HMS Inconstant (H49)
 The inconstant
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The HMS Inconstant (H49) was one of four destroyers ordered by Turkey in Great Britain at the end of 1938 , construction of which began in May 1939. They were an export version of the British I-Class . In September 1939 the British government bought two of these destroyers, while the other two were contractually completed for political reasons and delivered to Turkey in 1942. The Inconstant was completed in January 1942 as the first ship in the series and was used by the Royal Navy until the end of the European war. After a major overhaul, the ship was handed over to the Turkish Navy in 1946 and was in service there until 1960 under the originally intended name Muavenet .
History of the ship
The Turkish Navy ordered four standard Royal Navy destroyers in Great Britain in 1938. The orders for the British I-class destroyers went to Vickers in Barrow and William Denny in Dumbarton . When the war broke out, Great Britain bought two of the ships and had the others built for Turkey. The keel laying of the two ships at Vickers took place on May 24, 1939 under construction numbers 747/748. They were launched on December 15, 1940 as Inconstant and February 24, 1941 as Ithuriel for the Royal Navy, while the destroyers started at Denny for Turkey in 1942 were completed as Sultanhisar and Demirhisar . The main difference between the Inconstant and the I-class destroyers manufactured for the Royal Navy in 1937 was that it did not receive the five-fold torpedo tubes introduced with the class, but the quadruple sets previously installed in the standard destroyers.
On January 24, 1942, the HMS Inconstant (H49) came into service with the Royal Navy after completing all test drives. She was the sixth ship in the Royal Navy to be named Inconstant since 1778. She was last carried by an Arethusa- class scout cruiser from 1914 to 1922.
War missions
The Inconstant began her service with the Home Fleet in Scapa Flow and her first deployment took place in the convoy operation PQ 12 / QP 8 in the North Sea . Then they relocated to the Eastern Fleet with the aircraft carrier Illustrious and the destroyer Javelin .
On April 28, 1942, the Inconstant belonged to the cover group that had left South Africa for the landing at Diego Suarez with the battleship Ramillies , the aircraft carrier Illustrious , the cruiser Hermione and the destroyers Active , Duncan , Javelin , Lookout , Paladin and Panther , which also had the fast ones Accompanied convoy Z with five attack transporters and three landing craft to Madagascar .
From June 12 to 16, 1942, the Inconstant was involved with the Pakenham and the Paladin in the Vigorous convoy operation of Alexandria to supply Malta . At the same time was of Gibraltar from the Operation Harpoon instead. The three destroyers of the 12th destroyer flotilla belonged to the cover group of the eastern convoy with seven light cruisers and a further eleven destroyers. On the afternoon of June 15, Ju 87 of Sturzkampfgeschwader 3 and Italian Cant Z.1007 damaged the light cruiser Birmingham by close hits, and the severely damaged cruiser had to be sunk by accompanying destroyers. Since the Italian fleet initially continued its advance, the British convoy turned away, whereupon the Italians began the march back to Taranto .
During the final British occupation of Madagascar from September 10 to November 5, 1942, the Inconstant secured the aircraft carrier Illustrious in the Indian Ocean , which provided air security, with the destroyers Hotspur , Express and Fortune and the seaplane mother ship Albatross .
At the beginning of July 1943, the Inconstant belonged to the security forces of the Allied landing on the south and south-east coast of Sicily ( Operation Husky ). On July 12, she sank U 409 northeast of Algiers with depth charges. Eleven men died on the submarine, 37 men were rescued and taken prisoner.
On September 1st, the Inconstant left Gibraltar in the association of the "3rd Escort Group" with the destroyer Wrestler , the sloop Chanticleer and four frigates as escort of the troop convoy MKF.22 to Great Britain. On the 4th, the convoy's security vehicles damaged the U 515 under Lieutenant Henke , which was sailing into the Atlantic, so severely that it had to turn back.
