, Armor wise she was a battleship, gun wise she is a battlecruiser, take your pick. I usually call her a fast battleship.

[@notsureyou]

"Pocket battleship 2.0" 🤷‍♂

[@meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee2]

Armour and gun power at the expense of speed = Battleship. Speed and gun power at the expense of armour = Battle Cruiser. Speed and armour at the expense of gun power = Something else. (Pocket Battleship?)

[@dovetonsturdee7033]

@@meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee2 A 'pocket battleship' had neither speed armour, nor firepower. Effectively, if was a heavy cruiser, but lacked the speed of one.

[@stevenvanlinge8895]

British pre WW1 battlecruisers were versions of contemperary battle ships designs, which had the same gun calibre, but sacrificed armour and number of turrets/barrels for speed. So these battlecruisers sacrificed gun power not in terms of calibre but in terms of number of barrels (mostly 8 barrels for a battlecruiser and 10 barrels for a battleship). Before WW2 the French produced the Dunquerque class as a reply to the German pocket battleships to which the Germans responded by building the Scharnhorst class thereby introducing smaller battleships with lesser gunpower as a shiptype, which one might call battlecruisers, but which are not battlecruisers according to WW1 standards.

[@g.pistof7581]

We must take into account that the Jean Bart was docked and immobile, so easier to hit than a speeding and maneuvering target...

[@rand49er]

The longest is nearly 16.5 miles! Amazing!

[@garfieldfarkle]

At 6:36 the narrator says the Massachusetts scored the longest-range hit on a moving ship in history, but the Glorious was underway when the Scharnhorst hit it at a distance 100 meters farther than the Massachusetts hit on the Milan.

[@charlescurran1289]

Interesting that cruisers with their smaller caliber guns made it to this list. You always think the big battleship guns had better range but I guess not.

[@metaknight115]

Cruisers had smaller guns, but a higher rate of fire. I’ve heard that US troops preferred cruisers and destroyers for shore bombardment

[@jamieduff1981]

Battleship guns definitely did have a longer range but it becomes much, much harder to hit anything with increasing range so generally speaking the range top trumps played by armchair admirals is moot.

[@RobdeKoter]

"The nine 16-inch guns are the Mighty Mo's trademark feature. Each gun barrel is 68 feet long, weighs an incredible 134 tons, and can fire a 2,700-pound projectile 23 nautical miles in 90 seconds - with pinpoint accuracy. The Missouri was the last U.S. battleship ever built. She was also the most formidable."

[@w.reidripley1968]

USS Missouri was BB63, USS Wisconsin was BB64, and the last of the class.

[@MrStrat01]

Richelieu was far better 😎

[@GeorgiaBoy1961]

I remember reading someplace - probably the book "Japanese Destroyer Captain" by Captain Tamechi Hara - that a single one of the super-battleship Yamato's triple-18-inch gun turrets weighed more than an entire IJN destroyer! The U.S.S. Montana super battleships with twelve sixteen inch guns were to be the American answer to the Yamato class battleships, but they were cancelled before being built. At around 72000 tons fully-laden, they would have been immense ships if built. Construction priority was then directed towards carriers instead of battleships. I'm fortunate-enough to have toured the "Mighty Mo'" at her berth in Pearl Harbor, and what an amazing experience! If you ever get the chance to do it, don't hesitate - go for it! - as it is well worth doing.

[@w.reidripley1968]

@@GeorgiaBoy1961 Iowas are possessed of a terrible grace and beauty, are they not? Yet their beauty is all in aid of their terrible purpose --- they are seagoing bludgeons. Few naval platforms say "I am a weapon" with such silent impressiveness. Until their main battery trains out and goes to work. The entire ship is wrapped tight around its main weapons system. The broadside does not seem to fire in all one instant, but in a somewhat irregular string of basso _BBBABAMBAMBBAM_ that strikes like a hammer blow. Half the world turns orange, then thick smokey brown before shredding into a gray-lint color. The startling thing is the heat on your face. My shipboard buddies said sometimes they could see the shells like black dots as they raced away, but I never did. These were the only times I ever felt the Iowa roll. They are designed to hardly roll at all; pitching was more perceptible; most surface ships ride on top of the waves, but Iowa rode through them, more like a submarine. Very heavily built, on a rather small hull for about fifty thousand tons.

