HMS Battleaxe (D118)
HMS Battleaxe
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| History | |
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 United Kingdom
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| Name: | HMS Battleaxe |
| Ordered: | 7 April 1943 |
| Builder: | Yarrow Shipbuilders |
| Laid down: | 22 April 1944 |
| Launched: | 12 June 1945 |
| Identification: | Pennant number G18/D118 |
| Fate: | Arrived at Blyth for scrapping on 20 October 1964 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Weapon-class destroyer |
| Displacement: | 1,980 tons standard |
| Length: | 365 ft (111 m) |
| Beam: | 38 ft (12 m) |
| Armament: |
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HMS Battleaxe was a Weapon-class destroyer of the Royal Navy, completed just after the Second World War.
Battleaxe was one of 19 Weapon-class destroyers ordered as part of the Royal Navy's 1943 War Programme. The Weapons were intended to be built in shipyards where the larger Battle class could not be built, but still mounting the heavy anti-aircraft armament and modern fire-control which war experience had shown to be necessary. As designed, the Weapons were to be armed by six 4-in guns in three twin turrets, two forward and one aft, with radar direction, with a close-in anti-aircraft armament of six 40-mm Bofors guns. Ten 21-inch torpedo tubes were carried in two quintuple mounts, while up to 150 depth charges could be carried.
Battleaxe was laid down on at Yarrows Scotstoun shipyard in Glasgow on 22 April 1944, and was launched on 12 June 1945. The end of the Second World War meant that most of the class were cancelled, with the remaining four ships, including Battleaxe having their armament fit revised to improve their anti-submarine capability. One of the ships' four inch mounts (in Battleaxe's case the superimposed forward B-mount, leaving one turret forward and another aft) was removed to allow the fitting of two Squid anti-submarine mortars, while the conventional depth charge armament was also removed.Battleaxe commissioned on 23 October 1947, the first of the four Weapon class to be completed.
On commissioning, Battleaxe served as the leader of the Home Fleet's 6th Destroyer Flotilla, which consisted of the four Weapons. It remained part of the 6th Flotilla through the rest of the 1940s and well into the 1950s, deploying to form part of the Mediterranean Fleet from April 1955 to March 1956. In 1953 she took part in the Fleet Review to celebrate the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. Later in 1956, Battleaxe was laid off into the reserve.
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