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Allied Warships

HMS Churchill (I 45)

Destroyer of the Town class

NavyThe Royal Navy
TypeDestroyer
ClassTown 
PennantI 45 
Built byNewport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Co. (Newport News, Virginia, U.S.A.) 
Ordered 
Laid down25 Nov, 1918 
Launched31 May, 1919 
Commissioned9 Sep, 1940 
End service16 Jul, 1944 
Loss position
 
HistoryUSS Herndon (DD 198) was decommissioned and turned over to Great Britain under the lend lease program at Halifax, Nova Scotia on 9 September 1940. As HMS Churchill (I 45), she served as leader of the first Town-class flotilla in transatlantic convoys and patrol duty off the western approaches to the British Isles. High points in her career in the Royal Navy include participation in the search for Bismarck after the German battleship had sunk HMS Hood (51), and a visit by her namesake, the redoubtable Prime Minister, on his way home from the momentous Atlantic Conference with President Roosevelt in August 1941. HMS Churchill (I 45) also served as an escort for the pre- and post-invasion buildup for Operation Torch, the Allied invasion of North Africa. Transferred to the Russian Navy 16 July 1944, the destroyer was renamed Dejatelnyj (Active) and was probably sunk by an U-boat on 16 January 1945 about 40 miles east of Cape Tereberski while escorting the convoy KB-1 over the treacherous route from Kola Inlet to the White Sea.

Commanding Officers:
Cdr. Gerald R. Cousins, DSC, RN (retired)
9 September 1940 -

Cdr. P.J. Fitzgerald, RN (retired)
3 March 1942 – 27 February 1943

Cdr. Godfrey Noel Brewer, RN
27 February 1943 – ???

???

Lt. Anthony Charles Dennisis Leach, RN
June 1943 - ???

T/Lt. J.H. Millar, RNVR
??? - 16 July 1944 

Former nameUSS Herndon (DD 198)
Career notesto Soviet Union as Dejatelnyj

Noteable events involving Churchill include:

9 Jun, 1942
HMS Churchill (Cdr. P.J. Fitzgerald, RN (retired)) picks up 37 survivors from the American tanker Franklin K. Lane that was torpedoed and damaged by the German submarine U-502 about 35 nautical miles north-east of Cape Blanco, Venezuela in position 11º12'N, 66º39'W. Churchill later sank the damaged tanker with gunfire.

13 Aug, 1942
HMS Churchill (Cdr. P.J. Fitzgerald, RN (retired)) picks up 50 survivors from the American merchant Delmundo that was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine U-600 about 18 nautical miles south of Cape Maysi, Cuba in position 19º55'N, 73º49'W.


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