[@GeorgiaBoy1961]

@@w.reidripley1968- A "terrible beauty" is a good way of describing an Iowa-class battleship, or for that matter many of her contemporaries. How could a machine or mechanical device designed for such a purpose be so beautiful? But there's no denying it; just as a Supermarine Spitfire is beautiful so is an Iowa-class battlewagon. I'll leave the philosophical implications of that to the better qualified.

[@jimwinchester339]

Wow - that USS Massachusets got *two* of the top 7! Wish I knew who the gunner was.

[@jamieduff1981]

Both are debated though, with the ship's own logs disagreeing on the matter.

[@stephengrimmer35]

It's pronounced "Oy Gen", not "You Jean"

[@giacomozuccarino5593]

The pronunciation of 'Giulio Cesare' is totally wrong. Kudos for the good video essay.

[@HK-sp1pl]

19000 meters. That is hell of a many meters. Just 19 km was i wanted to hear

[@stucar7677]

Where did you get your facts from as warspite and schrnhost are rank equal at number 1 as both fired a distance of 26,000 yards

[@Rymunin]

ok basic search on guiness world records shows Scharnhorst and Warspite sharing the prize with an approximate range hits of 24km (15miles), so Im curious about the sources of the data presented here :D

[@dufus7396]

"You sunk my battle ship"

[@timwrobel5603]

3:52 the West Virginia is in the background. Behind the Mississippi.

[@dirkbrueser8185]

wrong compare between Scharnhorst and Massachusetts: Massachusetts fired on a towed ship while Schrnhorst fired on a moving vessel, so wh´ts more tricky and what´s more worth of it? ;-)

[@gtcruisermanebayebay325]

Wow! That's 17 miles!!!!

[@aestradarespeto]

At September 29th of 1936, spaniard nationalist Cruiser Canarias with a 203mm gun obtained a direct hit to the spaniard republican destroyer Almirante Ferrandiz at 11 miles, nearly 20km of distance. Six more impacts of the same caliber sunk the ship. The Canarias ship was not suited with a properly rangefinder system and was firing using an old device and asisted only with the use of manual lenses.

[@harrymaiolo6719]

It’s pronounced Prince (oy-gen), not (you-gene)

[@TheBruceGday]

The silhouette of West Virginia used was the old pre Pearl Harbor look, not how she looked at the time she fought Yamashiro and made this hit.

[@stevefranklin9920]

What was the longest range hit by the USS Missouri?

[@jimfrazier8611]

The Iowas were too late entering service to ever get in a gunfight with another ship, and their speed made them more valuable as carrier escorts than anything else. In their final configuration after they were brought back in the 1980s, they were capable of hitting battleship-sized targets up to around 42,000 yds in gunnery exercises, but that was with the aid of muzzle velocity radars that weren't available back in the war years.

[@johngaither9263]

She bombarded some islands but never entered into a gunfight with another ship.

[@su-57stealthfighter73]

The only known ship hit by Iowa class is the one made by the lead ship Iowa ,when she engage the IJN cruiser Katori( Katori was dead on the water after recieving multiple bomb hits and couple torpedoes from Enterprise aircraft ) at the range of 14,500 yards she fired 46 HC 16"inch shell and at least 124 5"inch shell the first hit was achieve in 3rd salvo ...

[@metaknight115]

Nothing, she never fought an enemy warship. Her sister ships Iowa and New Jersey sank the training cruiser Katori, the destroyer Maikaze, and the armed trawler Shonan Maru hunting convoys off Truk from around 14,500 yards.

[@T0ffik1]

