Whimbrel, is that you?
Some 75 years ago this week.
Official period caption: “Egyptian sub-chaser anchored in Grand Harbor, Valetta, Malta. 24 January 1951.”
Photographed by U.S. Navy PH2 W.S. McGill, 80-G-426951
I’m fairly sure that the warship above, with very British lines, is the Egyptian Navy frigate El Malek al Farouq (Farouk). A former Yarrow-built Black Swan-class sloop, HMS Whimbrel (U 29), she entered service in January 1943, making her just eight years old in the above photo.
She replaced a Hawthorne-built sloop of the same name, which was sunk in a scrap with the Israelis in 1948. As such, she was the best ship in the Egyptian fleet until a pair of ex-British Z-class destroyers (HMS Myngs and Zenith) were transferred in 1955.
Transferred in November 1949 to the nascent Egyptian force, she was named after Farouk I, the King of Egypt and the Sudan from 1936 through 1952, including the period during which she was captured above.
After King Farouk was overthrown in a military coup, the sloop/frigate was renamed a third time to Tariq (Tarik) in 1954.
Tariq, ex-Farouk, ex-Whimbrel, in the 1960 Janes.
Where the ship really stands out is, as Whimbrel, rode on more than two dozen Atlantic convoys and picked up battle honors for Sicily, 1943; Atlantic, 1943–44; Normandy, 1944; English Channel, 1944; Arctic, 1944; and Okinawa, 1945, and has been reported as the only member remaining of the 16 Royal Navy warships to have been present at the Surrender of Japan on VJ Day in Tokyo Bay.
Wait, what?
Yeah, the Egyptians apparently kept Tariq in somewhat limited service as a pier-side trainer until at least 2016 and held on to her for a while after that.
Assorted museums in the UK have shown an interest in housing ex-Whimbrel and as a museum ship, but I am not sure that is still a thing.
She has likely been scrapped since then.
I would love to be wrong about that.