HMS Trespasser (P312)

HMS Trespasser in September 1942 at Barrow
History
United Kingdom
Name	HMS Trespasser
Builder	Vickers Armstrong, Barrow
Laid down	8 September 1941
Launched	29 May 1942
Commissioned	25 September 1942
Fate	Scrapped in September 1961
Badge
General characteristics
Class and type	British T class submarine
Displacement	1,290 tons surfaced 1,560 tons submerged
Length	276 ft 6 in (84.28 m)
Beam	25 ft 6 in (7.77 m)
Draught	12 ft 9 in (3.89 m) forward 14 ft 7 in (4.45 m) aft
Propulsion	Two shafts Twin diesel engines 2,500 hp (1.86 MW) each Twin electric motors 1,450 hp (1.08 MW) each
Speed	15.5 knots (28.7 km/h) surfaced Nine knots (20 km/h) submerged
Range	4,500 nautical miles at 11 knots (8,330 km at 20 km/h) surfaced
Test depth	300 ft (91 m) max
Complement	61
Armament	Six internal forward-facing 21-inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes Two external forward-facing torpedo tubes Two external amidships rear-facing torpedo tubes One external rear-facing torpedo tubes Six reload torpedoes 1 x 4-inch (102 mm) deck gun

HMS Trespasser was a British submarine of the third group of the T class. She was built as P312 by Vickers Armstrong, Barrow, and launched on 29 May 1942. So far she has been the only ship of the Royal Navy to bear the name Trespasser.

She was one of only two T-class submarines completed without an Oerlikon 20 mm anti-aircraft gun, the other being HMS P311.

Service

Trespasser served in a number of naval theatres, home waters, the Mediterranean and the Far East during her wartime career. While on patrol in the Gulf of Lyon, she fired three torpedoes at a dead whale, having mistaken it for an enemy submarine. She also attacked the German auxiliary patrol vessel Uj 6073 / Nimeth Allah, but failed to hit her. Her luck changed when she sank the Italian auxiliary patrol vessel V8 / Filippo with gunfire. Transferred to the Pacific Far East, she torpedoed and damaged the Japanese auxiliary gunboat Eifuku Maru off Burma.

She survived the war and continued in service with the Navy, finally being scrapped at Gateshead on 26 September 1961.

Publications

• 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.
• Hutchinson, Robert (2001). Jane's Submarines: War Beneath the Waves from 1776 to the Present Day. London: HarperCollins. ISBN 978-0-00-710558-8. OCLC 53783010.