HMS Jewel (J390)

HMS Jewel (J390) was a steam turbine-powered Algerine-class minesweeper during the Second World War.

Design and description
The turbine-powered ships displaced 850 LT at standard load and 1125 LT at deep load. The ships measured 225 ft long overall with a beam of 35 ft. The turbine group had a draught of 11 ft. The ships' complement consisted of 85 officers and ratings.

The ships had two Parsons geared steam turbines, each driving one shaft, using steam provided by two Admiralty three-drum boilers. The engines produced a total of 2000 ihp and gave a maximum speed of 16.5 kn. They carried a maximum of 660 LT of fuel oil that gave them a range of 5000 nmi at 10 kn.

The Algerine class was armed with a QF 4 in Mk V anti-aircraft gun and four twin-gun mounts for Oerlikon 20 mm cannon. The latter guns were in short supply when the first ships were being completed and they often got a proportion of single mounts. By 1944, single-barrel Bofors 40 mm mounts began replacing the twin 20 mm mounts on a one for one basis. All of the ships were fitted for four throwers and two rails for depth charges.

Construction and career
The ship was ordered on 30 April 1942 at the Harland & Wolff at Belfast, Ireland. She was laid down on 27 November 1943 and launched on 20 July 1944. The ship was commissioned on 9 December 1944.

On 21 February 1945, she was deployed to Scapa Flow during Operation Shred. Two days later, she swept the Norwegian waters during Operation Groundsheet. In October, she was stationed in Singapore as part of the 10th Flotilla.

In September 1946, the ship was sent back to the UK to be decommissioned on arrival. The ship was put into the reserve fleet and laid up at Harwich until the ship was transferred to be used as a RNVR Drill Ship at Dundee in January 1948.

On 28 December 1955, she was recommissioned into the Dartmouth Training Squadron in which she trained Cadets from the Royal Naval College at Dartmouth until 1961.

In 1956 she was the starting vessel for the Torbay to Lisbon yacht race - now considered to be the first modern Tall Ship Race.

In 1966, she was put on the disposal list and sold to BISCO for scrap at Inverkeithing, Scotland in which she arrived on 7 April 1967.