In the "8th Support Group" with the escort carrier Fencer , the destroyers Viscount , Whitehall , Wrestler and the Polish Garland and Burza , the Inconstant took part in "Operation Alacrity" from October 1 to 8, 1943. Together with the "Escort Group B5" (three destroyers, three corvettes and a sloop), the 8th Support Group secured the transfer of material and personnel in three small convoys for the RAF-Air Group 247 and smaller vehicles for local security to the Azores ; Allied air bases were to be established on the Azores islands of Fayal and Terceira . At the end of the month, the 8th Support Group supported Konvoi SC 145 (32 ships, Escort Group B6) with the Inconstant ; Approaching submarines were attacked early by the Fencer's swordfish , so that the convoy passed the German submarine group undisturbed.
On January 12, 1944, the Inconstant led the security group of convoy JW 56A with 20 steamers from Loch Ewe . The convoy got caught in a severe storm and had to call at Akureyri in Iceland , where five ships were left with storm damage. On January 21, the convoy with 15 ships left again. The Inconstant was assigned with two corvettes and two minesweepers to her security group of the escort group formed for the convoy. Run by the Hardy (II) , it included seven other destroyers. On the march, the Inconstant 68 rescued survivors of the Andrew G. Curtin (7200 GRT). On January 26, the Soviet destroyers Gremyashchi , Gromki and Razyarenny and smaller units picked up convoy JW 56A , which entered the Kolafjord on January 28 . The escort group ran towards the convoy JW 56B with six destroyers in order to strengthen its submarine security.
On April 7, 1944, the Inconstant belonged to the ocean escort of convoy RA.58 , which ran with 38 steamers from the Kolafjord to Iceland. Because of the heavy casualties on convoy JW.58 , the German air force was only able to fly nightly radar reconnaissance, which only captured the convoy on April 9th. Of the ten German submarines lined up in two groups, only four were unsuccessful with wren torpedoes against destroyers.
On April 21st, an escort force led by the cruiser Diadem marched with two escort carriers, the 3rd Destroyer Flotilla (eight destroyers), the 6th Support Group (four frigates) and the 8th Support Group (eight destroyers, including Inconstant , and one corvette) to the Kolafjord to pick up the convoy RA 59 . On April 28, RA 59 went to sea, the ships of which were also carried on board by the American crew of the cruiser Milwaukee , which had been handed over to the Soviet Union, as well as around 2,300 sailors from the Red Fleet , who were to take over British units in Great Britain as a share of the Italian spoils of war. The convoy was discovered early by the German aerial reconnaissance, but only attacked by twelve submarines. All they could do was sink a freighter and shoot down a Martlett .
To secure the planned invasion area in Normandy , ten new defense groups were formed in May 1944 in order to prevent German submarines from advancing to the supply and reinforcement convoys and the ships providing artillery support across the English Channel. The Inconstant was used from June 6, 1944 in the "14th Escort Group" with Hesperus , Havelock , Fame and Icarus . On June 18, the Inconstant with the Fame and the Havelock sank the German submarine U 767 near Guernsey (a survivor).
The 14th Escort Group later relocated to Liverpool with the destroyers Duncan , Havelock , Icarus and Inconstant as well as the destroyers Fame (SO), Forester , Hotspur and the Canadian Assiniboine, which were in repair or docking time . Together with the "2nd Escort Group" (one sloop and five frigates), the destroyers operated from there in the western approaches and in the Irish Channel.
In mid-March 1945, the 14th Escort Group relocated to Portsmouth with the destroyers Havelock (SO), Duncan , Hesperus , Hotspur , Icarus , Inconstant and Assiniboine , while the Forester was still doing test drives after a lay in the shipyard and the Fame and the Saskatchewan were under repair. The group then operated mainly in the English Channel next to the 1st Escort Group (six destroyer escorts ) and the Canadian escort groups 26 (five frigates) and 9 (nine frigates, only four operational). In April, the Inconstant began a routine docking time in Liverpool. In May the ship came back into service in Europe after the end of the war and was stationed in Plymouth .
