HMCS Port Hope

There has been only one vessel named HMCS Port Hope in the Royal Canadian Navy.

HMCS Port Hope (J280 / 183)

The HMCS Port Hope was a Bangor Class minesweeper. The Bangor Class ships were built in order to replace the old Basset Class minesweepers, as they were larger, faster, had much greater endurance, and burned oil as opposed to coal. Most of the Bangors were named after Canadian towns and cities, the rest after bays. As enemy mines were laid only once in 1943 in Canadian waters, the Bangors were used primarily as escorts to coastal shipping or as local escorts to ocean convoys. Sixteen of them, however, assisted in sweeping the approaches to Normandy before D-Day, and stayed to help clear German and Allied minefields in the Channel for some months afterward.

Commissioned at Toronto, Ontario on 30 July 1942, HMCS Port Hope arrived in Halifax, Nova Scotia, on 29 August and joined Halifax Force upon completion of work-ups. In May of 1943, owing to U-boat activity in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, she was transferred to Gaspé Force but returned to Halifax Force in November. In January 1944, she was transferred to Newfoundland Force. That October, she underwent an extensive refit at Saint John, New Brunswick, and Halifax, on completion of which she went to Bermuda for work-ups. Returning to Nova Scotia, HMCS Port Hope served for a short time with Halifax Force from April to June 1945, and performed miscellaneous duties on the east coast until paid off at Sydney, Nova Scotia, on 13 October 1945. She lay in strategic reserve at Sorel, Quebec until 1952, when the Royal Canadian Navy reacquired her; never re-commissioned, she was sold in February 1959 for break up at Sorel.

• Builder: Davie Shipbuilding and Repairing Co. Ltd., Lauzon, Quebec
• Date laid down: 9 September 1941
• Date launched: 14 December 1941
• Date commissioned: 30 July 1942
• Date paid off: 13 October 1945
• Displacement: 682.8 tonnes
• Dimensions: 54.9 m x 8.7 m x 2.5 m
• Speed: 16 knots
• Crew: 83
• Armament: one 4-inch (102 mm) gun, two 20 mm guns (2 x I) and depth charges.

Battle honours

• Gulf of St. Lawrence 1942
• Atlantic 1943-1945