HMS Foylebank

History
United Kingdom
Name	MV Foylebank
Operator	Bank Line (Andrew Weir Shipping)
Builder	Harland and Wolff, Belfast, Northern Ireland
Launched	12 June 1930
Fate	Requisitioned by Royal Navy September 1939
History
United Kingdom
Name	HMS Foylebank
Namesake	Previous name retained
Operator	Royal Navy
Acquired	September 1939
Commissioned	6 June 1940
Fate	Sunk 5 July 1940
General characteristics
Displacement	5,582 tons
Propulsion	2 diesel engines, 16 cylinders, two screws
Speed	11 knots (20 km/h; 13 mph)
Complement	290–300
Armament	4 twin high-angle 4-inch (102 mm) turrets 2 quadruple 2-pounder pom-pom mounts 2 quadruple .5-inch (12.7 mm) machine guns

HMS Foylebank was a Royal Navy anti-aircraft ship active during the early part of the Second World War. She entered service in June 1940 and was sunk in a German air attack in July 1940.

Service history

Foylebank was launched on 12 June 1930 as the 5,500-gross register ton motor merchant ship MV Foylebank for the Bank Line (Andrew Weir Shipping) and requisitioned by the Royal Navy when the Second World War broke out in September 1939. She was converted into an anti-aircraft ship, equipped with 0.5 inch (12.7 mm) machine guns, two quad 2-pounder pom-poms and four twin high-angle 4-inch (102 mm) gun turrets. Commissioned as HMS Foylebank on 6 June 1940, with Captain Henry P. Wilson in command, she arrived in Portland Harbour next to the Isle of Portland in Dorset, England, on 9 June 1940 for a work-up for anti-aircraft duties. She subsequently saw action at Portland.

On 4 July 1940 whilst the majority of her crew were at breakfast, unidentified aircraft were reported to the south. These were originally thought to be Allied aircraft returning to base but they turned out to be 26 Luftwaffe Junkers Ju 87 Stuka dive bombers. These aircraft had the objective of disabling Foylebank, which the Germans saw as a threat to their plans to destroy the United Kingdom's coastal shipping. During an eight-minute attack, Foylebank shot down two aircraft, but an estimated 22 bombs hit the ship and she listed to port, shrouded in smoke, with 176 out of a total crew of 298 killed and many more wounded.. She sank on 5 July 1940. One of the ship's company, Jack Foreman Mantle, was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross for his actions in defending the ship from aircraft whilst mortally wounded.

Salvage

Foylebank later was salvaged in two sections. The forward section was broken up at Falmouth, Cornwall, in 1947, the aft section at Thos. W. Ward Grays in Essex in 1952. Some fragments remain on the seabed and one piece has been recovered and presented to the Portland Museum in Dorset.