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HMCS ''St. Stephen'' was a River-class frigate that served with the Royal Canadian Navy during the Second World War. She served primarily as a convoy escort in the Battle of the Atlantic. She was named for St. Stephen, New Brunswick. ''St. Stephen'' was ordered on 1 February 1943 as part of the 1943–1944 River-class building program.〔(【引用サイトリンク】work=uboat.net )〕 She was laid down on 5 October 1943 by Yarrows Ltd. at Esquimalt and launched 6 February 1944.〔 She was commissioned into the Royal Canadian Navy on 28 July 1944 at Esquimalt.〔 ==Background== (詳細はRoyal Navy at the time, including the Flower-class corvette. The first orders were placed by the Royal Navy in 1940 and the vessels were named for rivers in the United Kingdom, giving name to the class. In Canada they were named for towns and cities though they kept the same designation.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Fact Sheet No. 21 – Canadian River Class Frigates )〕 The name "frigate" was suggested by Vice-Admiral Percy Nelles of the Royal Canadian Navy and was adopted later that year. Improvements over the corvette design included improved accommodation which was markedly better. The twin engines gave only three more knots of speed but extended the range of the ship to nearly double that of a corvette at at 12 knots.〔 Among other lessons applied to the design was an armament package better designed to combat U-boats including a twin 4-inch mount forward and 12-pounder aft.〔 15 Canadian frigates were initially fitted with a single 4-inch gun forward but with the exception of , they were all eventually upgraded to the double mount.〔 For underwater targets, the River-class frigate was equipped with a Hedgehog anti-submarine mortar and depth charge rails aft and four side-mounted throwers.〔 River-class frigates were the first Royal Canadian Navy warships to carry the 147B Sword horizontal fan echo sonar transmitter in addition to the irregular ASDIC. This allowed the ship to maintain contact with targets even while firing unless a target was struck. Improved radar and direction-finding equipment improved the RCN's ability to find and track enemy submarines over the previous classes.〔 Canada originally ordered the construction of 33 frigates in October 1941.〔〔 The design was too big for the shipyards on the Great Lakes so all the frigates built in Canada were built in dockyards along the west coast or along the St. Lawrence River.〔 In all Canada ordered the construction of 60 frigates including ten for the Royal Navy that transferred two to the United States Navy.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「HMCS St. Stephen (K454)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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