The transfer of RN Destroyers to the RCN between the wars
In 1919-20 Canada made plans for the future post-war Navy. The preferred option was a fleet of seven cruisers, twelve destroyers, six submarines, eighteen patrol boats, and three parent ships. Jellicoe’s empire mission proposed several other options. In parallel with this planning, the Admiralty had offered Canada one light cruiser and two destroyers to provide the basis of a more ambitions Canadian naval policy. In the event the Canadian Navy opted to accept the three vessels to take the place of the existing obsolete training ships, and abandoned all other plans for the time being. The cruiser Aurora, and destroyers Patrician and Patriot were transferred in 1920, and not renamed in RCN service.
In 1927 the decision was taken to replace Patrician and Patriot, and the Canadian Government approached the British Admiralty, asking for the best two destroyers currently in the RN reserve fleet for scrap-metal prices. The British were extremely reluctant to allow Canada (now an ‘autonomous community, equal in status’) to maintain a navy at British taxpayers’ expense. In April 1927, the RN’s Director of Plans wrote that “If the Admiralty accept this situation now, they will be condoning, for a further indefinite period of years, the failure of Canada to develop her naval resources and acquiescing in Canada retaining a special position vis-à-vis the other Dominions.” Moreover the Admiralty still wanted Canada to develop a fleet built around cruisers which would be suitable for trade protection in time of war. Canada was advised in May 1927 that destroyers “were unsuitable for Canada’s needs” The British responded on 9 June with a suggestion that Canada should replace Patrician and Patriot with newly built minesweeping sloops – and if the two destroyers could not last until the sloops were read, the Admiralty would arrange to lend two destroyers of the ‘S’ type on the understanding that the Canadian Government would bear the cost of bringing the vessels forward for service (estimated at approximately £11,000). When it became clear, however, that Canada had no interest in building sloops, the Admiralty were disinclined to help Canada carry out a policy against Admiralty advice by quoting a low price for the destroyers, and on 12 August, the Admiralty offered to sell two ‘S’ class destroyers for £75,500 each, plus the cost or storing, reconditioning, and preparing the vessels for RCN service.
On 9 November, the Canadians advised that they were now planning on building two new destroyers, and accepted Britains 9 June offer to lend two destroyers to replace Patriot and Patrician while the new destroyers were being built, for the estimated cost of £11,000 each. The conditions attached to the loan of the two destroyers required that the vessels would be available for return to the Royal Navy if required in an emergency.
In early 1928 Patriot and Patrician were paid off and their crews sent to the United Kingdom to collect the two ‘S’ class destroyers Champlain (ex-Torbay) and Vancouver (ex-Toreador), which commissioned at Portsmouth on 1 March 1928 and sailed to Canada.
The two new destroyers, Saguenay and Skeena, were constructed in Britain, and commissioned in 1931. Together with Champlain and Vancouver these four destroyers constituted the main force of the RCN during the years of the depression.
From 1928-1936 the RN had laid down a flotilla of destroyers each year – the so-called ‘A’-‘I’ classes (each flotilla consisted of 8 destroyers with names starting with the same letter). The exception was 1930, when only 4 destroyers were ordered due to the effects of the great depression. The resulting ‘C’ class did not easily into the RN flotilla organisation, and were often maintained out of commission in reserve. These destroyers were generally similar to Saguenay and Skeena.
Champlain and Vancouver were due to be scrapped in 1936 as part of the British Empire commitment to arms reduction under the 1930 London Naval Treaty, and the Admiralty had indicated a willingness to replace them with two ‘C’ class destroyers. On 23 April 1935 Canada unofficially advised the Admiralty that their efforts to obtain approval to build replacements for Champlain and Vancouver had been unsuccessful, and they welcomed the suggestion that an application to transfer two ‘C’ class destroyers to the RCN would receive favourable consideration by the Admiralty. But Admiralty advice that the destroyers could be sold to Canada for a total of £564,000 came as a shock to Canada, who had been anticipating that they would be loaned under similar conditions to Vancouver and Champlain. A supplementary estimate of C$100,000 was therefore passed by the Canadian Government to enable work to be carried out on Champlain and Vancouver to keep them in a seaworthy condition.
The matter rested there for over a year before the Canadians approached the Admiralty again in September 1936 with an offer to buy the first two ‘C’ class destroyers for C$1 million each, and also loan the two remaining ‘C’ class destroyers as soon as the Canadian manning situation permitted them to be taken over. While the Admiralty were happy to sell the first two destroyers, there were concerns over the loan of the other two: (1) Treasury might not agree to the loan, (2) the Dominions Office might not view the proposal favourably due to possible difficulties with other Dominions, and (3) it was the Admiralty intention to use the remaining two ‘C’ class destroyers to attend on aircraft carriers, and replacing them with other modern destroyers would be difficult without breaking up the existing destroyer flotillas (which were organised along class lines). Nevertheless the offer on the first two ‘C’ class destroyers was accepted, and Fraser (ex-Crescent) and St Laurent (ex-Cygnet) were purchased for $978,527 each, and commissioned into the RCN on 17 February 1937 to replace Champlain and Vancouver.
Under the Canadian government’s rearmament plan, the RCN’s annual appropriations doubled in 1937-38, and the remaining two ‘C’ class destroyers were purchased for $817,500 each, commissioning in June 1938 – Ottawa (ex-Crusader) and Restigouche (ex-Comet).
In June 1938, Canada asked whether the Admiralty would be able to support a request to purchase Kempenfelt – originally built as flotilla leader for the ‘C’ class destroyers, and in December 1938 the Canadian High Commission formally requested permission to purchase the leader. In February 1939, Treasury approved the transfer at the price of £150,000. The Canadians originally requested a transfer date of 1 August 1940, but that was brought forward to the autumn of 1939, and then delayed by the outbreak of war and the immediate need for anti-submarine forces in the Channel. Kempenfelt eventually commissioned into the RCN on 19 October 1939.