Corvettes and Sloops (1916-1941)

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In that other timeline the Royal Navy started the search for a set of ships to replace all of the sloops of the 'Flower' class that were built 1915-18. These ships were built to mercantile standards and could be built in yards with no naval experience.

Which is exactly what the RN wanted from the replacement classes. For some reason the RN managed to get these ships and replacement types completely wrong. The first type was the Kingfishers where the RN was trying to build escorts of less than 600 tons which had no limit of building under the various treatys. They were so bad they needed escorts to do their job.

HMS Kitiwake, Kingfisher corvette in non-Shipbucket sizing, when completed their sole armament was the 4" gun, the other smaller AA were added at later refits. They were too lightly built to face the rigours of the North Atlantic.

The next ships were the sloop series' Grimsbys' etc. These were good reliable ships and were sorely needed as Atlantic escorts, unfortunately they were Navy Yard builds only. The design and fittings required the expertise of the regular yards. Not what was needed. These sloops were built in numbers and were enlarged with another twin 4" placed on the quarterdeck to increase the AA value. These ships were well known as escorts to the Escort Carriers.

Lastly was the 'corvette' based on the whale catcher, while these ships had half the equation in that they could be built in mercantile yards, the design itself was flawed beyond reason. 'Roll on wet grass' was one of the comments.

(Not Shipbucket style)

All the Royal Navy had had to do was to use the same design they had in the First World War with the updates available from the better technology developed in the 20 years since the original design. My Flower Class 2 design.

Fitted with 2 1600hp engines driving 2 shafts, the engines were the same as those used in the fishing vessels operating around the coasts of Britain. This helped with engineroom staff drawn from those vessels being instantly familiar with the equipment, they just had two to play with. Medical facilities and extra survivor accomodation was fitted around the funnel as it was felt that the heat passing through would help with the cold in the North Atlantic winters.

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