HMS Eagle was originally ordered by Chile and was laid down before WWI. In early 1918 she was requisitioned by Britain for conversion to an aircraft carrier and was finished in 1924. She was initially assigned to the Mediterranean Fleet and then later to the China Station.

Eagle spent the first nine months of WWII in the Indian Ocean searching for German commerce raiders.  She was transferred to the Mediterranean in May 1940, where she escorted convoys to Malta and Greece and attacked Italian shipping, naval units and bases in the Eastern Mediterranean.

She was relieved in March 1941 and deployed to hunt for Axis shipping in the Indian Ocean and South Atlantic. After completing a major refit in early 1942, she made several trips delivering fighter aircraft to Malta to boost its air defences

 Eagle was torpedoed and sunk by U-73 on 11 August 1942 while escorting a convoy to Malta during Operation Pedestal.