The P class, nominally described as "patrol boats", was in effect a
class
Class or The Class may refer to:
Common uses not otherwise categorized
* Class (biology), a taxonomic rank
* Class (knowledge representation), a collection of individuals or objects
* Class (philosophy), an analytical concept used differentl ...
of British coastal
sloops
A sloop is a sailboat with a single mast typically having only one headsail in front of the mast and one mainsail aft of (behind) the mast. Such an arrangement is called a fore-and-aft rig, and can be rigged as a Bermuda rig with triangular sa ...
. Twenty-four ships to this design were ordered in May 1915 (numbered ''P.11'' to ''P.34'') and another thirty between February and June 1916 (numbered ''P.35'' to ''P.64'') under the
Emergency War Programme for the
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against F ...
in the
First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, although ten of the latter group were in December 1916 altered on the stocks before launch for use as decoy
Q-ship
Q-ships, also known as Q-boats, decoy vessels, special service ships, or mystery ships, were heavily armed merchant ships with concealed weaponry, designed to lure submarines into making surface attacks. This gave Q-ships the chance to open f ...
s and were renumbered as PC-class sloops. None were named initially, although in 1925 ''P.38'' was given the name ''Spey''.
These vessels were designed to replace
destroyer
In naval terminology, a destroyer is a fast, manoeuvrable, long-endurance warship intended to escort
larger vessels in a fleet, convoy or battle group and defend them against powerful short range attackers. They were originally developed in ...
s in coastal operations, but had twin screws, a very low freeboard, ram bows of hardened steel, a sharply cutaway funnel and a small turning circle. Clearly seen as the linear descendants of the late 19th century steam
torpedo boat
A torpedo boat is a relatively small and fast naval ship designed to carry torpedoes into battle. The first designs were steam-powered craft dedicated to ramming enemy ships with explosive spar torpedoes. Later evolutions launched variants of se ...
s and coastal destroyers, many were fitted with the 14-inch torpedo tubes removed from old torpedo boats.
With the survival of a builder's diary by William Bartram, full details of the sea trials of ''P.23'' on 21 June 1916 exist. She worked up to . Bartram's commissioned a model from
Sunderland
Sunderland () is a port city in Tyne and Wear, England. It is the City of Sunderland's administrative centre and in the Historic counties of England, historic county of County of Durham, Durham. The city is from Newcastle-upon-Tyne and is on t ...
modelmaker C Crawford & Sons and this model, in the collections of Sunderland Museum and Heritage Service, is stored in the model store of
Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums
Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums (TWAM) is a regional group of United Kingdom national museums and the county archives service located across the Tyne and Wear area of north-east England. They have been administered by a joint board of local author ...
Service at the
Discovery Museum
The Discovery Museum is a science museum and local history museum situated in Blandford Square in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. It displays many exhibits of local history, including the ship, '' Turbinia''. It is managed by Tyne & Wear Archives ...
.
PC class sloops
![Patrol boat HMS P32 - IWM Q 75571](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/42/Patrol_boat_HMS_P32_-_IWM_Q_75571.jpg)
Ten of these ships were completed as
Q-ships
Q-ships, also known as Q-boats, decoy vessels, special service ships, or mystery ships, were heavily armed merchant ships with concealed weaponry, designed to lure submarines into making surface attacks. This gave Q-ships the chance to open f ...
, with their numbers being altered by the addition of a "C" after the "P". These were termed the PC class sloops. A further batch of ten ships were ordered in 1917 (''PC.65'' to ''PC.70'' in January, and ''PC.71'' to ''PC.74'' in June) as PC class sloops. These were built to resemble small merchant vessels for use as decoy (Q) ships, and were alternatively known as "PQ" boats. Again, none were named, although in 1925 ''PC.73'' was given the name ''Dart'', while ''PC.55'' and ''PC.69'' were named ''Baluchi'' and ''Pathan'' respectively upon transfer to the
Royal Indian Navy
The Royal Indian Navy (RIN) was the naval force of British India and the Dominion of India. Along with the Presidency armies, later the Indian Army, and from 1932 the Royal Indian Air Force, it was one of the Armed Forces of British India.
Fr ...
in May 1922.
The PC-class sloops were completed with slight enlargement from the standard P-class sloops. They were 247 ft (overall) long and 25½ ft in breadth, although they had similar machinery. Displacement varied from 682 tons in ''PC.42'', ''PC.43'', ''PC.44'', ''PC.51'', ''PC.55'' and ''PC.56 '' to 694 tons in ''PC.60'' to ''PC.63'' and in ''PC.65'' to ''PC.74''. They carried one 4-inch and two 12-pounder guns, and no torpedo tubes.
Ships
References
* Dittmar, F. J. and J. J. Colledge. ''British Warships 1914–1919''. Shepperton, Surrey, UK: Ian Allan, 1972. .
* Gardiner, Robert and Randal Gray. ''Conway's All The World's Fighting Ships 1906–1921''. London: Conway Maritime Press, 1985. .
Further reading
* ''British and Empire Warships of the Second World War'', H T Lenton, 1998, Greenhill Books,
* ''Jane's Fighting Ships of World War I'', Janes Publishing, 1919
* ''The Grand Fleet, Warship Design and Development 1906–1922'', D. K. Brown, Chatham Publishing, 1999,
* ''P boats of the First World War – William Bartram and P23'' a
Ian Whitehead's blog
* Catalogue entry for TWCMS:B9633 P23 materials is a
then input TWCMS : B9663 .
External links
*
{{Frigates_of_the_Indian_Navy
Ship classes of the Royal Navy
Sloop classes
Sloops of the Royal Navy
Sloops of the United Kingdom