HMS Grenville (R97)
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HMS ''Grenville'' was the second ship of this name to serve with the Royal Navy in the
Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
. ''Grenville'' and seven other U-class destroyers were ordered as part of the Emergency Programme. She was launched at
Swan Hunter Swan Hunter, formerly known as Swan Hunter & Wigham Richardson, is a shipbuilding design, engineering, and management company, based in Wallsend, Tyne and Wear, England. At its apex, the company represented the combined forces of three powe ...
and Wigham Richardson Ltd., Wallsend-on-Tyne on 12 October 1942 and commissioned on 27 May 1943. The Royal Navy's practice had been to name all destroyers of a class with names starting with the class letter, in this "U". However, the Royal Navy had reverted to an earlier practice of naming the flotilla leader after a prominent historical seaman, in this case after Vice Admiral Sir
Richard Grenville Sir Richard Grenville (15 June 1542 – 10 September 1591), also spelt Greynvile, Greeneville, and Greenfield, was an English privateer and explorer. Grenville was lord of the manors of Stowe, Cornwall and Bideford, Devon. He subsequently ...
, an
Elizabethan The Elizabethan era is the epoch in the Tudor period of the history of England during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (1558–1603). Historians often depict it as the golden age in English history. The symbol of Britannia (a female personifi ...
soldier and sailor.


Design and construction

''Grenville'' was one of eight U-class destroyers ordered as the 7th Emergency Flotilla on 12 June 1941, and was fitted as
leader Leadership, both as a research area and as a practical skill, encompasses the ability of an individual, group or organization to "lead", influence or guide other individuals, teams, or entire organizations. The word "leadership" often gets vi ...
. The U-class were
War Emergency Programme destroyers The War Emergency Programme destroyers were destroyers built for the British Royal Navy during World War I and World War II. World War I emergency programmes The 323 destroyers ordered during the First World War belonged to several different cl ...
, intended for general duties, including use as anti-submarine escort, and were to be suitable for mass-production. They were based on the hull and machinery of the pre-war J-class destroyers, but with a lighter armament (effectively whatever armament was available) in order to speed production. The U-class were almost identical to the S-class ordered as the 5th Emergency Flotilla and the R-class ordered as the 6th Emergency Flotilla earlier in the year, but were not fitted for operations in Arctic waters. The U-class were
long overall __NOTOC__ Length overall (LOA, o/a, o.a. or oa) is the maximum length of a vessel's hull measured parallel to the waterline. This length is important while docking the ship. It is the most commonly used way of expressing the size of a ship, an ...
, at the waterline and
between perpendiculars Length between perpendiculars (often abbreviated as p/p, p.p., pp, LPP, LBP or Length BPP) is the length of a ship along the summer load line from the forward surface of the stem, or main bow perpendicular member, to the after surface of the stern ...
, with a
beam Beam may refer to: Streams of particles or energy *Light beam, or beam of light, a directional projection of light energy **Laser beam *Particle beam, a stream of charged or neutral particles **Charged particle beam, a spatially localized grou ...
of and a draught of mean and full load.
Displacement Displacement may refer to: Physical sciences Mathematics and Physics *Displacement (geometry), is the difference between the final and initial position of a point trajectory (for instance, the center of mass of a moving object). The actual path ...
was standard and full load. Two Admiralty 3-drum water-tube boilers supplied steam at and to two sets of
Parsons Parsons may refer to: Places In the United States: * Parsons, Kansas, a city * Parsons, Missouri, an unincorporated community * Parsons, Tennessee, a city * Parsons, West Virginia, a town * Camp Parsons, a Boy Scout camp in the state of Washingt ...
single-reduction geared
steam turbine A steam turbine is a machine that extracts thermal energy from pressurized steam and uses it to do mechanical work on a rotating output shaft. Its modern manifestation was invented by Charles Parsons in 1884. Fabrication of a modern steam turbin ...
s, which drove two propeller shafts. The machinery was rated at giving a maximum speed of and at full load. 615 tons of oil were carried, giving a range of at . The ship had a main gun armament of four 4.7 inch (120 mm) QF Mk. IX guns, capable of elevating to an angle of 55 degrees, giving a degree of anti-aircraft capability. The close-in anti-aircraft armament for the class was one Hazemayer stabilised twin mount for the
Bofors 40 mm gun Bofors 40 mm gun is a name or designation given to two models of 40 mm calibre anti-aircraft guns designed and developed by the Swedish company Bofors: *Bofors 40 mm L/60 gun - developed in the 1930s, widely used in World War II and into the 1990s ...
and four twin
Oerlikon 20 mm cannon The Oerlikon 20 mm cannon is a series of autocannons, based on an original German Becker Type M2 20 mm cannon design that appeared very early in World War I. It was widely produced by Oerlikon Contraves and others, with various models emplo ...
s. This was modified in 1945, with 5 single 40mm Bofors guns added, with one manually-operated Mark III mount in the searchlight position and four power-operated "Boffin" mounts replacing the twin Oerlikon mounts. Two quadruple mounts for 21 inch (533 mm) torpedoes were fitted (these were actually spare quintuple mounts with the centre tube removed), while the ship had an depth charge outfit of four depth charge mortars and two racks, with a total of 70 charges carried. ''Grenville'' was fitted with a Type 291 air warning
radar Radar is a detection system that uses radio waves to determine the distance (''ranging''), angle, and radial velocity of objects relative to the site. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, w ...
on the ship's tripod
foremast The mast of a Sailing ship, sailing vessel is a tall spar (sailing), spar, or arrangement of spars, erected more or less vertically on the centre-line of a ship or boat. Its purposes include carrying sails, spars, and derricks, and giving necessa ...
, together with a
high-frequency direction finding High-frequency direction finding, usually known by its abbreviation HF/DF or nickname huff-duff, is a type of radio direction finder (RDF) introduced in World War II. High frequency (HF) refers to a radio band that can effectively communicate over ...
(HF/DF) aerial, with the tripod mast later replaced by a lattice mast. A Type 285 fire control radar integrated with the ship's high-angle gun director, while the Hazemayer mount had an integrated Type 282 radar. As leader, ''Grenville'' had a crew of 225 officers and other ranks. ''Grenville'' was
laid down Laying the keel or laying down is the formal recognition of the start of a ship's construction. It is often marked with a ceremony attended by dignitaries from the shipbuilding company and the ultimate owners of the ship. Keel laying is one o ...
at
Swan Hunter Swan Hunter, formerly known as Swan Hunter & Wigham Richardson, is a shipbuilding design, engineering, and management company, based in Wallsend, Tyne and Wear, England. At its apex, the company represented the combined forces of three powe ...
's
Wallsend Wallsend is a town in North Tyneside, England, at the eastern end of Hadrian's Wall. It has a population of 43,842 and lies east of Newcastle upon Tyne. History Roman Wallsend In Roman times, this was the site of the fort of Segedunum. This fo ...
shipyard on 1 November 1941 and was launched on 12 October 1942. She was completed on 27 May 1943, and assigned the
Pennant number In the Royal Navy and other navies of Europe and the Commonwealth of Nations, ships are identified by pennant number (an internationalisation of ''pendant number'', which it was called before 1948). Historically, naval ships flew a flag that iden ...
R97.