There is confirmed by US (and Japan) straddle from 17.046 nmi; 31.569 m range from Yamato on USS white plains. The difference between IJN/KM shells vs US ones is that they were designed to score hits underwater (bypass the belt armor). That streddle was an exploasion of underwater under the ship - deeper then intended, that IJN shells were designed to do and it blown out ships electricity for 15-30 minutes. That one a straddle/hit that was made by one of only 4 fired salvos on that range. If you dont want to count it, then you have the Yamato hit on USS Gambier bay from 20.044 m what made an overpenetration and giant holes in its engine room making the ship take water and sink from more hits. To it, its worth to add that 18,6km range Yamato hit on a destroyer (moving in a squall - so medium visibility) hit - Johnston was much smaller target then the milan, it had 2,5k tonns of tonnage vs 3,1k of Milan's. Lenght is 112m vs 120+m with flecher class being much lowest in water. So its the highest range in WW2 where such a small ship was hit. To it on the same range 3x 155mm shells hit the destroyer also from the same range from Yamato 2ndery turrets (also the highest range that such a small destroyer was hit by such a caliber of guns - only 500-600m less then Eugen scored hits on a battleship). In case of West Virgina it had "easier case" as Yamashiro was battling already a fleet of destroyers (so WV had info about what the ship was doing), to it, Yamashiro didnt see WV and never had any defensive position vs it. Shells also didnt do much dmg because of range.

[@icewaterslim7260]

I know champions of other Battleships will argue that a near miss but Japan's Type 93 torpedo definitely holds the record for a direct hit by torpedo to this day. On the 5th of June 1943 the Japanese Destroyer, Niizuki fired a 14 torpedo salvo of "Long Lances" at a narrow channel in the Solomons that Destroyers from Task Force 67 had to pass through from 11 nautical miles away. A brand new Fletcher class Destroyer, USS Strong, was hit by one of the devastatingly potent torpedoes. USS Strong broke in half before sinking setting off depth charges onboard that killed 46 of her crew. USS Chevalier rescued the 241 survivors. . The US Ordinance Bureau was still in denial about our own malfunctioning torpedoes and Allied Naval Commanders were still in the dark about the Type 93 that had tech advancements thought impossible by every maritime power but Japan. When the launching adversary wasn't seen and out of range of our radar they were blaming this hit and other previous hits from the Battle of the Java Sea on undetected submarines! . An ironic footnote is that when SBDs dropped 700 lb bombs that punched through the decks of three IJN capital carriers at the Battle of Midway those huge instantaneous explosions in the hangers below the flight deck were in large part the result of loose long lances being fitted to the Kates and Kates already armed along with Val dive bombers and Zekes being armed and fueled with aviation gasoline for a counterstrike by very capable veteran IJN aircrews. Once we knew what was what those Type 93s with a warhead more than twice the size of ours became devastating potent ordinance for hunted and targeted IJN destroyers, subs and cruisers to get rid of in a big hurry.

[@ConradAinger]

Eugen, as in Prinz Eugen, is pronounced with a hard 'g'.

[@Lee-vk1xy]

There's pretty good evidence that Yamato hit White Plains with her first salvo off Samar. The shell left a dent in her hull then exploded some distance beneath her. Range would have been around 30,000 yards.

[@patjcarey]

Which puts it 114’ below the horizon (earth curvature calculator viewed from a height of 100’)!

[@metaknight115]

34,500 yards to be exact. I believe some sources put it on her 3rd salvo. If anyone American fanboy talks about how Yamato couldn’t aim, show them that hit

[@patjcarey]

@@metaknight115 and show them how in hell they could see a ship at that distance! Even from a lookout height of 100’ the ship would be 114’+ below the horizon. People just don’t think!

[@metaknight115]

@@patjcarey Some less knowledgeable US fanboys think "No advanced radar guided fire control=couldn't aim". Both of the confirmed longest ranged naval hits were made by ships that mainly relied on optical systems, which pretty much shuts that down.

[@johngregory4801]

@@metaknight115 It wasn't a hit - it was a near miss that caused damage. There's a difference.

[@bestestusername]

no.3 the US ship against the destroyer is a bit iffy as its only suspected that it was its guns not actual. impressive gunnery from the group

[@johngrogan4609]

Please include distance by miles please.

[@FarSeeker8]

I wonder if Rapunzel knew Prince Eugene was that accurate.

[@brianjones7660]

Prinz Eugen is “prinz oy-gen”

[@randywarren7101]

Prince Eugen is pronunced Oy-gan!

[@user-ye6cn5yl7f]

Are Guns range measured in Yards or Meters?

[@crazyeddie1981]

Yards

[@metaknight115]

Both

[@DT-wp4hk]

Hits made the flagship De Ruyter go down😂

[@metaknight115]

She was not sunk in the first engagement. Haguro sank De Ruyter later that midnight with a torpedo hit from around 16,000 yards