HMS Royalist, pennant 89, was a modified Dido, or Bellona-class, anti-aircraft cruiser. Scotts of Greenock laid her down on 21 May 1940, launched her on 30 May 1942, and completed her on 10 September 1943. She was fitted to serve as a carrier flagship, with aircraft-direction spaces added during the long completion. The London Fire Brigade adopted her. Captain Markham Henry Evelegh had been appointed on 25 May 1943, before she was finished, and he still had her when she finally worked up.
Defects and the extra work kept her in hand into the winter of 1943. In March 1944 she was with the Home Fleet escort for Operation Tungsten, the carrier attack on Tirpitz in Altenfjord, in company with Anson, Duke of York, Furious, Victorious and the escort carriers, and the cruisers Belfast, Sheffield and Jamaica. The attack on 3 April did not succeed. On 12 April she escorted the escort carriers Emperor and Striker, with Sheffield, for a strike on shipping off Norway, and then went into a Tyne yard. She was nominated for the landings in the south of France. Captain Royer Mylius Dick relieved Evelegh on 21 May 1944 and had her for six weeks, the passage out of the refit and toward the Mediterranean. Captain John Graham Hewitt relieved Dick on 1 July 1944.
Hewitt took her into Operation Dragoon. She was flagship of the British carrier group TG 88.1, with Delhi and the escort carriers Attacker, Emperor, Khedive, Searcher and Pursuer, under American command for the assault. On 15 August she was off the beaches on fighter-direction duty. On the 28th she was released and sent to the British Aegean force. On 15 September, north of Crete, she was in action off Cape Spatha with the destroyer Teazer during Operation Outing I. The German escort Expel and UJ2171, Heidelberg, were sunk in that action. The chronology does not give the sinking to one ship. She then covered the reoccupation of the Aegean islands and the Greek mainland, Operation Manna, with the escort carriers Emperor, Hunter, Khedive, Pursuer, Searcher and Stalker, and on 12 October she was with Orion, Ajax, Black Prince, Argonaut, Aurora and Colombo for gunfire support. She was back at Alexandria on 30 October and was nominated for the Eastern Fleet. Hewitt left her in December 1944. Captain Wilfred Geoffrey Brittain took her that month.
She refitted at Alexandria in January 1945 and went out to Ceylon in February. In March she joined the 21st Aircraft Carrier Squadron. On 23 April she worked up for the Burma operations with Hunter, Stalker, Emperor, Khedive and Phoebe. On 28 April she covered the assault landings near Rangoon, Operation Dracula. On 4 May she escorted the escort carriers for strikes on shipping and airfields along the Tenasserim coast. On the 10th she was with them in a search of the 11 Degree Channel for Japanese ships leaving the Nicobars and the Andamans. Queen Elizabeth, Richelieu, Cumberland and the Dutch cruiser Tromp were also at sea, with eight destroyers. On the 11th she covered attacks on Car Nicobar. The search was then extended to the 6 Degree Channel, with Cumberland added to the escort, as Operation Mitre. That search ended with the sinking of the Japanese cruiser Haguro by destroyers of the 26th Flotilla. Royalist was covering the escort carriers. The chronology does not put her in the gun action. On 16 May she covered strikes by Hunter and Khedive on the Andamans.
On 20 June she escorted Stalker, Khedive and Ameer, with Suffolk and five destroyers, for Operation Balsam: airfields and shipping off Sumatra, and photographic flights over southern Malaya. In July she escorted the squadron's carriers against shipping and targets in Malaya and prepared for Operation Zipper, the landing that was then postponed. In August she sailed for the Zipper area. On 9 September she covered the Malayan landings as escort for the 21st Aircraft Carrier Squadron, with Nelson, Richelieu, Ceylon, Nigeria and Cleopatra. On 11 September she was at Singapore for the surrender. Brittain's appointment on uboat.net runs to late 1945. She returned home and paid off into reserve in January 1946. The chronology does not name the officer who paid her off.
She stayed in reserve until 1956, was modernised, and was then transferred to the Royal New Zealand Navy. Mason's history says she served ten years as flagship and was returned. She was placed on the disposal list in January 1968 and went to a breaker's yard in Osaka. The ship's bell went to the London Fire Brigade's training school. She was not sunk.
A note on sources. Movements and the post-war outline are from Geoffrey Mason's service history on naval-history.net, saved as a digitized copy. Uboat.net, saved with it, gives pennant 89, the builder, the launch on 30 May 1942, completion on 10 September 1943, and the four commanding officers. Mason dates the laying down to 21 May 1940. Uboat.net prints 21 March 1940. The May date is the one used. Uboat.net's later history, not used against Mason where they differ, says she was transferred to the Royal New Zealand Navy on 9 July 1956, decommissioned there on 4 June 1966, returned in 1967, sold to Nissho Co. in November 1967, and left Auckland under tow on 31 December 1967. Mason's disposal list is January 1968. The month he prints as Match is read as March because it sits between February and April. Operation Dracula is dated from Royalist's 28 April 1945 line. No casualty figure for Royalist was in these pages.