HMS Stevenstone (L16)

300px Stevenstone at anchor in the Solent
History
United Kingdom
Name:	HMS Stevenstone
Ordered:	23 August 1940
Builder:	J. Samuel White, East Cowes, Isle of Wight
Laid down:	2 September 1941
Launched:	23 November 1942
Commissioned:	18 March 1943
Honours and awards:	English Channel 1943-44 North Sea 1944 Normandy 1944
Fate:	Scrapped in 1959
Badge:	On a Field per fess wavy Blue and White a cubit arm vested blue charged with a fesse indented and double cotised Gold, the hand proper grasping a horn also Gold.
General characteristics
Class & type:	Hunt-class destroyer
Displacement:	1,050 long tons (1,070 t) standard 1,435 long tons (1,458 t) full load
Length:	85.3 m (279 ft 10 in) o/a
Beam:	10.16 m (33 ft 4 in)
Draught:	3.51 m (11 ft 6 in)
Propulsion:	2 Admiralty 3-drum boilers 2 shaft Parsons geared turbines, 19,000 shp (14,000 kW)
Speed:	27 knots (31 mph; 50 km/h) 25.5 kn (29.3 mph; 47.2 km/h) full
Range:	2,350 nmi (4,350 km) at 20 kn (37 km/h)
Complement:	168
Armament:	4 × QF Mark XVI guns on twin mounts Mk. XIX 4 × QF 2-pounder (40 mm) Mk. VIII AA guns on quad mount MK.VII 2 × 20 mm Oerlikon AA guns on single mounts P Mk. III 2 × torpedo tubes 110 depth charges, 4 throwers, 3 racks

HMS Stevenstone was a Hunt-class destroyer of the Royal Navy. She was a member of the third subgroup of the class, and saw service in the Second World War. All the ships of this class were named after British fox hunts. She was the first Royal Navy warship with this name, after the Stevenstone hunt in Devon.

In 1946 and 1947 Stevenstone was part of the 3rd Destroyer Flotilla based in the Mediterranean and was repaired in Chatham in 1948. She was subsequently sold for scrap and arrived at the ship breakers in Dunston on 2 September 1959

Sources

• Colledge, J. J. & Warlow, Ben, Ships of the Royal Navy: The Complete Record of all Fighting Ships of the Royal Navy from the 15th Century to the Present, Newbury, 2010
• English, John, The Hunts - A history of the design, development and careers of the 86 destroyers of this class built for the Royal and Allied Navies during World War II, Cumbria, 1987 (World Ship Society)
• Whitley, M. J., Destroyers of World War Two - an international encyclopedia, London, 1988
• Gardiner, Robert (ed.), Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1922-1946, London, 1987