A major overhaul of the ship began on September 13, 1945 and at the beginning of October the Admiralty agreed to transfer it to Turkey. The armament then consisted of four 120-mm guns, four individual 20-mm Oerlikons and a quadruple torpedo tube set. The destroyer was the first Turkish ship to have a modern radar system. On January 27, 1946, the overhaul of the ship was completed, which then sailed under the British flag into the Mediterranean and was handed over to the Turkish Navy in a ceremony in Istanbul on March 9, 1946 and renamed Muavanet (as planned in 1939).
In Turkish service
With the takeover of Inconstant on March 9, 1946, the Turkish Navy still received its Muavenet . With its name it was reminiscent of the Schichau destroyer Muavenet-i Milliye , who sank the British ship of the line Goliath in 1915 during the defense of the Dardanelles . The sister ship Ithuriel (H05) was badly damaged off Algeria in November 1942. It was still towed to Great Britain in 1944, only to be scrapped as a total loss from August 1944. As a replacement, the British therefore be delivered mid-1946 nor the fully repaired destroyer Oribi the O-class .
A fundamental modernization of the ships did not take place during the service time in Turkey. Only the anti-aircraft armament for close range was changed in the early 1950s with the installation of six 40 mm L / 56 Bofors guns and the delivery of two Oerlikons.
In 1960, the Muavenet ex Inconstant and her two always Turkish sisters were separated and then canceled after the Turkish Navy had received more modern destroyers from American and British stocks (four M-class ships ). Only the similar Gayret ex Oribi remained in service as a training ship for another five years .
More ships named Muavenet
The name Muavenet was given to the USS Gwin (DM-33) of the Allen-M.-Sumner class, which was taken over by Turkey in 1972 and which was lost on October 1, 1992 when it was carried out by two Sea Sparrow during a joint maneuver in the Aegean Sea Missile of the USS Saratoga was hit. Six crew members of the Muavenet died, another thirteen were seriously injured. Almost all officers on board were killed or injured when a missile hit the ship's command center.
From 1993 to 2012 the Turkish Navy once again had a ship with the traditional name with the frigate Muavenet (ex- Capodanno ) of the Knox class .
Footnotes
- ^ Rohwer: Chronicle of the naval war. P. 373.
- ^ Rohwer, p. 391
- ^ Rohwer, p. 395
- ↑ a b Rohwer, p. 456
literature
- Maurice Cocker: Destroyers of the Royal Navy, 1893-1981. Ian Allan, 1983, ISBN 0-7110-1075-7
- Norman Friedman: British Destroyers: From Earliest Days to the Second World War. Seaforth Publishing, Barnsley 2009, ISBN 978-1-84832-049-9 .
- HT Lenton: Warships of the British and Commonwealth Navies. Ian Allan, 1969.
- Antony Preston: Destroyers. Hamlyn, ISBN 0-600-32955-0 .
- Jürgen Rohwer , Gerhard Hümmelchen : Chronicle of the naval war 1939-1945. Manfred Pawlak Verlagsgesellschaft, Herrsching 1968, ISBN 3-88199-009-7 .
- MJ Whitley: Destroyers of World War 2nd Naval Institute Press, Annapolis 1988, ISBN 0-87021-326-1 .
Web links
- HMS Inconstant , destroyer
- HMS Inconstant uboat.net
- ex-Turkish destroyers (1942)
- DEMİRHİSAR destroyers (1942, 1942/1946)
HMS Inglefield † (Flotilla Leader)
HMS Icarus |
HMS Ilex |
HMS Imogen † |
HMS Imperial † |
HMS Impulsive |
HMS Intrepid † |
HMS Isis † |
HMS Ivanhoe †
built for Turkey: HMS Inconstant | HMS Ithuriel †
Demirhisar Class : Demirhisar | Sultanhisar | Muavenet ex Inconstant