HMS ''Oakham Castle'' was a

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the naval warfare force of the United Kingdom. It is a component of His Majesty's Naval Service, and its officers hold their commissions from the King of the United Kingdom, King. Although warships were used by Kingdom ...

corvette A corvette is a small warship. It is traditionally the smallest class of vessel considered to be a proper (or " rated") warship. The warship class above the corvette is that of the frigate, while the class below was historically that of the sloo ...

of the Castle class. Built as a convoy escort during the Second World War, it later became a weather ship before being scrapped in 1977.

Design and construction

The Castle-class corvettes were an improved and enlarged derivative of the earlier

Flower-class corvette The Flower-class corvetteGardiner and Chesneau 1980, p. 62. (also referred to as the ''Gladiolus'' class after the lead ship) was a British class of 294 corvettes used during World War II by the Allied navies particularly as anti-submarine ...

s, which was intended to be built by shipyards that could not build the larger and more capable frigates. The greater length of the Castles gave made them better seaboats than the Flowers, which were not originally designed for ocean escort work. Large numbers (96 in total) were ordered in late 1942 and early 1943 from shipyards in the United Kingdom and Canada, but Allied successes in the

Battle of the Atlantic The Battle of the Atlantic, the longest continuous military campaign in World War II, ran from 1939 to the defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945, covering a major part of the naval history of World War II. At its core was the Allies of World War II, ...

meant that the requirement for escorts was reduced, and many ships (including all the Canadian ones) were cancelled. The Castles were long overall, at the waterline and

between perpendiculars Length between perpendiculars (often abbreviated as p/p, p.p., pp, LPP, LBP or Length BPP) is the length of a ship along the summer load line from the forward surface of the stem, or main bow perpendicular member, to the after surface of the ster ...

Beam Beam may refer to: Streams of particles or energy *Light beam, or beam of light, a directional projection of light energy **Laser beam *Radio beam *Particle beam, a stream of charged or neutral particles **Charged particle beam, a spatially lo ...

was and draught was aft at full load.

Displacement Displacement may refer to: Physical sciences Mathematics and physics *Displacement (geometry), is the difference between the final and initial position of a point trajectory (for instance, the center of mass of a moving object). The actual path ...

was about standard and full load. Two Admiralty Three-drum water tube boilers fed steam to a Vertical Triple Expansion Engine rated at which drove a single propeller shaft. This gave a speed of . 480 tons of oil were carried, giving a range of at . The ships had a main gun armament of a single QF 4-inch Mk XIX dual-purpose gun, backed up by two twin and two single

Oerlikon 20 mm cannon The Oerlikon 20 mm cannon is a series of autocannons based on an original German Becker Type M2 20 mm cannon design that appeared very early in World War I. It was widely produced by Oerlikon Contraves and others, with various models empl ...

. Anti-submarine armament consisted of a single triple-barrelled

Squid A squid (: squid) is a mollusc with an elongated soft body, large eyes, eight cephalopod limb, arms, and two tentacles in the orders Myopsida, Oegopsida, and Bathyteuthida (though many other molluscs within the broader Neocoleoidea are also ...

anti-submarine mortar with 81 charges backed up by two depth charge throwers and a single depth charge rail, with 15 depth charges carried. Type 272 or Type 277 surface search radar was fitted, as was

high-frequency direction finding High-frequency direction finding, usually known by its abbreviation HF/DF or nickname huff-duff, is a type of radio direction finder (RDF) introduced in World War II. High frequency (HF) refers to a radio band that can effectively communicate ove ...

(HF/DF) gear. The ships'

sonar Sonar (sound navigation and ranging or sonic navigation and ranging) is a technique that uses sound propagation (usually underwater, as in submarine navigation) to navigate, measure distances ( ranging), communicate with or detect objects o ...

outfit was Type 145 and Type 147B. ''Oakham Castle'' was one of 13 Castle-class corvettes ordered on 19 December 1942. The ship was

laid down Laying the keel or laying down is the formal recognition of the start of a ship's construction. It is often marked with a ceremony attended by dignitaries from the shipbuilding company and the ultimate owners of the ship. Keel laying is one ...

A & J Inglis A & J Inglis Limited, was a shipbuilding firm founded by Anthony Inglis (shipbuilder), Anthony Inglis and his brother John, engineers and shipbuilders in the Partick area of Glasgow, Scotland in 1862. The firm built over 500 ships in a period o ...

Glasgow Glasgow is the Cities of Scotland, most populous city in Scotland, located on the banks of the River Clyde in Strathclyde, west central Scotland. It is the List of cities in the United Kingdom, third-most-populous city in the United Kingdom ...

shipyard on 30 November 1943, launched on 20 July 1944, and completed on 10 December 1944.

Career

On entering service, ''Oakham Castle'' was employed on convoy escort duty in the North Atlantic. In 1948, ''Oakham Castle'' joined the 2nd Training Squadron based at

Portland Harbour Portland Harbour is beside the Isle of Portland, Dorset, on the south coast of England. Construction of the harbour began in 1849; when completed in 1872, its surface area made it the largest human-made harbour in the world, and it remains ...

, continuing to serve in this duty until December 1950, when she was reduced to reserve at Devonport. ''Oakham Castle'' was refitted in 1953, and then was laid up in a preserved condition at

South Shields South Shields () is a coastal town in South Tyneside, Tyne and Wear, England; it is on the south bank of the mouth of the River Tyne. The town was once known in Roman Britain, Roman times as ''Arbeia'' and as ''Caer Urfa'' by the Early Middle Ag ...

. The ship was transferred to the

Met Office The Met Office, until November 2000 officially the Meteorological Office, is the United Kingdom's national weather and climate service. It is an executive agency and trading fund of the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology and ...

in 1957, and was converted to a

Weather ship A weather ship, or ocean station vessel, was a ship stationed in the ocean for surface and upper air meteorological observations for use in weather forecasting. They were primarily located in the north Atlantic and north Pacific oceans, report ...

by James Lamont & Co. at

Greenock Greenock (; ; , ) is a town in Inverclyde, Scotland, located in the west central Lowlands of Scotland. The town is the administrative centre of Inverclyde Council. It is a former burgh within the historic county of Renfrewshire, and forms ...

. On 16 May 1958 the ship was renamed ''Weather Reporter'' by Lord Hurcomb. It was scrapped in 1977.

References

Publications

* * . * * * * *

External links

HMS Oakham Castle (K 530).
uboat.net *http://www.weatherships.co.uk/oakham_reporter.htm {{DEFAULTSORT:Oakham Castle, HMS Corvettes of the United Kingdom Castle-class corvettes 1944 ships

Design and construction

Career

See also

References

Publications

External links