Large wooden scale model of British Royal Navy battlecruiser HMS Hood, detailing to include gun turrets, bridge, control top and armoured conning tower, in a scratch built hardboard and chipboard case with perspex front, 104cm x 26cm high (ex.base), case: 148cm x 25.5cm x 40cm high

HMS Hood was an agile battle cruiser with the size and guns of a battle ship, but was capable of higher speed thanks to lighter armour. It was intended to act as a scout for the main battle fleet, and to hunt down enemy commerce raiders. The Hood was finished shortly after the First World War, however it did not fire its guns in anger until early in the Second World War. Sometime between the Wars, the Hood's secondary armament was changed, and this particular model has the later armament as circa 1939.

The Hood was sunk by a lucky hit from a downward plunging shell from the Bismarck, which penetrated the inadequately armoured deck and exploded in the Hood's own magazine, setting off explosions of the Hood's own shells. The resulting conflagration caused instant catastrophic damage and the ship sank quickly with much loss of life.

This model was purchased around 1975 from a shop on the South Coast (the vendor believes perhaps in Lymington). Probably a one-off, the model is made predominantly of wood to a scale of 1 : 200 and is partly converted for sailing on a pond or lake. To prepare the model for sailing, it would require fitting with a motor, battery holder a moving rudder and radio control receiver-sender. The whole deck and superstructure can be lifted off the hull, with care, to facilitate the above works.