HMS Pretoria Castle (F61)

For other ships with the same name, see Pretoria Castle.

HMS Pretoria Castle (F61) was a Union-Castle ocean liner that in the Second World War was converted into a Royal Navy armed merchant cruiser, and then converted again into an escort carrier. After the war she was converted back into a passenger liner and renamed Warwick Castle.

HMS Pretoria Castle
History
Name	Pretoria Castle
Port of registry	London
Builder	Harland & Wolff
Yard number	1006[1]
Launched	12 October 1938
Completed	18 April 1939[1]
Identification	UK official number 167220 Call sign GRRJ
Fate	Requisitioned for Royal Navy October 1939
United Kingdom
Name	HMS Pretoria Castle
Commissioned	28 November 1939
Decommissioned	August 1942
Refit	Converted from armed merchant cruiser to escort carrier
Identification	Pennant number F61
Commissioned	29 July 1943
Decommissioned	26 January 1946
Fate	Sold back to the Union-Castle Line 1946
Name	RMMV Warwick Castle
Port of registry	London
Acquired	1946
Fate	Scrapped July 1962
General characteristics
Type	Ocean liner
Tonnage	17,392 GRT
Displacement	23,450 tons
Length	594 ft (181.1 m)
Beam	76 ft (23.2 m)
Draught	29 ft (8.8 m)
Installed power	16,000 bhp (12,000 kW); 3,284 NHP
Propulsion	Diesel engines, twin screw
Speed	18 knots (33 km/h; 21 mph)
Aircraft carried	21

History

Flight training aboard the Pretoria Castle.

Harland & Wolff built Pretoria Castle in Belfast, launching her in 1938 and completing her in April 1939.^[2] The Admiralty requisitioned her for the Royal Navy in October 1939, and had her converted into an armed merchant cruiser with eight 6-inch (152 mm) and two 3-inch (76 mm) guns, entering service in November 1939. In this role she served mainly in the South Atlantic.

In July 1942 the Admiralty bought her outright for conversion to an escort carrier by Swan Hunter on Tyneside. For her new role her armament included ten Oerlikon 20 mm cannon.^[3] She was commissioned in her new role in July 1943. She operated as a trials and training carrier, seeing no active combat service.

In 1945 she twice became part of aviation history, firstly when British test pilot Captain Eric "Winkle" Brown landed a Bell Airacobra Mk. 1 on her flight deck – the first carrier landing made using an aircraft with a tricycle undercarriage, when Brown declared an emergency and was given permission to make a deck landing; a ruse which had previously been agreed with the carrier's captain, Caspar John, during initial trials for rubber deck landings planned for future carriers, and then by hosting the first ever landings and take-offs by a glider, performed by John Sproule in a Slingsby T.20 as part of research into "round-down" turbulence. On 11 August 1946, while moored on the Clyde, a Gloster Meteor was used for deck handling trials which later led to flight trials on other carriers.^[4]

After the war the ship was sold back to the Union-Castle Line in 1946 and converted back to a passenger liner, restored to its route between England and South Africa but renamed Warwick Castle. She was sold and scrapped in Barcelona in July 1962.