HMS President (1918)

HMS President on the Thames
HMS President in the Thames
History
United Kingdom
NameHMS Saxifrage
BuilderLobnitz & Company, Renfrew, Scotland
Yard number827
Launched29 January 1918
Renamed
  • HMS President, July 1922;
  • HMS President (1918), 1988
Nickname(s)"Mystery Ship"
FateSold, 1988; resold 2001 & 2006, sold in 2018 Abandoned 2022
StatusAbandoned
General characteristics
Class and typeAnchusa-class sloop
Displacement1,290 long tons (1,311 t)
Length
  • 250 ft (76.2 m) p/p
  • 262 ft 3 in (79.9 m) o/a
Beam35 ft (10.7 m)
Draught11 ft 6 in (3.5 m)
Propulsion
  • 4-cylinder triple expansion steam engine
  • 2 boilers
  • 2,500 hp (1,864 kW)
  • 1 Propeller
Speed16 knots (30 km/h; 18 mph)
Range260 tons coal
Complement93
Armament

HMS President (formerly HMS Saxifrage) is a retired Flower-class Q-ship that was launched in 1918. She was renamed HMS President in 1922 and moored permanently on the Thames as a Royal Navy Reserve drill ship. In 1982 she was sold to private owners and, having changed hands twice, served as a venue for conferences and functions as well as the offices for a number of media companies. She has been moved to Chatham on the Medway in Kent since 2016, but is due to return to the capital. She had the suffix "(1918)" added to her name in order to distinguish her from HMS President, the Royal Naval Reserve base in St Katharine Docks. She is one of the last three surviving Royal Navy warships of the First World War.[Note 1] She is also the sole representative of the first type of purpose built anti-submarine vessels, and is the ancestor of World War II convoy escort sloops, which evolved into modern anti-submarine frigates.
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