Scale: 1:96. The four ships of the ‘Iron Duke’ class came into service at the beginning of the First World War in 1914. They were the last class to carry 13.5-inch guns, their successors having 15-inch guns. HMS ‘Iron Duke’ (1912) herself was built at Portsmouth dockyard. She was the flagship of the Commander-in-Chief, Admiral Sir John Jellicoe, at the Battle of Jutland in 1916. After serving as a training ship from 1932 she was a depot ship at Scapa Flow during the Second World War and was then struck of the navy list.

The model was made by Messrs Alfred Graham & Company apparently to illustrate the extensive nature of the ship’s electrical equipment. The pillar cradle supports are not permanently fixed to the model allowing it to be easily removed from its baseboard. Several sections of its deck can be removed to show the wiring and electrics though, as with the case of so many working models, much of the equipment is now missing. The four propeller shafts, extending into the model’s interior, and still with their electrical connectors and silk electrical flex attached, indicate that the model could propel itself through water. When the deck sections are removed they reveal that the hull has been carved from solid wood, remarkable for a model of this size.