I’ve been reading up on WWII sea power, and the British used ‘sloops’ as part of their defence; often in cooperation with corvettes, MTBs and MGBs. I used to sail sloops when I was a kid – fore-and-aft-rigged sailboats with a mainsail and a jib. Were the British using ‘sloops’ in the sense of sailboats in their military operations? Or does ‘sloop’ in this sense mean some sort of motor vessel; and if so, then what?
One of these, I expect.
I haven’t read the entire article, but I gather a sloop is a slow destroyer.
How did ‘sloop’ come to be applied to this type of vessel?
Ah. That helped.
I looked up ‘sloop’ on Wikipedia before I posted. I didn’t know there was an entry for ‘sloop-of-war’.
They appear to be similar to the Buckley and John C. Butler class U. S. destroyer escorts, larger than corvettes.
Sloop-of-war is an older term, much used in the British Navy, less frequently in the U.S., from the age of sail. It did not refer to the single mast rigging.
Wiki’s take on sloop-of-war.
Looking at Tomndebb’s link and taking others I have come up with the following:
Destroyers were for fleet escort duty. Fast, carried torpedos and lightly armoured. For convoy duty many smaller cheaper ships were needed. So there were:
Destroyer escorts
The British called this class of ships a Frigate
Then there are Corvette and Sloops
One thing to note about these ships
So similar sized ships, but different goals.
Well, I’m flummoxed. I had thought “sloop” was one of the few words wind-powered boats still had to themselves. “Yawl” is anybody in a southern state, “bark” is what a dog does, “ketch” is something you do to a baseball, but I was clinging to “sloop.” Dagnabbit, now I don’t know what to call that wind-powered boat I sail in the summertime.
Excuse me while I stumble, muttering, into the sunset.
You forgot “junk.”
I believe, although I can’t now find a reference, that in the early 19th century “sloop” was used to refer to a vessel that was commanded by a person holding the rank of Commander, as opposed to a smaller vessel commanded by a leutenant. I recall a passage in a Patrick O’Brian book in which one of the characters mentions that the Sophie was a brig that “became” a sloop when the Commander came on board. I think part of the definition of a “sixth rate” in those days was that it was the smallest vessel to be commanded by someone with the rank of Captain, and that a sloop by definition was a vessel not quite large enough to be commanded by a person with that rank.
Might it be the case that the term “sloop” as it was used in the WWII period had something to do with the rank of the person commanding? Was a destroyer a Captain’s command while a sloop or destroyer escort a Commander’s?
Make one up! “Hey, honey, I’m just going out for a sail in my ‘jaunt’.” Or “What do you think of my 32ft ‘drig’. Ain’t she a beauty?” No worries.
There is “schooner.”
you also forgot “frigate” what happens when you don’t remember.
and “Fluyt” what a bird or airplane achieves.
Ye old sloop was fore-and-aft rigged single masted small ship, one or two square sails before the mast. Small, but extremely manuverable.
WWII era “sloop”: it would have to be small and very manuverable, but still a ship, not a boat.
That’s a beer glass.
Or it could be as I stated in post #9 a ship that was about the size of a destroyer, but without the speed of a destroyer that was heavy with AA guns and depth charges, and designed for convoy escort duty.
I went scuba diving from a sloop.
We did engage in some hand-to-neck combat with some Bahamian beers.