HMS Foresight (H68)

History
UK
Name	HMS Foresight
Ordered	17 March 1933 1933 Naval Programme
Laid down	21 July 1933
Launched	29 June 1934
Commissioned	15 May 1935
Fate	Sunk, Operation Pedestal, August 1942
General characteristics
Class and type	F class destroyer
Displacement	1,405 long tons (1,428 t) standard 1,940 long tons (1,970 t) full load
Length	318 ft 3 in (97.00 m) p/p 329 ft (100 m) o/a
Beam	33 ft 3 in (10.13 m)
Draught	12 ft 6 in (3.81 m)
Propulsion	3 × Admiralty 3-drum boilers, 300 psi 2 shaft Parsons geared turbines 36,000 shp (27,000 kW)
Speed	36 knots (41 mph; 67 km/h)
Range	6,000 nmi (11,000 km) at 15 kn (17 mph; 28 km/h)
Endurance	471 tons fuel oil
Complement	145 (173 in 1942)
Armament	• 4 × 4.7 inch/45 (120 mm) Mk XVIII (4×1) • 8 × .50 inch Vickers machine guns (2×4) • 5 × .303 inch machine guns (5×1) • 8 × 21 inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes (2×4) • 2 × depth charge racks • 60 depth charges 1940: • 4 × 21 inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes replaced by • 1 × 3 in (76.2 mm)/50 and 2 × 20 mm Oerlikon (2×1)

HMS Foresight was a Royal Navy F class destroyer. She operated as a fast minesweeper during World War II and was scuttled after being damaged in an aerial attack during Operation Pedestal, an attempt to bring supplies to Malta.

On 18 June 1941 Foresight took part in the sinking of the German submarine U-138 west of Spain, together with her sister ships HMS Faulknor, HMS Fearless, HMS Forester and HMS Foxhound.

On 6 April 1942 she left Scapa Flow for a routine convoy patrol, escorting convoy PQ14. Of the twenty four ships that made up the convoy, sixteen were forced by unseasonal ice and bad weather to return to Iceland and another was sunk by a U-Boat. Along with the remaining seven convoy vessels, Foresight arrived in Murmansk on 19 April. She left, on 29 April, to cover the return convoy QP11. On 30 April the German submarine U-456 (under the command of Captain Max-Martin Teichert), which had been alerted to the presence of the convoy by German aerial reconnaissance whilst en route from the Kola Peninsula, fired a torpedo into the starboard side of the cruiser HMS Edinburgh. The ship began to list heavily. Soon after, Teichert launched a second torpedo, which struck the stern of Edinburgh, wrecking her steering equipment and effectively crippling her. Taken in tow, she attempted to limp back to Murmansk but was hounded constantly by German torpedo bombers. On 2 May she was attacked by three German destroyers off Bear Island and torpedoed yet again. As she began to sink, her crew abandoned the ship and took refuge in accompanying destroyers. Foresight had the task of scuttling the cruiser.

During Operation Pedestal in August 1942, while operating as a fast minesweeper, Foresight took a torpedo from an Italian Savoia-Marchetti SM.79 aircraft, which severed her stern section from the rest of the hull. All power failed. The Tribal class destroyer HMS Tartar arrived but the attempt to tow the stricken vessel was fruitless and she was scuttled by a torpedo after her crew had been taken off the doomed ship.

Bibliography

• English, John (1993). Amazon to Ivanhoe: British Standard Destroyers of the 1930s. Kendal, England: World Ship Society. ISBN 0-905617-64-9.
• Friedman, Norman (2009). British Destroyers From Earliest Days to the Second World War. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN [[Special:BookSources/978591140818 |978591140818 [[Category:Articles with invalid ISBNs]]]]. {{cite book}}: Check |isbn= value: invalid character (help)
• Lenton, H. T. (1998). British & Commonwealth Warships of the Second World War. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 1-55750-048-7.
• Rohwer, Jürgen (2005). Chronology of the War at Sea 1939-1945: The Naval History of World War Two (Third Revised ed.). Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 1-59114-119-2.
• Whitley, M. J. (1988). Destroyers of World War 2. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 0-87021-326-1.