View My Guestbook
Sign My Guestbook

H.M.S. Savage

This page is dedicated to my father

Hugh Thomas

who served aboard the destroyer Savage during the Second World War.

b.7th March 1924 d.6th April 1975

HMS Savage

Launched:

24 September 1942. Built by Hawthorn Leslie at Hebburn, on the South bank of the Tyne in County Durham.

Displacement:

1,710 tons standard; 2,530 full-load.

Length:

362.75 ft

Beam:

35.75 ft

Machinery:

Two sets of Parsons geared turbines; 40,000 shp = 36 knots.

Armament:

Four 4.5 inch (one twin, two single); twelve 20mm Oerlikon AA (six twin); eight 21 inch torpedo tubes.

Compliment:

170.

Battle Honours:

North Cape 1943; Normandy 1944; Arctic 1943-45.

In many ways, HMS Savage, one of the S Class emergancy destroyers is typical of British wartime destroyer construction.

Ships of the S Class began to come into service about the middle of 1943, and all gave very hard and sustained service during the war, the Savage no less than others.

She became famous for her part in the sinking of the Scharnhorst in December 1943. After the war she served as a test ship for machinery until she was sold in 1962 for scrap.

The Savage was chosen as the test ship for the prototype of the new twin 4.5 inch D/P gun which can be seen in A position.

Summary of Service 1942-1961

HMS Savage was launched in September 1942 and completed in June, 1943. She was built by Hawthorn, Leslie & Co. Ltd, Hebburn, Newcastle-on-Tyne. In July she was attached to the Home Fleet and operated from Scapa.

In September she took part in anti-U/boat patrols between Iceland and the Faeroes.

On the 4th October the Savage was one of the destroyers present when the Ranger's aircraft attacked shipping targets in the Norwegian Leads off Bodo.

The Savage escorted the battleship King George V from Gibraltar to the United Kingdom leaving Gibraltar on the 13th October.

During November and December she was one of the destroyers escorting the Russian convoys. On the 26th December, the Savage, while in the escort of a Russian convoy, was one of the four 'S' Class destroyers which played such a gallant part in the sinking of the Scharnhorst.

From January to March 1944 she continued to assist in the escort of Russian convoys. In May the Savage took part in attacks on enemy shipping off the Norwegian coast.

In June she helped cover the landings in Normandy, and remained on patrol in the Dover Strait during July and August. In September the Savage returned to escorting Russian convoys.

On 29th October, when Bomber Command Lancaster aircraft made an attack on the Tirpitz in Fromso Fiord, Norway, the Savage with two other destroyers took part in the operation as air/sea rescue craft.

During the passage of one of the Russian convoys a subsidiary operation was carried out for the transport of a Norwegian token force to take part in the Russian advance into North Norway. On 3rd November the destroyers Savage and Scorpion left Scapa and proceeded to Murmansk at high speed with this token force aboard.

From December 1944, to March 1945, the Savage escorted further Russian convoys, and during February took part in two mining and air strikes on enemy shipping off Norway.

During April 1945 the Savage took part in further anti-shipping sweeps off the coast of Norway.

Between 1st and 5th May, the Savage, with other ships of the Home Fleet from Scapa, carried out what proved to be the last offensive operation in the war against Germany. The force carried out air attacks on the German U-boat depot ships at Kilbotn, Norway.

The Savage with the Canadian destroyer Iroquois escorted the cruiser Devonshire from Oslo to Copenhagen on the 20th May. On the 24th the three ships left Copenhagen escorting the German cruisers Prinz Eugen and Nurnberg to Wilhelmshaven where the two German ships with over 200 other vessels of the former German Navy were awaiting decisions by the Allied Powers on their disposal.

The Savage returned to the United Kingdom at the end of May 1945 and remained in Home Waters as an experimental trials ship until September 1955 when she was paid off into reserve. The board approved that she should be scrapped in March, 1958, but she remained in Portsmouth dockyard as a fender ship until she was towed to the ship-breakers in September1961.

Some of the crew of HMS Savage

My father is 4th from left front row (cap at an angle).

The names of the other sailors are unknown.

The ships emblem

E-MAIL ME AT hms_savage@hotmail.com