USS Twiggs (DD-127)
![]() HMS Leamington, ex-Twiggs
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History | |
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Name | USS Twiggs |
Namesake | Levi Twiggs |
Builder | New York Shipbuilding Corporation, Camden, New Jersey |
Laid down | 23 January 1918 |
Launched | 28 September 1918 |
Commissioned | 28 July 1919 to |
Decommissioned | 24 June 1922 |
Recommissioned | 20 February 1930 |
Decommissioned | 6 April 1937 |
Recommissioned | 30 September 1939 |
Decommissioned | 23 October 1940 |
Stricken | 8 January 1941 |
Identification | DD-127 |
Fate | Transferred to UK, 23 October 1940 |
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Name | HMS Leamington |
Acquired | 23 October 1940 |
Identification | Pennant number: G19 |
Fate | Transferred to USSR, 16 July 1944 |
Notes | Transferred to Canada October 1942; returned to United Kingdom December 1943 or January 1944 |
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Name | Leamington |
Acquired | October 1942 |
Honours and awards | Arctic 1942, Atlantic 1944-45 |
Fate | Returned to United Kingdom, December 1943 or January 1944 |
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Name | Zhguchy (Жгучий / Fiery) |
Acquired | 16 July 1944 |
Fate | Returned to UK, 1950 and scrapped, on 26 July 1951 |
General characteristics | |
Class and type | Wickes-class destroyer |
Displacement | 1,306 long tons (1,327 t) |
Length | 314 ft 4 in (95.81 m) |
Beam | 30 ft 11 in (9.42 m) |
Draft | 9 ft 9 in (2.97 m) |
Propulsion |
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Speed | 35 kn (40 mph; 65 km/h) |
Complement | 122 officers and enlisted |
Armament |
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The first USS Twiggs (DD–127) was a
Service history
Twiggs was
Following shakedown, the destroyer joined Destroyer Division 16 (DesDiv 16), Destroyer Squadron 4 (Desron 4),
After almost eight years of inactivity, Twiggs was placed in commission again on 20 February 1930 at San Diego. She became flagship of DesDiv 14 and conducted operations out of San Diego with the
Towards the end of the destroyer's sojourn in San Diego's "red lead row",
As flagship for DesDiv 64, DesRon 32, Twiggs initially operated out of San Diego on shakedown and training cruises through November. In company with eight of her
During her subsequent operations with DesDiv 64, Twiggs conducted neutrality patrols, training cruises for Naval Reserve contingents, battle practices, and exercises through the summer of 1940.
Meanwhile, by the spring of 1940, the Allied cause had taken a decided turn for the worse, as Norway fell after a disastrous British-Norwegian defense, and France and the Low Countries crumbled under the German blitzkrieg. In addition, German submarines—preying upon the convoys in the Atlantic which served as England's lifeline—began taking heavy tolls on both the cargo ships and their escorts. After the fall of France, Britain found herself very much alone in her struggle to prevent German hegemony in Europe.
With British destroyer forces in bad shape (the beatings taken in Norway, in the Atlantic convoy lanes, and in the
As the summer of 1940 gave way to fall, Twiggs began preparation for her transfer to Britain. She arrived at
Turned over to the Royal Navy on 23 October 1940, the flush-decker became HMS Leamington, with the
Leamington arrived at Devonport Dockyard, on 15 November, where she was refitted for Royal Navy service. After workup and training, the destroyer was allocated to the 2nd Escort Group, Western Approaches Command, based at Londonderry Port.[1] She conducted convoy escort missions across the Atlantic into 1941. On 28 April 1941, Leamington was one of three escorts detached from Convoy OB 314 to reinforce Convoy HX 121, under attack by German U-boats. When the corvette Gladiolus detected a submarine on her sonar, Leamington and sister ship Roxborough joined Gladiolus in attacking the contact. Although Gladiolus was credited with sinking the submarine, post-war analysis showed that the submarine, U-96 was undamaged.[2][3] On 27 May 1941, Leamington was part of the escort of Convoy OB 325 when she collided with the Norwegian merchant ship Thyra, which sank, killing five aboard the merchant ship.[1][4] Leamington was under repair at Liverpool until July that year, when she rejoined the 2nd Escort Group, which moved to Iceland in September.[5] On 11 September, the 2nd Escort Group, including Leamington was sent to reinforce Convoy SC 42 under heavy attack off the east coast of Greenland from the U-boats of the wolfpack Markgraf, which had sunk 15 ships from the convoy already. On the afternoon of 11 September, Leamington and the destroyer HMS Veteran were sent ahead of the convoy to investigate a sighting by an aircraft of a submarine ahead of the Convoy. The two destroyers spotted U-207 on the surface and carried out a series of depth charge attacks against the submarine, which was destroyed with no survivors.[6][7]