Type 15 modification

After the end of the Second World War and as the
Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...
started, the Royal Navy found itself with a shortage of fast anti-submarine escorts capable of dealing with modern Soviet diesel-electric submarines, with existing sloops and frigates too slow. At the same time, the relatively recent War Emergency destroyers, with their low-angle guns and basic fire control systems, were considered unsuitable for modern warfare, so it was decided to convert these obsolete destroyers into fast escorts, acting as a stop-gap solution until new-build ships, such as the
Type 12 frigate Type 12 frigate refers to several ship classes, most commonly the three ship classes of the Royal Navy designed during the 1950s and constructed during the 1960s. * The first Type 12 frigates, designed as convoy escorts, were later named the . Six ...
s could be built in sufficient numbers. The
Type 15 frigate The Type 15 frigate was a class of United Kingdom, British anti-submarine warfare, anti-submarine frigates of the Royal Navy. They were conversions based on the hulls of World War II-era destroyers built to the standard War Emergency Programme d ...
was a rebuild of War Emergency destroyers into 'first-rate' anti-submarine ships, with similar anti-submarine equipment as the new frigates. The ships' superstructure and armament was removed, with the ships'
forecastle The forecastle ( ; contracted as fo'c'sle or fo'c's'le) is the upper deck of a sailing ship forward of the foremast, or, historically, the forward part of a ship with the sailors' living quarters. Related to the latter meaning is the phrase " be ...
extended rearwards and a new, low but full width superstructure fitted. The revised ships had a much reduced gun armament of one twin 4-inch (102 mm) anti aircraft mount aft of the main superstructure and one twin Bofors mount, but anti-submarine equipment was as fitted to the Type 12s, with ''Grenville'' being fitted with two
Limbo In Catholic theology, Limbo (Latin '' limbus'', edge or boundary, referring to the edge of Hell) is the afterlife condition of those who die in original sin without being assigned to the Hell of the Damned. Medieval theologians of Western Euro ...
anti-submarine mortars, directed by Type 170 and 172 sonar.


