HMS Rifleman (1910)

For other ships with the same name, see HMS Rifleman.

Rifleman on 1 January 1917 during the rescue of troops from Ivernia
History
United Kingdom
Name	HMS Rifleman
Builder	J. Samuel White & Company, Cowes
Launched	22 August 1910
Fate	Sold on 9 May 1921 Scrapped in 1923
General characteristics
Displacement	772 tons
Length	246 ft (75.0 m)
Beam	25.2 ft (7.7 m)
Draught	8.5 ft (2.6 m)
Propulsion	4 Yarrow boilers, Parsons turbines, 13,500 shp
Speed	27 knots
Complement	72
Armament	2 × BL 4-inch (101.6 mm) L/40 Mark VIII guns, mounting P Mark V 2 × QF 12 pdr 12 cwt Mark I mounting P Mark I 2 × 21 inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes
Notes	Pennant numbers: H82 (1914) H97 (from January 1918)

HMS Rifleman was an Acorn-class destroyer built by J. Samuel White & Company, Cowes, completed on 4 November 1910 and sold for breaking up on 9 May 1921.

On 1 January 1917 the German U-boat UB-47 torpedoed the Cunard liner RMS Ivernia off Cape Matapan, Greece. She was en route to Alexandria with 2,400 Scottish troops aboard; of these 85 drowned, together with 36 crew. Rifleman, the escorting destroyer, took off 650 and armed trawlers towed the remainder of the survivors in their lifeboats to Crete.

On 15 April 1917 the SS Cameronia was en route from Marseilles to Alexandria, Egypt, when the German U-boat U-33 torpedoed her 150 miles east of Malta. Cameronia was a 10,963 ton passenger liner that had been converted to a troopship in January 1917. She was carrying 2,650 troops and the exact number of deaths is unknown, though the number is likely to be 11 crew members and 129 troops. The Chatby Memorial in Egypt lists the names of 127 soldiers as having been lost with Cameronia. The vessel that carried the survivors to Suda was likely the Rifleman.

References

• Colledge, J. J.; Warlow, Ben (2006) [1969]. Ships of the Royal Navy: The Complete Record of all Fighting Ships of the Royal Navy (Rev. ed.). London: Chatham Publishing. ISBN 978-1-86176-281-8.