Design History
From 1926, all Royal Navy destroyers had descended from a common lineage based upon the prototypes Amazon and Ambuscade. During the interwar period, advances in armament and machinery meant that by the mid-1930s, these "interwar standard" destroyers were being eclipsed by foreign designs, particularly from Japan, Italy, and Germany. To counteract this trend, the Admiralty decided on a new destroyer type, with an emphasis on gunnery over torpedo warfare. The destroyer was based on 'Design V', a failed design for a small fleet cruiser (another variant of this design evolved into the Dido-class cruiser). This design envisioned a 1,850-ton ship with a speed of 36.25 knots (67.14 km/h; 41.72 mph), an endurance of 5,500 nautical miles (10,200 km; 6,300 mi), and five twin 4.7 inch guns as main armament.
Although the design was rejected for the fleet cruiser role, by August 1935, after no less than eight design proposals, it had evolved to present a destroyer with eight 4.7 inch Quick Firing Mark XII guns, in four twin mountings, with a maximum elevation of 40°, controlled by a low-angle (LA) director and high-angle / low-angle (HA/LA) rangefinder director on the bridge. To provide close in anti-aircraft protection, the design was fitted with a quadruple Mark VII QF 2 pdr "pom pom" mounting, and two quadruple Vickers .50 inch machine guns. These ships introduced the Fuze Keeping Clock High Angle Fire Control Computer, which was used on all subsequent British wartime destroyers. The ships were also armed with a quadruple bank of torpedo tubes. They were considered to be handsome ships, with a clipper bow that provided excellent seakeeping and two raked funnels and masts. They are remembered with great affection to this day.
The Tribals were so much larger and differed so much from other British destroyers in service that the resurrection of the corvette classification was considered for them. This did not go ahead, and by 1939, the Tribals were classified as destroyers, with the corvette designation going to mass-produced anti-submarine escorts such as the Flower class.
Read more about this topic: Tribal Class Destroyer (1936)
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