text: During World War I, Lowestoft was bombarded by the German Navy on 24 April 1916 in conjunction with the Easter Rising. The port was a major naval base during the war, including for armed trawlers such as Ethel & Millie and Nelson used to combat German U-boat actions in the North Sea such as that of 15 August 1917. In World War II the town was heavily bombed by the Luftwaffe for its engineering industry and role as a naval base. It is sometimes placed among the UK's most heavily bombed towns per head of population. The Royal Naval Patrol Service was mobilised in August 1939, mainly by trawlermen and fishermen of the Royal Naval Reserve. Its depot, HMS Europa, was also known locally as the Sparrow's Nest.
  Governance
  Lowestoft is the major settlement in the East Suffolk district. It lost its status as a municipal borough in 1974, but retained a ceremonial mayor elected annually by its district councillors and acting as charter trustees until 2017. Suffolk County Council is the county authority. A civil parish of Lowestoft was created on 1 April 2017, governed by Lowestoft Town Council, which elects a town mayor annually.
  The town is part of the  Lowestoft parliamentary constituency.
  Before 1 April 2019, Lowestoft, as part of Waveney District Council, was divided into ten electoral wards, with Carlton Colville treated as a separate electoral area. Harbour, Kirkley, Normanston, Pakefield, St Margarets and Whitton wards elected three councillors each, and Carlton, Gunton and Corton, Oulton and Oulton Broad wards two. Of the 48 council seats in the district, 26 represented wards within Lowestoft and three were in Carlton Colville. In 2010 the council changed to a system of all seats being elected every four years.