HMS President in the Thames |
|
| Career | |
|---|---|
| Name: | HMS Saxifrage |
| Builder: | Lobnitz & Company, Renfrew |
| Launched: | 29 January 1918 |
| Renamed: | President, July 1922 |
| Fate: | Sold, April 2006 |
| Status: | Conference venue and offices |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Anchusa-class sloop |
| Displacement: | 1,290 long tons (1,311 t) |
| Length: | 250 ft (76 m) p/p 262 ft 3 in (79.93 m) o/a |
| Beam: | 35 ft (11 m) |
| Draught: | 11 ft 6 in (3.51 m) |
| Propulsion: | 4-cylinder triple expansion engine 2 boilers 2,500 hp (1,864 kW) 1 screw |
| Speed: | 16 knots (30 km/h; 18 mph) |
| Range: | 260 tons coal |
| Complement: | 93 |
| Armament: | • 2 × 4 in (100 mm) guns • 1 or 2 × 12-pounder guns • Depth charge throwers |
HMS President, formerly HMS Saxifrage is an Anchusa-class sloop of the Royal Navy, completed in 1918. The vessel was built at the shipyard of Lobnitz & Company, Renfrew, Scotland as Yard Number 827.[1]
She was originally named Saxifrage after the Saxifrage genus of plants which includes the variety London Pride, but was renamed President in July 1922 at the same time as she became a drill ship for the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve. Currently, the name HMS President is given to a shore establishment of the Royal Naval Reserve near Tower Bridge.
Saxifrage was built in Renfrew, part of a small class of convoy protection ships built to look like merchant ships for use as Q-ships in the First World War.
She was purchased in April 2006 by the serviced office company, MLS Group Plc.
HMS President is permanently berthed in the River Thames on the Victoria Embankment in the City of London close to Blackfriars Millennium Pier and is listed on the National Register of Historic Vessels. It currently serves as a venue for conferences and functions and also houses the offices of a number of media companies. A notable event to have been hosted there was the 113th birthday celebrations of Henry Allingham, the world's oldest man and one of the last surviving the First World War veterans, in June 2009. He died the following month at his care home in East Sussex.[2]
The nearest London Underground stations are Temple and Blackfriars on the District and Circle Lines. Blackfriars is a National Rail station. They are within Travelcard Zone 1.
HMS Wellington, a Grimsby-class sloop, is moored nearby. A sister ship HMS Chrysanthemum was formerly moored nearby, but was scrapped in 1995.
|
|
||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||