Hadleigh Castle - F355

[Whickham]

I "found" this photo on the web and as there doesn't appear to be a central place for shipbreaking on the Tyne other than here I thought I would add it "for the record"
Photo shows HMS HADLEIGH CASTLE being broken up at CW Dorkin's yard at Gateshead. Miramar and Tees Built have "Broken up at Gateshead 01/1959".
She was of course a product of Smith's Dock at South Bank in 1943.

[E28]

Rare image of Hadleigh Castle awaiting the breakers here.

I will not get too engrossed in the Castle class corvettes here other than Smith's Dock were the truly significant player in the design of the RN's earlier corvette class, the Flowers. They also used Smith's engines and boilers and when a slightly more capable single screw anti submarine Corvette was needed they did the Castle class too with Hadleigh Castle as lead ship.

And they did the larger twin screw twin engined River class Frigates.

Smith's Dock during the first years of WW2 contributed more than most in the war against the u boats and yet their exhaustive efforts and knowledge are relatively unknown.

Finally, launch dates i have for Hadleigh Castle differ between the 19th or 21st June 1943.