HMS Porcupine (G93)

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HMS Porcupine p1
Ship data
flag United KingdomUnited Kingdom (Naval War Flag) United Kingdom
Ship type destroyer
class O and P class
Shipyard Vickers Armstrong ,
Walker, Newcastle
Build number 24
Order October 20, 1939
Keel laying October 26, 1939
Launch June 10, 1941
Commissioning August 31, 1942
Whereabouts December 9, 1942 Torpedo hit (total loss), two harbor ships were built from the two hull parts
Ship dimensions and crew
length
105.1 m ( Lüa )
100.2 m ( Lpp )
width 10.67 m
Draft Max. 4.11 m
displacement 1570 ts , maximum: 2210 ts,
 
crew 176 men
Machine system
machine 2 Admiralty boilers
2 Parsons geared turbines
Machine
performance 		40,000
Top
speed 		37 kn (69 km / h)
propeller 2
Armament
Sensors

Radar type 286, sonar type 123A, 127

HMS Porcupine (G93) was a British destroyer of World War II . The destroyer was hit with a torpedo on December 9, 1942 by submarine U 602 northeast of Oran ; Seven men died on board the destroyer. Porcupine could be brought into Arzew . The destroyer was split in half and declared a total loss. The halves were transferred to Portsmouth and used as barges until 1946.

History of the ship

The tenth Porcupine was one of eight destroyers of the "P" class commissioned shortly after the start of World War II . Its name predecessor was an A-class destroyer also built on the Tyne near Palmer's Ship Building in Jarrow , which the Royal Navy used from 1896 to 1920. The new destroyer was built under the hull number 24 on the High Walker Yard of Vickers Armstrong . The keel of the destroyer with hull number 24 took place six days after the order was placed on December 26, 1939, together with the sister ships with hull numbers 22 ( Penn ) and 23 (as Persistent from the stack, in service as Petard ). The three newbuildings were launched in February 1941, most recently the Porcupine on June 10, 1941. The destroyer was delivered on August 31, 1942 as the last ship of the P subgroup of the class. When the construction contract for the destroyers was awarded, the shipyard still had the battleship King George V , the aircraft carrier Victorious and the cruiser Nigeria in the equipment and another cruiser ( Uganda ), two fleet destroyers ( Marne , Martin ) and four escort destroyers ( Eglington , Exmoor , Liddesdale , Oakley ) under construction. The shipyard was also supposed to build another battleship , which was abandoned after the outbreak of war.

Commissioning and first operations

After taking over the destroyer, the Porcupine and its crew began entering Scapa Flow in September at Home Fleet. The use of the destroyer was to take place with the Force H in Gibraltar , where the destroyer moved in October to join the 3rd Destroyer Flotilla . The sister ships Panther , Partridge , Pathfinder and Penn were already on duty there. The destroyers secured the convoys for the planned Allied landings in North Africa ( Operation Torch ).
On November 8, 1942, the flotilla secured the fleet with twelve other destroyers with the battleships Duke of York , Rodney , the battle cruiser Renown , the aircraft carriers Furious , Victorious , Formidable , the cruisers Bermuda , Argonaut and Sirius , which were supposed to prevent attacks against the landing forces .

The "Nieuw Zeeland" 1932

After the first landing phase, the emptied transporters usually returned quickly to Gibraltar in order to be used for further transports if necessary. In the sea area between the landing areas and the base, anti-submarine groups operated freely. On November 11, around 12:42 p.m., U 380 torpedoed the Nieuw Zeeland (11069 BRT, built in 1928) used as a troop transport on the way back to Gibraltar at 37 ° 57 '  N , 3 ° 58'  W , about 130 km from Gibraltar. 214 crew members, 29 gunners and 13 passengers left the sinking ship in twelve lifeboats; 14 men had already lost their lives as a result of the torpedo hit. Porcupine was able to save six boats, Albrighton five boats and the Dutch Isaac Sweers a boat with a total of 241 men, four of whom died on the way to Gibraltar. On the evening of November 12, 1942, Isaac Sweers and Porcupine refueled from the Force R tankers, the Dingledale (8145 BRT, built in 1941), Brown Ranger (3417 BRT, built in 1941), secured by the Corvette Coreopsis and four U - Hunting trawlers. The two destroyers stayed with the tankers overnight.

The last use of the Porcupine

From December 8, 1942, Porcupine secured the voyage of the transporters Otranto and Tegelbug and the submarine tender Maidstone from Gibraltar to Oran with Antelope , Boreas , Vanoc and the Polish Blyskawica . When the German submarine U 602 attacked the escort and fired four torpedoes at the Maidstone , only one hit, but the Porcupine . Seven men died and three were seriously injured on the destroyer. However, the destroyer was hit very badly as the hit almost divided it. The Vanoc therefore took over the crew of the Porcupine except for a small necessary remainder and the frigate Exe towed the heavily damaged destroyer towards Oran. The next morning a French tug took over the destroyer and towed it to the port of Arzew to be on the safe side .

HMS Pork and HMS Pine

The HMS Pine stern section next to the Swarthy tug

The difficult condition of the damaged vessel caused the French tug Arzeu to call in , while the small remaining crew of the destroyer tried to keep it stable by removing top weight. For the remaining stretch to Oran, as many higher weights as possible were dismantled. It was not until March 1943 that the destroyer, which had already been largely disarmed and temporarily sealed, was towed to Oran, where it was docked on the 28th for a thorough investigation. It is unclear whether a final decision about the fate of the Porcupine has been made here.
Its commander, the Australian Commander George Scott Stewart , had given up command on January 19, 1943 and on the 21st took command of the somewhat modern Quiberon in nearby Mers el Kebir .

In May and June 1943, the bow and stern sections of the destroyer were separated in Oran and both parts were prepared for a transfer to Gibraltar. In view of Operation Husky , the two parts were sent on tugboats to the UK. Now at the latest the decision was made not to reconstruct the destroyer from the existing parts. Jokingly as HMS Pork (bow section) and HMS Pine (stern section), the two parts were used from mid-January 1944 as barges at the Landing Craft Base in Stokes Bay near Portsmouth. In 1946 the two remains of the Porcupine were taken out of service and demolished in various shipyards in 1947.

Remarks

  1. ^ Destroyer Porcupine 1896
  2. ^ Rohwer: Sea War , November 5-15, 1942 Mediterranean
  3. ^ Nieuw Zeeland Dutch Troop Transport
  4. ↑ HNMS Isaac Sweers (G 83) Destroyer of the Gerard Callenburgh class
  5. ↑ Wacko: WWII ship named HMS porcupine was hit with a torpedo & was split in half. They then built two ships from her, named HMS Pork and HMS Pine

literature

  • Maurice Cocker: Destroyers of the Royal Navy, 1893-1981. Ian Allen (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 .
  • Alan Raven, John Roberts: War Built Destroyers O to Z Classes. Bivouac Books, London 1978, ISBN 0-85680-010-4 .
  • MJ Whitley: Destroyers of World War 2nd Naval Institute Press, Annapolis 1988, ISBN 0-87021-326-1 .

Web links

Commons : O and P class destroyers  - collection of images, videos and audio files