Service history


Second World War service

In late August 1943, ''Grenville'' and the Canadian destroyer formed the force covering
anti-submarine An anti-submarine weapon (ASW) is any one of a number of devices that are intended to act against a submarine and its crew, to destroy (sink) the vessel or reduce its capability as a weapon of war. In its simplest sense, an anti-submarine weapo ...
sweeps by the Canadian 5th Support group, off north-west Spain. These ships were attacked by eighteen
Dornier Do 217 The Dornier Do 217 was a bomber used by the German ''Luftwaffe'' during World War II as a more powerful development of the Dornier Do 17, known as the ''Fliegender Bleistift'' (German: "flying pencil"). Designed in 1937 and 1938 as a heavy bomber ...
s using
Henschel Henschel & Son (german: Henschel und Sohn) was a German company, located in Kassel, best known during the 20th century as a maker of transportation equipment, including locomotives, trucks, buses and trolleybuses, and armoured fighting vehicle ...
Hs293 A-1 glider bombs. ''Athabaskan'' was heavily damaged and the
sloop 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 ...
was sunk with the loss of 194 of her crew. After this, the
U-boat U-boats were naval submarines operated by Germany, particularly in the First and Second World Wars. Although at times they were efficient fleet weapons against enemy naval warships, they were most effectively used in an economic warfare role ...
hunt was abandoned. Later on, in September and October, ''Grenville'' was involved in a series of blockade runner sweeps along the French coast ( Operation Tunnel). On 4 October, she joined in an action with enemy destroyers in which she was hit and suffered a small number of casualties. Later in October, during another of these sweeps, ''Grenville'' was with the cruiser and other destroyers in another, more disastrous, Operation Tunnel action against a blockade runner off the north coast of
Brittany Brittany (; french: link=no, Bretagne ; br, Breizh, or ; Gallo language, Gallo: ''Bertaèyn'' ) is a peninsula, Historical region, historical country and cultural area in the west of modern France, covering the western part of what was known ...
. In this operation, the cruiser ''Charybdis'' and destroyer ''Limbourne'' were sunk by German s. In November, ''Grenville'' joined the 24th Destroyer Flotilla and the
Mediterranean Fleet The British Mediterranean Fleet, also known as the Mediterranean Station, was a formation of the Royal Navy. The Fleet was one of the most prestigious commands in the navy for the majority of its history, defending the vital sea link between t ...
. In the Mediterranean, she supported the Anzio landings, sunk an
E-boat E-boat was the Western Allies' designation for the fast attack craft (German: ''Schnellboot'', or ''S-Boot'', meaning "fast boat") of the Kriegsmarine during World War II; ''E-boat'' could refer to a patrol craft from an armed motorboat to a lar ...
and destroyed a train near San Giorgio on the
Adriatic Sea The Adriatic Sea () is a body of water separating the Italian Peninsula from the Balkan Peninsula. The Adriatic is the northernmost arm of the Mediterranean Sea, extending from the Strait of Otranto (where it connects to the Ionian Sea) to t ...
. On 3 December, she was ordered to refuel, arriving immediately after the
air raid on Bari The air raid on Bari (german: Luftangriff auf den Hafen von Bari, it, Bombardamento di Bari) was an air attack by German bombers on Allied forces and shipping in Bari, Italy, on 2 December 1943, during World War II. 105 German Junkers Ju 88 bo ...
, a
mustard gas Mustard gas or sulfur mustard is a chemical compound belonging to a family of cytotoxic and blister agents known as mustard agents. The name ''mustard gas'' is technically incorrect: the substance, when dispersed, is often not actually a gas, b ...
disaster. In May 1944, ''Grenville'' returned to Britain and in June took part in the
landings in Normandy The Normandy landings were the landing operations and associated airborne operations on Tuesday, 6 June 1944 of the Allied invasion of Normandy in Operation Overlord during World War II. Codenamed Operation Neptune and often referred to as ...
. At the end of 1944, after a refit on the
Humber The Humber is a large tidal estuary on the east coast of Northern England. It is formed at Trent Falls, Faxfleet, by the confluence of the tidal rivers Ouse and Trent. From there to the North Sea, it forms part of the boundary between th ...
, she left for the Indian Ocean where she joined operations against the Japanese. In January 1945, ''Grenville'' and three other U-class destroyers forming the 26th Destroyer Flotilla, escorted the British carrier force (Task Force 63) that became the
British Pacific Fleet The British Pacific Fleet (BPF) was a Royal Navy formation that saw action against Japan during the Second World War. The fleet was composed of empire naval vessels. The BPF formally came into being on 22 November 1944 from the remaining ships ...
. After raids against Japanese installations on
Sumatra Sumatra is one of the Sunda Islands of western Indonesia. It is the largest island that is fully within Indonesian territory, as well as the sixth-largest island in the world at 473,481 km2 (182,812 mi.2), not including adjacent i ...
, TF63 left for
Okinawa is a prefecture of Japan. Okinawa Prefecture is the southernmost and westernmost prefecture of Japan, has a population of 1,457,162 (as of 2 February 2020) and a geographic area of 2,281 km2 (880 sq mi). Naha is the capital and largest city ...
, via
Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...
, where there were air strikes on Japanese airfields in support of
Operation Iceberg Operation or Operations may refer to: Arts, entertainment and media * ''Operation'' (game), a battery-operated board game that challenges dexterity * Operation (music), a term used in musical set theory * ''Operations'' (magazine), Multi-Man ...
. Later, ''Grenville'' participated in the final raids on the Japanese home islands. Near the end of the Pacific war, several Allied warships began to relay Australian programmes to surrounding areas on shortwave. ''Grenville'' was one of these heard relaying the commercial programmes from 2KY Sydney in January 1946.


