HMS Tigris (N63)
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 HMS Tigris |
|
| Career (UK) |  |
|---|---|
| Builder: | Chatham Dockyard |
| Laid down: | 11 May 1938 |
| Launched: | 31 October 1939 |
| Commissioned: | 20 June 1940 |
| Fate: | sunk 27 February 1943 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | British T class submarine |
| Displacement: | 1,090 tons surfaced 1,575 tons submerged |
| Length: | 275 ft (84 m) |
| Beam: | 26 ft 6 in (8.1 m) |
| Draught: | 16.3 ft (5.0 m) |
| Propulsion: |
Two shafts |
| Speed: |
15.25 knots (28.7 km/h) surfaced |
| Range: | 4,500 nautical miles at 11 knots (8,330 km at 20 km/h) surfaced |
| Test depth: | 300 ft (91 m) max |
| Complement: | 59 |
| Armament: |
6 internal forward facing torpedo tubes |
HMS Tigris (N63) was a T-class submarine of the Royal Navy. She was laid down at Chatham Dockyard and launched in October 1939.
Contents |
[edit] Career
Tigris had a relatively active career, serving in the North Sea and the Mediterranean.
[edit] Home waters
Tigris was active in the English Channel and the Bay of Biscay in mid 1940. She sank the French fishing vessels Sancte Michael, Cimcour, Charles Edmond and Rene Camaleyre, the French merchants Jacobsen and Guilvinec, and the German tanker Thorn. She unsuccessfully attacked a number of submarines, including U-58 and the Italian submarine Veniero and may have also attacked the Italian submarine Otario. Tigris also succeeded in sinking the Italian submarine Michele Bianchi.
She was assigned to operate in the North Sea off the Scandinavian coast in mid 1941. Here she sank the Norwegian passenger / cargo ship Haakon Jarl and the German merchant Richard With. She also attacked and heavily damaged the German auxiliary submarine chaser UJ 1201 off the Rolvsoy Fjord. The bow of the ship sank but the stern was towed to port and the ship was rebuilt, entering service again in April 1944. Tigris also unsuccessfully attacked the German merchant Bessheim and a merchant of 3000 tons, and also attacked a convoy, but missed her targets of the Norwegian merchants Mimona, Tugela and Havbris.
She was also one of the ships assigned to track the German battleship Bismarck.
[edit] Mediterranean
Tigris was reassigned to the Mediterranean, and was active there from late 1942. She torpedoed and sank the Italian submarine Porfido and the Italian merchant Citta di Genova.[1]
[edit] Sinking
Tigris left Malta on 18 February 1943 to patrol off Naples. She was last sighted at 0730 on 24 February, 39 miles from Capri. On the morning of the 27th, the German submarine chaser UJ2210, escorting a convoy six miles south east of Capri, made contact with a submarine and carried out three depth charge attacks, the third attack brought oil to the surface and the contact was noted to be stationary. A fourth attack of fifteen depth charges brought a huge bubble of air to the surface. On 6 March, Tigris was ordered to Algiers but there was no reply to this signal. She failed to return to Algiers on 10 March 1943 and was declared overdue on that date. Tigris was most likely the submarine sunk on 27 February by UJ-2210.[2]
[edit] Tributes
Each year there is an annual Remembrance Service for the submarine and the crew lost at St Nicholas Church, Newbury, Berkshire, on the Sunday nearest the 27th of February. The submarine had been adopted by Newbury during the Second World War.[3]
[edit] References
- ^ HMS Tigris, Uboot.net
- ^ Submarine losses 1904 to present day, RN Submarine Museum, Gosport
- ^ HMS Tigris, Uboot.net
- Submarines, War Beneath The Waves, From 1776 To The Present Day, by Robert Hutchinson
- Colledge, J. J. and Warlow, Ben (2006). Ships of the Royal Navy: the complete record of all fighting ships of the Royal Navy, Rev. ed., London: Chatham. ISBN 9781861762818. OCLC 67375475.
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