Gallant

Design

Gallant had guns that went pew-pew and torpedoes that went splish-zzzzzzzzzrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Service History

HMS Gallant was commissioned on 25 February 1936, joining the 1st Destroyer Flotilla of the Mediterranean Fleet. During the late 1930’s she patrolled Spanish waters during the Spanish Civil War, coming under attack by Spanish Nationalist aircraft in April 1937 but emerging undamaged. She was still in the Mediterranean when World War II broke out, but she — along with her entire flotilla — was transferred to the Western Approaches Command by the beginning of October 1939, before being moved (again) to Nore Command at the end of October. She spent the rest of 1939 and early 1940 escorting convoys and performing patrols in the North Sea until late May, when she moved to the English Channel in preparation for Operation Dynamo: the evacuation of British Expeditionary Force troops surrounded at Dunkirk.

Gallant spent 26 May 1940 guarding the first convoys to reach Dunkirk, and on the night of the 27th she — alongside HMS Vega — scouted a smaller harbor in Dunkirk to see if it could be useful in the Allied evacuation (it was). She first embarked troops herself on the 28th, ferrying them back to Dover. On the 29th she embarked her second load of troops, when she came under attack by German dive bombers and a near-miss knocked out her steering. Nevertheless, Gallant made it back to Dover under her own steam before docking for repairs in the Hull shipyard, having lifted 1,466 soldiers back to Britain. She returned to duty on 5 June, a day after the final Dunkirk evacuations were completed. She resumed her escort and patrol duty, later joining battlecruisers HMS Renown and HMS Repulse in the ultimately unsuccessful search for the German battleships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau.

In late July 1940 Gallant was assigned to the Mediterranean Fleet, sailing for Gibraltar on 24 July to join Force H, responsible for screening aircraft carrier HMS Argus. She served in this role through the end of August, when she was moved to the screen of aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious and battleship HMS Valiant to reinforce the British Fleet in the Eastern Mediterranean. Gallant returned Gibraltar via Malta in mid-September and remained on station around Gibraltar, where, on 20 October, she and destroyers HMS Griffin and HMS Hotspur were credited for the sinking of Italian submarine Lafolé. On 31 October she joined the screen of battlecruiser HMS Renown and battleship HMS Barham to monitor Vichy French naval movements off Morocco. In November she was transferred back to the Eastern Mediterranean Fleet, joining Barham again to sail for the Eastern Mediterranean. On 24 November she screened battleship HMS Ramillies and accompanying ships being transferred out of the Mediterranean via Gibraltar. She was involved in the inconclusive Battle of Cape Spartivento on 27 November, finally arriving at Alexandria on the 29th. She spent the rest of the year on screening duties, most notably screening Illustrious and battleships HMS Warspite and Valiant in mid-December.

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  HMS Gallant in April 1938.

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  HMS Gallant, date unknown.

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  HMS Glowworm, G class destroyer.

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  HMS Grafton, G class destroyer.

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  HMS Grenade, G class destroyer.

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  HMS Greyhound, G class destroyer.

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  HMS Griffin, another G class destroyer.