HMS Chiddingfold (L31)
| Navy: | Royal Navy |
|
Type: |
Destroyer |
|
Class: |
Hunt Type II |
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Pennant: |
L31 |
|
Built by: |
Greenock yard of Scott's Shipbuilding Co. in March 1940, |
|
Launched: |
she was launched a year later, on 10 March 1941 |
|
Commissioned: |
Completed on 16 October of the same year. |
| History: | |
|
The
first operation in which she participated after her work-up at Scapa Flow
was the Commando raid on Vaagso, where she bombarded the enemy positions
to cover the landings and assisted in the destruction of enemy-controlled
shipping. Thereafter, was allocated to the Orkneys and Shetlands Command,
undertaking patrols and escort duties which took her as far a field as
Iceland, the Clyde and Rosyth. After a refit in the summer of 1943, she was reallocated to the Mediterranean Fleet, joining the 59th Destroyer Division at Malta in mid-September. For the next 18 months, she operated mainly in the central Mediterranean, escorting convoys to advanced ports in Italy; providing bombardment support for the Army and undertaking patrols in the Adriatic to intercept German shipping off the coast of Dalmatia. Her final operation in the Mediterranean was a bombardment of Genoa harbour on 1 March 1945; two days later she was ordered to return to the United Kingdom to join 16th Destroyer Flotilla at Harwich, to reinforce to antisubmarine forces escorting the convoys to and from the Scheldt. She operated from Harwich during the last eight weeks of the war in Europe and was then modified for operation in the East Indies. Leaving the United Kingdom in early July 1945, she worked-up in the Mediterranean and joined the 18th Destroyer Flotilla at Trincomalee after the end of the war in the Far East but in time to take part in the re-occupation of Singapore in early September. In mid-October, she left the East Indies Fleet to return home and paid off into reserve on arrival at Portsmouth on 16 November 1945. She remained in reserve, laid up at Harwich from early 1950, until July 1952, when she was towed to Liverpool to refit for service with the Indian Navy, to which she was to be transferred on loan. The refit was completed on 9 June 1953 and on the 18th, after trials she was formally transferred and renamed Ganga. She was purchased outright in April 1958 and continued in service, latterly in reserve until 1975, when she and her sister-ship Gomati (formerly the Lamerton) were paid off and scrapped |
