Bob C's Everything you Didnt Want to Know about British Coast Forces and how to play them.

The Fairmile D

We now come to the main protagonist of this project the famous’ Dogboats’ a name given them to by the press at the time. From the outset heavily armed , initially being built as either MGB’s or MTB’s with the later carrying  less gun mounts if favour of 2 x 21″ Torps.

Again designed by Bill Holt of the Admiralty to specifically combat the e-boat threat some 227 where completed beginning in 1942 with MGB 601 the  first handful of boats did not have the distinctive torpedo baffle in  the hull. 115 ft long and weighing with std load 102 tons for the MTB and 90 for the MGB. Capable initially of around 31 knots it their single form dropping to 29 knots with the later combined boats.

The MGBS had respectable armament intially of 1 x 2pdr pom pom  on the bow , an old Hotchkiss 6pdr at the stern, a powered twin 20mm amidships , 2x twin .50 Hmgs either side of the bridge and around 4 x twin .300 vickers k guns scattered around the boat.

The main difference with the MTB is there was no rear 6pdr , the twin 20mm taking its place and no midship gun , but carrying 2x 21″ torpedoes.

The forward 2pdr was replaced on both types by a naval version of  6pdr anti tank gun with a semi automatic loader and was a totally different type of gun to the old Hotchkiss still on the back.

This on the later comibined boats was also replaced by a the by 6pdr semi auto.

The .50 vickers had an inability to penetrate the armoured briges on S.boats and were replaced by single 20mm orlkens at the very least some may have been twin manual mounts. There is  a fuzzy picture  in the book ‘Dogboats at War’ of one on the Thames which could be both mountings on the Bridge sides and fordeck.

Dogboats were operated by the RN the Royal Canadian and about 7 boats by the Norwegian Navy who braved  long North Sea crossing from the North of Scotland to operate in the Fiords of Norway.

They could be in mixed flotillas operating with their smaller brethren or Dogboat only flotillas like the 55^th (famous for the shark teeth bows on the front on most books on Fairmile D’s) operating in the Channel, North Sea, Med and Aegean. In the latter two theatres they could operate in Battlegroups with American PT’s the former providing the gun power and the later acting as scouts as they were equipped with Radar.