Post-war

''Grenville'' served as part of the 25th Destroyer Flotilla in the Pacific and in 1946 and returned to Portsmouth where she was placed in reserve. In 1951 she served as part of the Plymouth Local Flotilla and was used as an air training target vessel in October 1951. She collided with the Italian ship ''Alceo'', off Start Point, Devon. Three crewmen on the ''Grenville'' died and another four were listed as missing. After repairs she was re-commissioned at Devonport on 5 August 1952. In 1953 - 54, she was extensively converted and re-armed into a
Type 15 frigate The Type 15 frigate was a class of United Kingdom, British anti-submarine warfare, anti-submarine frigates of the Royal Navy. They were conversions based on the hulls of World War II-era destroyers built to the standard War Emergency Programme d ...
. On 19 March 1954 she re-commissioned as leader of the 2nd Training Squadron, based at Portland. In 1957 she was fitted with an experimental helicopter landing pad for use during trials with the
Fairey Ultra-light Helicopter The Fairey Ultra-light Helicopter was a small British military helicopter intended to be used for reconnaissance and casualty evacuation, designed by the Fairey Aviation Company. The Ultra-light had been conceived of as a straightforward, low ...
. In December 1958 she replaced in the 5th Frigate Squadron. Between 1960 and 1964 she was held in reserve at Gibraltar. In June 1966 she arrived back in Portsmouth under tow and was subsequently fitted with a third mast carrying experimental air-search
radar Radar is a detection system that uses radio waves to determine the distance (''ranging''), angle, and radial velocity of objects relative to the site. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, w ...
, prior to its operational use in s. She attended Portsmouth Navy Days in 1967. In 1969 she replaced in the 2nd Frigate Squadron. In 1970 she was again present at Portsmouth Navy Days; at the time she was a trials ship for the Admiralty Surface Weapons Establishment (ASWE).Programme, ''Navy Days Portsmouth, 29th–31st August 1970'', p19. ''Grenville'' was paid off in 1974 and laid up in Portsmouth before being scrapped on the River Medway in 1983.


References


Publications

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Further reading

*


External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Grenville (R97) U and V-class destroyers of the Royal Navy Ships built by Swan Hunter Ships built on the River Tyne 1942 ships World War II destroyers of the United Kingdom Radio ships Cold War destroyers of the United Kingdom Type 15 frigates Cold War frigates of the United Kingdom Maritime incidents in 1951