581st Radio Relay Company
in Japan (1950)

HMS Ravager - Ferry Carrier

HMS Ravager (D-70) was built as an Attacker class escort carrier in the USA at Seattle-Tacoma, being laid down on 11 April 1942, purchased by the USN in May 1942, completed by Commercial Iron Works and commissioned as AVG-24 (later as ACV 24 - CVE 24). Transferred and commissioned in the Royal Navy as HMS Ravager on 26 April 1943.

The "Attacker" Class were the second batch of escort carriers built in the USA for the Royal Navy, the lead ship - Attacker - having originally been intended to be one of the "Avenger" Class. They were also the first escort carriers to be ordered after the USA entered the war; the USN kept the other 10 vessels ordered at the same time, as these became the "Bogue" Class. Like their predecessors they were converted from mercantile hulls. The RN undertook essential alterations to the aviation fuel systems, and lengthened the flight deck. Once the ships were ready for action they soon proved themselves, both as convoy escorts and fighter support ships for amphibious landings. HMS Ravager saw war service in the Atlantic with 835 (wildcat) and 804 (hellcat) squadrons embarked between September and October 1943, but subsequently she was used mainly as a DLT training, Ravager becoming one of the main RN training carriers which was operating in the North Sea off the Scottish coast. Training DLTs training of Ravager included many squadrons over the period, and included such as the Sea Hurricane of 760 squadron from RNAS Inskip in October, 1944.

Ravager was returned to the USN on 26 February 1946, and became mercantile Robin Trent in 1948, the Trent in 1971, scrapped Kaohsiung, Taiwan in 1973.