HMS Nabob (D77)

HMS Nabob (D77) was a Bogue-class escort aircraft carrier which served in the Royal Navy during 1943 and 1944. The ship was built in the United States as USS Edisto (CVE-41) (originally AVG-41 then later ACV-41) but did not serve with the United States Navy.

She was laid down on 20 October 1942, launched 22 March 1943, and transferred under Lend-Lease to the United Kingdom on 7 September 1943 prior to her commissioning as HMS Nabob (D77) into the Royal Navy. She served as an anti-submarine warfare carrier and the ship's crew was largely drawn from personnel provided by the Royal Canadian Navy. Flight crew were Royal Navy personnel (852 and 856 Naval Air Squadrons of the Fleet Air Arm).

On 22 August 1944, while returning from a strike against the German battleship Tirpitz (Operation Goodwood), she was torpedoed by U-354 in the Barents Sea and sustained heavy damage. Five days later she steamed into Scapa Flow under her own power but had lost 21 men.

She was eventually judged not worth repairing, was beached and abandoned then cannibalized for other ships and decommissioned on 30 September 1944, but retained as part of the Reserve Fleet. She was returned to USN at Rosyth and stricken for disposal 16 March 1946. Sold for scrapping in Holland 3/1947. Resold and converted as the merchant Nabob of Norddeutscher Lloyd (later renamed Glory). She was sold for scrap in Taiwan in 1977.

Nabob is one of three Royal Navy escort carriers built in the United States which is listed as lost in action (2 sunk and 2 heavily damaged and never repaired) during World War II.

Design and description
These ships were all larger and had a greater aircraft capacity than all the preceding American built escort carriers. They were also all laid down as escort carriers and not converted merchant ships. All the ships had a complement of 646 men and an overall length of 492 ft, a beam of 69 ft and a draught of 25 ft. Propulsion was provided a steam turbine, two boilers connected to one shaft giving 9,350 brake horsepower (SHP), which could propel the ship at 16.5 kn.

Aircraft facilities were a small combined bridge–flight control on the starboard side, two aircraft lifts 43 ft by 34 ft, one aircraft catapult and nine arrestor wires. Aircraft could be housed in the 260 ft by 62 ft hangar below the flight deck. Armament comprised: two 4 inch Dual Purpose guns in single mounts, sixteen 40 mm Bofors anti-aircraft guns in twin mounts and twenty 20 mm Oerlikon anti-aircraft cannons in single mounts. They had a maximum aircraft capacity of twenty-four aircraft which could be a mixture of Grumman Martlet, Vought F4U Corsair or Hawker Sea Hurricane fighter aircraft and Fairey Swordfish or Grumman Avenger anti-submarine aircraft.