HMCS Crescent (R16)
Crescent in 1945
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| History | |
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 United Kingdom
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| Name: | Crescent |
| Builder: | John Brown & Company, Clydebank |
| Yard number: | 607 |
| Laid down: | 16 September 1943 |
| Launched: | 20 July 1944 |
| Identification: | Pennant number: R16 |
| Fate: | transferred to Canada in January 1945 |
 Canada
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| Name: | Crescent |
| Acquired: | loaned 1945, purchased 1951 |
| Commissioned: | 10 September 1945 |
| Decommissioned: | 1 April 1970 |
| Identification: | Pennant number: 226 |
| Motto: | In virture cresco (I grow in virture) |
| Fate: | Scrapped 1971 |
| Badge: | Navy blue, a crescent argent defamed with a maple leaf gules for Canada |
| General characteristics (as built) | |
| Class and type: | C-class destroyer |
| Displacement: |
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| Length: | 326.7 ft (99.6 m) |
| Beam: | 35.6 ft (10.9 m) |
| Draught: | 10 ft 6 in (3.20 m) |
| Propulsion: |
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| Speed: |
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| Range: |
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| Complement: | 186 |
| Armament: |
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HMCS Crescent was a C-class destroyer that was built for the Royal Navy but was transferred before completion and saw active service with the Royal Canadian Navy. She was one of 32 destroyers of that class built between 1943 and 1945 as part of the War Emergency Programme.
After discussions about Canada's current fleet, the United Kingdom agreed to lend the Royal Canadian Navy a flotilla of C-class destroyers in January 1945. The ships had yet to be constructed and the surrender of Japan ended the war before any of the eight could be finished. In the end, only two were transferred, Crescent and Crusader, both named after ships which had been previously transferred to Canada and renamed. This time, they kept their names as the transfer was only made permanent in 1951.
Crescent was ordered as the leader of the 14th Emergency Flotilla. The keel was laid down on 16 September 1943 by John Brown & Company, Clydebank and launched on 20 July 1944. The ship was transferred to Canada in August 1945. The ship was commissioned by Canada and assigned to the west coast of Canada, arriving at Esquimalt, British Columbia in November 1945.
In April 1948, while returning from a training cruise with the cruiser Ontario, the two ships came across a floating mine leftover from the Second World War. The cruiser was forced to make an emergency turn to avoid the mine and Crescent destroyed it with gunfire. In October 1948, Crescent joined Ontario, destroyers Cayuga, Athabaskan and the frigate Antigonish in sailing to Pearl Harbor, Hawaii; the largest deployment of the Royal Canadian Navy following the war. She was given training duties until February 1949 when she was sent to China to safeguard Canadian interests during the Chinese Civil War. This was the first operational deployment of a Canadian warship since the end of the Second World War.Crescent arrived at Shanghai on 26 February after pausing at Guam.Crescent, the first Canadian warship to enter Chinese waters, sailed to Nanjing via the Yangtze River on 11 March.
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Wikipedia