User:DanaIsDiana/sandbox

HMS Esperance Bay was an armed merchant cruiser of the Royal Navy Later it was a troop transport. The ship was was built as Hobson's Bay, a passenger ship, and requisitioned by the Royal Navy and converted to a military ship. The German reconnaissance vessel Gonzenheim (4000 GRT, built 1937, former Norwegian Kongsfjord) was scuttled by her own crew after being sighted by HMS Esperance Bay in 1941 in the aftermath of the failed mission Rheinübung. It was returned and re-designated as a troop transport in 1941 by the Ministry of War Transport. Towards the end of the war she transported large numbers of United States troops to England. In that role she transported the 467th to England in January 1944.,