The Eighth HMS MOHAWK (F125), Type 81 General Purpose Frigate, was laid down on 23 Dec, 1960 and launched at Vickers Armstrong, Barrow-in-Furness by Lady Villiers, then wife of the First Sea Lord in 5 April 1962. Eventually, following demarkation problems with the unions, the vessel was commissioned on 29th November 1963. After final sea trials, which followed the commissioning, HMS MOHAWK was accepted into the Royal Navy on 2 Dec 1963.

After a quick trip to Portsmouth, Christmas and some subsequent weeks were then spent alongside at South Railway Jetty, testing and tuning the equipment with day running, and an overnight trip carrying out an unsuccessful search for a crashed aircraft, which was following by the usual 6 week work-up at Portland under the eagle eyes of FOST, where we were also joined by our Wasp "chopper" - the first to operate from a Tribal Class Frigate.

A short period was then spent at Chatham, preparing the vessel for the "Gulf". After brief stops at Gibraltar and Malta we soon arrived at the Suez: a pleasant unplanned 24 hours or so was spent in the Bitter Lakes following problems with the engines (a wonderful place to go for a swim at 0600 in the morning) and then it was on to Aden and the Gulf. En route we had to send two men ashore for urgent medical treatment: the benefits of having the Wasp onboard were soon becoming apparent!

At last we arrived at Mina Sulman Jetty at Bahrein and soon many of us took advantage of the swimming pool in the Naval Base and the sailing in the harbour, not forgetting we were now experiencing summer in the Gulf.

After 3 weeks we were on the move again calling at Aden and Djibouti enroute for Mombasa where we spent an enjoyable 2 or 3 weeks relaxing, with more sailing and a couple of pleasant days ashore at the Silversands Leave Centre. By September it was time to return to Aden and the Gulf. HMS ANZIO had recently had an encounter with SS ESSO NORWAY and had attempted a salvage operation, but the tides were too strong and it appeared to be more of a case of the NORWAY towing the ANZIO, an old WWII LCT, based in the Gulf. Anyway she managed to beach her and the Wasp was released to take photographs.

Visits were made to Sitra, Mina al Ahmadi (Kuwait) and Yas island; and back to Bahrein before we departed for Karachi to take part in operation Midlink : a most memorable part of the passage being to see the sea boiling as thousands of Dolphins converged on a few square miles of ocean - a sight to behold indeed !

After returning to Bahrein we were soon off to spend a wonderful Christmas at Aden - je was down with an ear infection and what with the problems ashore with some of the locals - not a pleasant time was had by all, particularly those on duty ashore (not me), but this was all made up for by a second trip to Mombasa where other members of the ships company disappeared off to Kilimanjaro and the Wasp went game counting etc. We then sailed for Aden and the Gulf: and for me it was a case of flying back to the UK from Bahrein by ancient prop-powered RAF Britannia, having nearly completed 2 years onboard (OK - that includes 6 months ashore in Barrow-in-Furness, standing by the ship whilst she was building), whilst the rest of the ship's company prepared for FOME's Inspection and a return to the UK by sea.

HMS MOHAWK was armed with 2 ancient 4.5 inch guns which I am informed were were formerly fitted to the WWII C Class Destroyers: 40mm Orelikon guns were fitted as a stop-gap as the Seacat system was not yet available: a single three barrelled Limbo mortar provided the anti-submarine weaponry. She was eventually scrapped in 1982

Photograph courtesy of First commission book for the Eighth HMS MOHAWK

^ back to top ^