British 'M' class destroyers of which the Royal Navy had 90 that were excess to requirements and sold or discarded during the 1920's. These ships were purchased by many countries.
Little was done to the ships through to the 1930's when various refits gave them AA mountings for the 4", while this gave the mountings a high angle capability, for firing at aircraft, they could still only be loaded at the -5 to +30 degree angle. While not ideal, it was a cheap upgrade the Greeks could do to the ships themselves. For close in AA defense, another pair of 2 pounder pom poms were fitted abaft the bridge.
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These ships just made it into WW2. The ships were to be discarded starting in 1941. Greece had ordered four of the RN 'H' class export destroyers to replace these eight ships. Due to the outbreak of war, the four 'H' class were requisitioned by the RN and completed for them in 1940. The biggest changes for these ships occurred when the remaining six ships were refitted at Alexandria for service in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. It was the AA and ASW values of the ships that were upgraded. Till then the ships had not been fitted with Asdic and only had a few depth charges. The AA was also looked at with four 20mm Oerlikon cannons replacing the center 4". An air search radar was fitted to the mast and that was it. The aft set of torpedoes was removed to enhance the depth charge numbers and throwers.
One of these Greek destroyers favourite past times was running along the coast of North Africa shooting up German and Italian vehicles on the coast road.
