HMCS Kokanee

There has been only one vessel named Kokanee in the Royal Canadian Navy.

HMCS Kokanee (K419)

Alternatively named in honour of Nelson, British Columbia, because that latter name was borne by another Allied ship; the River class frigate Kokanee was commissioned at Esquimalt, British Columbia, on June 6, 1944. She arrived at Halifax, Nova Scotia, on July 24 and left for Bermuda in August to work up. On arrival at St. John’s, Newfoundland, in September, she was assigned to Escort Group C-3 as Senior Officer’s ship, and spent the rest of the European war on Atlantic convoy duty. She left Londonderry, Northern Ireland, for the last time on May 25, 1945, with convoy ON.304, and soon after arriving in Canada she departed for the west coast.

She completed refit on October 4, 1945, but as Victory in Japan-Day had occurred, she was paid off into reserve on December 21 of the same year and sold to Canadian brokers in 1947. The following year, Kokanee was resold to the government of India for conversion to a pilot vessel for the Hooghly River and renamed Bengal in 1950.

• Builder: Yarrows Ltd., Esquimalt, British Columbia
• Laid down: August 25, 1943
• Launched:  November 27, 1943
• Commissionning date: June 6, 1944
• Paying off date: December 21, 1945
• Displacement: 1,445 tons
• Dimensions: 91.9 m x 11.1 m x 2.7 m
• Speed: 19 knots
• Crew: 141
• Armament: two 4-inch (102-mm) guns (1 double mount), one 12-pound (5.45 kg) gun, eight 20-mm guns (4 double mounts), one Hedgehog mortar, depth charges

Battle honours

• Gulf of St. Lawrence 1944
• Atlantic 1944-1945