Having served on H.M.S Colossus, I feel it necessary to place on record the following information. Probably a book could be written concerning all the interesting places Colossus sailed to and her exploits she performed in her short life with the Royal Navy.
 The Light Fleet carrier H.M.S Colossus was the first of her class. Launched 1943 and commissioned in 1944, she set sail for the Middle East accompanied by her sister carriers H.M.S Vengeance and H.M.S Venerable, both of the `Colossus' class, and accompanied by eight destroyers. Aboard were Barracudas from 827 Squadron and Corsairs from 1846 Squadron, known as the 14th Carrier Air Group. On the Declaration of Peace in Europe whilst at Alexandria, Egypt, the carriers were immediately ordered to join the British Pacific Fleet in the Far East, eventually being attached to the American 7th Fleet and known as the 11th Carrier Squadron.
At the end of hostilities whilst in Sydney, Australia, the Colossus was ordered to Leyte in the Philippines and then to Formosa to put ashore doctors and nurses to attend our former Prisoners of War. The ship then headed for Hong Kong for the re-occupation where a Naval Detachment was put ashore as an advance party before the Royal Marines could take over. The duties were to control the area and to escort Japanese soldiers to and fro from their prison camp to perform domestic duties in Kowloon. Australian former P.O.W's boarded the Colossus in and were taken back to Leyte before returning to their homeland by hospital ships. Dutch settlers who had been prisoners of war held by the Japanese and in poor health were repatriated to Colombo from the Dutch East Indies, but only women and children were allowed to board. Soon after a three month refit in South Africa, H.M.S Colossus finally returned to the U.K when the aircraft carrier was handed over to the French and renamed Arromanches. From there it is known the carrier twice performed duties in the Far East war zone with honours.
H.M.S Vengeance was purchased in by the Australian Navy in 1953 and became H.M.A.S Vengeance. Brazil then purchased the carrier for 2.7 million in 1956 and was renamed Minas Gerais but was sold for scrap this year (2004) at the Indian Alang shipyard - famed internationally as the graveyard of the shipping industry India. As Jim Watling, Chairman of the Vengeance Association said: "When you think of the millions of pounds wasted on projects like the Dome, a fraction of that could have saved the Vengeance.
H.M.S Venerable was sold to the Netherlands in May 1946 and became the Karel Doonman on 22 August 1969 she sold to the Argentina Navy. Finally she was beached for scrap the Alang shipyard, India in March 2000.
At least one of the Light Fleet carriers of the Colossus class should have been saved for prosperity.
By - Brian Jeffery
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