24-class sloop

24-class
General characteristics
Displacement:	1,320 tons normal
Length:	258 ft (p.p.), 267 ft 6 in (o.a.)
Beam:	35 ft
Draught:	10 ft 6in (mean)
Propulsion:	Machinery: 1 set 4-cylinder triple expansion. Boilers: 2 cylindrical. 1 screw
Range:	Coal: 260 tons normal.
Speed:	I.H.P. 2,500 = 17 kts.
Complement:	82 men
Armament:	Designed to mount 2 x 4 in(102mm). and 39 depth charges.

The 24 class was a class of minesweeping sloops. Derived from the preceding Flower class sloops but designed to look double-ended. Twenty-four ships to this design (hence the class name) were ordered between December 1916 and April 1917 under the Emergency War Programme for the Royal Navy in World War I, although two of them were cancelled before launch. All were named after famous racehorses, but they were not named "Racehorse" class as the Admiralty realised that this could easily be confused in communications with the Racecourse class of paddle minesweepers, and they officially became the 24 class.

Like the Flower class sloops, they were single-screw Fleet Sweeping Sloops used almost entirely for minesweeping, although only ten were completed by the Armistice in 1918. However, they had identical deckhouses and gunshields at either end of the vessel, with straight stems and sterns. Furthermore four of those completed had the single mast aft of the centrally-located funnel, and the rest had the mast forwards of the funnel.

Ships

• Ard Patrick — built by Swan Hunter & Wigham Richardson, Wallsend on Tyne, launched 6 June 1918. Sold 12 August 1920.
• Bend Or — built by Barclay Curle & Company, Whiteinch, launched 24 September 1918. Sold 12 August 1920.
• Aster — built by Swan Hunter, launched 26 July 1918. Sold for breaking up 1 December 1921.
• Donovan — built by Greenock & Grangemouth Dockyard Company, launched 27 April 1918. Sold 15 November 1922.
• Flying Fox — built by Swan Hunter, launched 28 March 1918. Transferred to RNVR on 24 March 1920.
• Harvester — built by Barclay Curle & Company, Whiteinch, launched 2 November 1918. Sold for breaking up in August 1922.
• Iroquois — built by Barclay Curle, launched 24 August 1918. Survey ship in 1922. Sold for breaking up 15 January 1923.
• Isinglass — built by Greenock & Grangemouth Dockyard, launched 5 March 1919. Sold 12 August 1920.
• Ladas — built Osbourne Graham & Company, Sunderland, launched 21 September 1918. Sold 6 November 1920.
• Merry Hampton — built by Blyth Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company, launched 19 December 1918. Survey ship in February 1923, renamed Herald. Scuttled in February 1942 at Selatar but salved by the Japanese Navy and added as IJN Heiyo in October 1942. Sunk by mine 14 November 1944.
• Minoru — built by Swan Hunter, launched 6 June 1919. Sold 25 February 1920, becoming mercantile Haim Mazza.
• Ormonde — built by Blyth Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company, launched 8 June 1918. Survey vessel in March 1924. Sold 6 August 1937 to break up.
• Laburnum — built by Connell, launched 10 June 1915. Hulked as RNVR drill ship in Singapore 1935, lost in February 1942 at the fall of Singapore.
• Larkspur — built by Napier & Miller, Old Kilpatrick, launched 11 May 1915. Sold for breaking up in March 1922.
• Lavender — built by Archibald McMillan & Son, Dumbarton, launched 12 June 1915. Sunk by German submarine UC.75 in the English Channel, 4 May 1917.
• Lilac — built by Greenock & Grangemouth Dockyard Company, Greenock, launched 2 April 1915. Sold for breaking up 15 December 1922.
• Lily — built by Barclay Curle, launched 16 June 1915. Depot ship October 1923, renamed Vulcan II; renamed Adamant II in 1930. Sold for breaking up 25 June 1930.
• Magnolia — built by Scotts, launched 26 June 1915. Sold for breaking up 2 July 1932.
• Mallow — built by Barclay Curle, launched 13 July 1915. Transferred to Royal Australian Navy in July 1919, dismantled July 1932, sunk as target off Sydney 1 August 1935.
• Marigold — built by Bow MacLachlan & Company, Paisley, launched 27 May 1915. Sold 26 January 1920, becoming mercantile Principe de Piamonte.
• Mimosa — built by Bow MacLachlan , launched 16 July 1915. Sold for breaking up 18 November 1922.
• Primrose — built by William Simons & Company, Renfrew, launched 29 June 1915. Sold for breaking up 9 April 1923.
• Sunflower — built by D. & W. Henderson & Company, Glasgow, launched 28 May 1915. Sold 27 January 1921 to Rangoon Port Commissioners, and renamed Lanbya.
• Veronica — built by Dunlop Bremner & Company, Port Glasgow, launched 27 May 1915. Sold for breaking up 22 February 1935.

References

• British and Empire Warships of the Second World War, H T Lenton, 1998, Greenhill Books, ISBN 978-1-85367-277-4
• Jane's Fighting Ships of World War I, Janes Publishing, 1919
• The Grand Fleet, Warship Design and Development 1906-1922, D. K. Brown, Chatham Publishing, 1999, ISBN 978-1-86176-099-9