On 23 March 1942, the fast troop convoy WS 17 set out from the United Kingdom to
Leamington was refitted at Hartlepool, England, between July and November 1942. On 12 November, the Panamian registry merchantman SS Buchanan was torpedoed by U-224. Thirteen days later, Leamington—assisted by aircraft—located one of the freighter's four lifeboats and took aboard its 17 uninjured sailors.[1][12][13]
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/01/HMCS_Leamington_Halifax_Jan_1943_LAC_3566566.jpeg/220px-HMCS_Leamington_Halifax_Jan_1943_LAC_3566566.jpeg)
In November 1942, the Royal Navy transferred Leamington to the
In April 1943,
Departing Halifax on 22 December, Leamington returned to the British Isles and reverted to Royal Navy control. After a period of service based at Rosyth, Scotland, Leamington was placed in reserve at the Tyne. However, on 16 June 1944, the British loaned the ship to the Russians, who renamed her Zhguchy (rus. Жгучий, "Fiery"). She served under the Russian flag through 1949 and was returned to Great Britain in 1950, when she starred in the Trevor Howard film Gift Horse as the fictional "HMS Ballantrae", (ex- "USS Whittier") which depicted the St Nazaire Raid. She was subsequently sold to John Cashmore Ltd and broken up for scrap at Newport, Wales on 26 July 1951.
References
Notes
- ^ Blair singles out Leamington from the eleven British destroyers on loan to the Canadians, including ten Town-class destroyers as being unsuitable for open ocean operations due to poor endurance.[15]
- ^ Both Hague[1] and Mason[5] state that the collision occurred in April, with repair work starting on 15 April, with the DANFS entry for Albatross stating that the collision occurred on 11 April.[16] The DANFS entry for Twiggs/Leamington states that the collision took place on 27 May.[12]
Citations
- ^ a b c d e Hague 1988, p. 54.
- ^ Blair Hitler's U Boat War: The Hunters 1939–42 2000, pp. 271–273.
- ^ Helgason, Guðmundur. "U-96". uboat.net. Retrieved 25 January 2015.
- ^ Lawson, Siri (15 September 2012). "D/S Thyra". Warsailors.com. Retrieved 25 January 2015.
- ^ Blair Hitler's U Boat War: The Hunters 1939–42 2000, pp. 361–363.
- ^ Helgason, Guðmundur. "U-207". uboat.net. Retrieved 25 January 2015.
- ^ Blair Hitler's U Boat War: The Hunters 1939–42 2000, p. 513.
- ^ Rohwer and Hümmelchen 1992, p. 132.
- ^ Rohwer and Hümmelchen 1992, pp. 147–148.
- ^ Blair Hitler's U Boat War: The Hunters 1939–42 2000, pp. 640–645.
- ^ a b c d "Twiggs". Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. Naval History and Heritage Command. Retrieved 31 January 2015.
- ^ Helgason, Guðmundur. "Buchanan: Panamanian Motor merchant". Retrieved 31 January 2015.
- ^ Hague 1988, pp. 19, 54.
- ^ Blair Hitler's U Boat War: The Hunted, 1942–1945 2000, p. 242.
- ^ "Albatross (AM-71) iv". Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. Naval History and Heritage Command. Retrieved 2 February 2015.
Sources
This article incorporates text from the public domain Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships. The entry can be found here.
- Blair, Clay (2000). Hitler's U-Boat War: The Hunters 1939–1942. London: Cassell & Co. ISBN 0-304-35260-8.
- Blair, Clay (2000). Hitler's U-Boat War: The Hunted, 1942–1945. New York: Modern Library. ISBN 0-679-64033-9.
- ISBN 978-1-86176-281-8.
- Hague, Arnold (1988). The Towns: A history of the fifty destroyers transferred from the United States to Great Britain in 1940. Kendal, UK: World Ship Society. ISBN 0-905617-48-7.
- Rohwer, Jürgen; Hümmelchen, Gerhard (1992). Chronology of the War at Sea 1939–1945. London: Greenhill Books. ISBN 1-85367-117-7.
External links
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