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NavSource Online: Frigate Photo Archive

HMS Ascension (K 502)
ex-Hargood
ex-PF-74
ex-PG-182


PF-74 served only in the Royal Navy
Tacoma Class Patrol Frigate/British Colony Class Frigate:

  • (MC Type T. S2-S2-AQ1) Originally authorized as Patrol Gunboat, (PG-182)
  • Reclassified as a Patrol Frigate, PF-74, 15 April 1943
  • Laid down under a Maritime Commission contract at Welsh-Kaiser Co., Inc., Providence, RI
  • Assigned to the Royal Navy under the Lend-Lease Program and named Hargood
  • Renamed Ascension and Launched 6 August 1943
  • Transferred to the Royal Navy and commissioned HMS Ascension (K 502), 24 November 1943
  • Returned to U.S. custody 31 May 1946 and decommissioned
  • Declared surplus 8 October 1946
  • Struck from the Navy Register 29 October 1946
  • Sold for scrap 16 October 1947 to the Hudson Valley Shipwrecking Corp. of Newburgh, NY
    Naval Vessel Register of 1 January 1949 lists lists sale date as November 1947
  • Removed from naval custody 7 November 1947
  • Broken up for scrap by December 1948.

    Specifications:

  • Displacement 1,246 t.
  • Length 304'
  • Beam 37' 6"
  • Draft 14'
  • Speed 20 kts.
  • Complement 190
  • Armament: Three 3"/50 dual purpose gun mounts, two twin 40mm gun mounts, nine 20mm guns, one Hedgehog depth charge projector; eight Y-gun depth charge projectors and two depth charge tracks
  • Propulsion: Three boilers, two 5,500 iHP turbines, two shafts.
    Click on thumbnail
    for full size image    		 Size Image Description Source
    PF-74 75k
    Namesake:

    Ascension - A British island located in the South Atlantic 700 miles northwest of St. Helena. During the exile of Napoleon, the Royal Navy built a station on Ascension. The island is the site of an international cable station; during World War II an airfield was built there for patrol flights and as a refueling stop for transatlantic flights to Africa, southern Europe, and the Middle East

    		 Tommy Trampp
    PF-74 210k Robert Hurst
    PF-74 144k c. 1943
    Photo by R. Perkins    		 Paul Silverstone
    View the PF-74
    DANFS History entry located on the Naval History and Heritage Command Website
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    This page created by Gary P. Priolo and maintained by Tom Bateman
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