HMS Egret (L75)
Encyclopedia
HMS Egret (L75) was a sloop
Sloop-of-war
In the 18th and most of the 19th centuries, a sloop-of-war was a warship with a single gun deck that carried up to eighteen guns. As the rating system covered all vessels with 20 guns and above, this meant that the term sloop-of-war actually encompassed all the unrated combat vessels including the...

 of the British Royal Navy
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

, the lead ship
Lead ship
The lead ship or class leader is the first of a series or class of ships all constructed according to the same general design. The term is applicable military ships and larger civilian craft.-Overview:...

 of her class
Egret class sloop
The Egret class sloops were a three ship class of a long-range escort vessels used in the Second World War by the Royal Navy. They were an enlarged version of the Bittern class sloop with an extra twin 4 inch gun mounting...

. She was built by J. Samuel White
J. Samuel White
J. Samuel White was a British shipbuilding firm based in Cowes, taking its name from John Samuel White . It came to prominence during the Victorian era...

 at Cowes
Cowes
Cowes is an English seaport town and civil parish on the Isle of Wight. Cowes is located on the west bank of the estuary of the River Medina facing the smaller town of East Cowes on the east Bank...

, Isle of Wight
Isle of Wight
The Isle of Wight is a county and the largest island of England, located in the English Channel, on average about 2–4 miles off the south coast of the county of Hampshire, separated from the mainland by a strait called the Solent...

 and was launched on 31 May 1938.

Egret was the first ship ever to be sunk by a guided missile
Guided Missile
Guided Missile is a London based independent record label set up by Paul Kearney in 1994.Guided Missile has always focused on 'the underground', preferring to put out a steady flow of releases and developing the numerous GM events around London and beyond....

. The Germans had used the Henschel Hs 293
Henschel Hs 293
The Henschel Hs 293 was a World War II German anti-ship guided missile: a radio-controlled glide bomb with a rocket engine slung underneath it. It was designed by Herbert A. Wagner.- History :...

 glider bomb for the first time on 25 August 1943 against the 40th Support Group in the Bay of Biscay
Bay of Biscay
The Bay of Biscay is a gulf of the northeast Atlantic Ocean located south of the Celtic Sea. It lies along the western coast of France from Brest south to the Spanish border, and the northern coast of Spain west to Cape Ortegal, and is named in English after the province of Biscay, in the Spanish...

. Landguard was slightly damaged by a near miss. Bideford was hit and damaged, with one sailor killed, though more serious damage was avoided because the bomb's explosive charge did not fully detonate.

On 27 August 1943 the 40th Support Group was relieved by the 1st Support Group, consisting of Egret together with the sloop Pelican and the frigates Jed, Rother, Spey and Evenlode. The group was attacked by a squadron of 18 Dornier Do 217
Dornier Do 217
The Dornier Do 217 was a bomber used by German Luftwaffe during World War II as a more powerful version of the Dornier Do 17, known as the Fliegender Bleistift . Designed in 1937 and 1938 as a heavy bomber, its design was refined during 1939 and production began in late 1940...

 carrying Henschel glider bombs. The covering destroyer HMCS Athabaskan
HMCS Athabaskan (G07)
HMCS Athabaskan was the first of three destroyers of the Royal Canadian Navy to bear this name. It was a destroyer of the Tribal-class, built in 1940-1941 in the United Kingdom by Vickers Armstrong of Newcastle upon Tyne with Parsons engine works....

 was heavily damaged by a bomb and Egret was sunk with the loss of 194 of her crew. At the time there were four RAF Y-Service electronics specialists on board, all of whom also died in the attack, thus bringing to total killed to 198. (These four RAF personnel are typically excluded from published casualty figures.) Egret had been fitted with electronic surveillance equipment designed to monitor Luftwaffe bomber communications and these Y-Service technicians were aboard to operate this equipment.

On August 16, 2009 one of the last survivors - if not the last - of the HMS Egret died at the age of 88.

Egret's sinking led to the anti-U-boat
U-boat
U-boat is the anglicized version of the German word U-Boot , itself an abbreviation of Unterseeboot , and refers to military submarines operated by Germany, particularly in World War I and World War II...

 patrols in the Bay of Biscay
Bay of Biscay
The Bay of Biscay is a gulf of the northeast Atlantic Ocean located south of the Celtic Sea. It lies along the western coast of France from Brest south to the Spanish border, and the northern coast of Spain west to Cape Ortegal, and is named in English after the province of Biscay, in the Spanish...

being suspended.
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