HNLMS Van Ghent (1926)

HNLMS Van Ghent () (originally named De Ruyter) was an  built for the Royal Netherlands Navy in the 1920s. The destroyer served in the Netherlands East Indies but was wrecked after running aground in 1942.

Design

In the mid-1920s, the Netherlands placed orders for four new destroyers to be deployed to the East Indies. They were built in Dutch shipyards to a design by the British Yarrow Shipbuilders, which was based on the destroyer , which Yarrow had designed and built for the British Royal Navy.

The ship's main gun armament was four  guns built by the Swedish company Bofors, mounted two forward and two aft, with two  anti-aircraft guns mounted amidships. Four 12.7 mm machine guns provided close-in anti-aircraft defence. The ship's torpedo armament comprised six  torpedo tubes in two triple mounts, while 24 mines could also be carried. To aid search operations, the ship carried a Fokker C.VII-W floatplane on a platform over the aft torpedo tubes, which was lowered to the sea by a crane for flight operations.

History

The destroyer De Ruyter was laid down on 28 August 1925, at Koninklijke Maatschappij De Schelde, Vlissingen, was launched on 13 October 1926, and commissioned on 31 May 1928.

She and her sister  left the Netherlands on 27 September 1928, for the Dutch East Indies.

On 29 July 1929, De Ruyter, her sister Evertsen, the cruiser , and the submarines  and , left Surabaya, and steamed to Tanjung Priok. At Tanjung Priok, the ships waited for the royal yacht, Maha Chakri, of the king of Siam, and the destroyer Phra Ruang. After this, the ships, without the submarines, visited Bangka, Belitung, Riau, Lingga Islands, Belawan, and Deli. On 28 August, they returned in Tanjung Priok. On 31 August, she participates in a fleet review at Tanjung Priok, held in honor of the Dutch Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands, who was born that day. Other ships that participated in the review where the destroyer Evertsen and the cruiser Java.

While practicing with the cruiser , her sister Evertsen, and five submarines, Sumatra stranded on an uncharted reef near the island Kebatoe, on 14 May 1931. Sumatra was later pulled lose by  and a tugboat.

De Ruyter was renamed Van Ghent on 1 October 1934 to free up her former name for the newly built light cruiser .

World War II
In 1940, she and her sister , guarded five German cargo ships. The ships were relieved by Java on 26 April 1940.

When war broke out in the Pacific in December 1941, Van Ghent was serving in the Netherlands East Indies as part of Rear Admiral Karel Doorman's command. She was involved in the salvage of the United States Army cargo ship .

De Ruyter, along with several Dutch and U.S. cruisers and destroyers, took part in an unsuccessful attempt to attack a Japanese invasion convoy reportedly bound for Surabaya (which in actuality was heading to Makassar) on 3–4 February 1942. This battle became known as the Battle of Makassar Strait, with the Allied force being driven off with damage to several ships by Japanese air attacks before ever nearing the convoy. Doorman's forces attempted another sortie against another Japanese invasion convoy on 15 February 1942, and to locate them this time took his ships northwest through the Gaspar Strait, to the east of Bangka Island. While passing through the strait in poor visibility, Van Ghent struck a rock and stuck fast, Another Dutch destroyer took off her crew, Deemed a wreck, Van Ghent was subsequently scuttled by the destroyer .

References

Bibliography
 
 Whitley, M.J. Destroyers of World War Two: An International Encyclopedia. London: Cassell & Co, 2000. .
 

Admiralen-class destroyers
Ships built in Vlissingen
1926 ships
World War II destroyers of the Netherlands
World War II shipwrecks in the South China Sea
Maritime incidents in February 1942
Scuttled vessels