HMS Inconstant (H49)

For other ships with the same name, see HMS Inconstant and TCG Muavenet.

Inconstant in 1941
History
UK
Name	HMS Ithuriel
Builder	Vickers-Armstrongs
Laid down	24 May 1939, as Muavenet
Launched	24 February 1941
Commissioned	24 January 1942
Decommissioned	1946
Identification	Pennant number: H49
Fate	Returned to Turkey 9 March 1946. Scrapped 1960.
General characteristics (as built)
Class and type	I-class destroyer
Displacement	1,370 long tons (1,390 t) (standard) 1,888 long tons (1,918 t) (deep load)
Length	323 ft (98.5 m)
Beam	33 ft (10.1 m)
Draught	12 ft 5 in (3.8 m)
Installed power	34,000 shp (25,000 kW)
Propulsion	2 shafts, Parsons geared steam turbines 3 Admiralty 3-drum water-tube boilers
Speed	36 knots (67 km/h; 41 mph)
Range	5,530 nmi (10,240 km; 6,360 mi) at 15 knots (28 km/h; 17 mph)
Complement	145
Sensors and processing systems	ASDIC
Armament	4 × 1 - 4.7-inch (120 mm) guns 2 × 4 - 0.5-inch (12.7 mm) machine guns 2 × 4 - 21-inch (533 mm) torpedo tubes 20 × depth charges, 1 rail and 2 throwers
Service record
Operations:	Operation Ironclad (1942)
Victories:	Sank U-409 (1943) and U-767 (1944)

HMS Inconstant was an I-class destroyer laid down as TCG Muavenet for the Turkish Navy by Vickers Armstrong Naval Construction Works at Barrow-in-Furness on 24 May 1939, purchased in September 1939 by the Royal Navy, launched on 24 February 1941 and commissioned on 24 January 1942.

Inconstant participated in the assault on Madagascar in May 1942, and attacked and sank the German submarines U-409 in the Mediterranean north-east of Algiers on 12 July 1943 and U-767 while in company with the destroyers HMS Fame and HMS Havelock in the English Channel south-west of Guernsey on 18 June 1944. Inconstant was returned to Turkey on 9 March 1946 and renamed Muavenet. She was discarded in 1960.

References

• English, John (1993). Amazon to Ivanhoe:British Standard Destroyers of the 1930s. Kendal, England: World Ship Society. ISBN 0-905617-64-9.
• Whitley, M. J. (1988). Destroyers of World War 2. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press. ISBN 0-87021-326-1.