Description
Original, as worn, wartime cap tally H.M.S. COURAGEOUS. This cap tally has been shortened to 33 inches. Earlier version with the narrow “H” & FULL STOP. Rayon with black bullion wire.
The battlecruiser Courageous was decommissioned after the First World War, then rebuilt as an aircraft carrier in the mid-1920s. She could carry 48 aircraft, compared with 36 carried by her half-sister Furious on about the same displacement. After recommissioning she spent most of her career operating off Great Britain and Ireland. She briefly became a training ship, but reverted to her normal role a few months before the start of the Second World War in September 1939.
A German U-boat sank Courageous by torpedo later that month, with the loss of more than 500 of her crew..
