Quercus robur the oak tree at Boscobel House, where the future King Charles II hid from his Parliamentarian pursuers in 1650 during the English Civil War; the tree has since been known as the Royal Oak. This event was celebrated nationally on 29 May as Oak Apple Day, which is continued to this day in some communities. ‘The Royal Oak’ is the third most popular pub name in Britain (541 in 2007) and has been the name of eight major Royal Navy warships. The naval associations are strengthened by the fact that oak was the main construction material for sailing warships. The
HMS Royal Oak (08) carrying Basque child refugees, to England. In July, as the war in northern Spain flared up, "Royal Oak", along with the battleship This same period saw "Royal Oak" star alongside fourteen other Royal Navy vessels in the 1937 British film melodrama "Our Fighting Navy", the plot of which centres around a coup in the fictional South American republic of Bianco. "Royal Oak" portrays a rebel battleship "El Mirante", whose commander forces a British captain (played by Robert Douglas) into choosing between his lover and his duty. The film was poorly received by critics, but gained some redemption through its dramatic