HMS Thorough
History
United Kingdom
NameHMS Thorough
BuilderVickers Armstrong, Barrow
Laid down26 October 1942
Launched30 October 1943
Commissioned1 March 1944
FateScrapped June 1962
Badge
General characteristics
Class and typeBritish T class submarine
Displacement
  • 1,290 tons surfaced
  • 1,560 tons submerged
Length276 ft 6 in (84.28 m)
Beam25 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
  • 9 knots (20 km/h) submerged
Range4,500 nautical miles at 11 knots (8,330 km at 20 km/h) surfaced
Test depth300 ft (91 m) max
Complement61
Armament
  • 6 internal forward-facing 21 inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes
  • 2 external forward-facing torpedo tubes
  • 2 external amidships rear-facing torpedo tubes
  • 1 external rear-facing torpedo tubes
  • 6 reload torpedoes
  • QF 4 inch (100 mm) deck gun
  • 3 anti aircraft machine guns

HMS Thorough was a British submarine of the third group of the T class. She was built as P324 by Vickers Armstrong, Barrow, and launched on 30 October 1943. So far she has been the only ship of the Royal Navy to bear the name Thorough.

Service

Thorough served in the Far East for much of her wartime career, where she sank twenty seven Japanese sailing vessels, seven coasters, a small Japanese vessel, a Japanese barge, a small Japanese gunboat, a Japanese trawler, and the Malaysian sailing vessel Palange. In August 1945, in company with HMS Taciturn, she attacked Japanese shipping and shore targets off northern Bali. Thorough sank a Japanese coaster and a sailing vessel with gunfire.

On 16 December 1957 Thorough returned to HMS Dolphin, Portsmouth Dockyard, after completing the first circumnavigation by a submarine.[1] While in Australian waters, on 2 August 1956, she rescued one of the four survivors of the sinking of the 'sixty-miler', Birchgrove Park.[2][3]

She survived the war and continued in service with the Navy, finally being scrapped at Dunston on Tyne on 29 June 1962.[4]

References

  1. ^ "Thorough (P324)". rnsubs.co.uk. Retrieved 13 January 2022.
  2. ^ "Michael McFadyen's Scuba Diving Web Site". www.michaelmcfadyenscuba.info. Retrieved 22 October 2022.
  3. ^ "8LIVES LOST AS SMALL COLLIER SINKS". Canberra Times. 3 August 1956. p. 1. Retrieved 22 October 2022.
  4. ^ HMS Thorough, Uboat.net
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