The Q-ship Society has launched a campaign to save HMS Saxifrage, a warship ordered to leave her current dock at Chatham. The vessel has been hidden from public view there since 2016, and its future now depends on whether preservation can be secured before it is moved again.
HMS Saxifrage was built in 1917 by Lobnitz & Co. of Renfrew in Scotland and commissioned in March 1918 as an Anchusa-Flower class sloop for convoy escort and anti-submarine duties during World War I. The ship was renamed HMS President in 1922, and it was saved from scrapping that same year after the Marjoram was wrecked while under tow to London.
Chatham and HMS President
For decades, HMS President was moored on the Thames Embankment in London before leaving her berth next to Blackfriars Bridge in 2016 to make way for the construction of the Thames Tideway Tunnel. The ship was then towed downriver to Chatham Working Docks, where it has remained since 2016.
The move now threatened by the dock order would remove a vessel that the Q-ship Society describes as one of the last surviving Royal Navy warships involved in anti-submarine operations in World War I. HMS Saxifrage came into contact with nine U-boats and never sank a U-boat, but it remains one of the few British Q-ships still tied to that wartime role.
Royal Navy Q-ships
The British built and deployed 366 Q-ships during World War I, and 61 were lost in battle. That record leaves HMS Saxifrage as a rare survivor from a program built around concealment, surprise, and close-range anti-submarine work rather than heavy firepower.
Its armament, including 4-inch guns and 12-pounder guns, reflected that role. The campaign now centers on whether a preservation solution can be found that keeps the ship from being lost to the dock move after so many years out of public sight at Chatham.
The immediate question is where HMS Saxifrage would go next and whether the campaign can keep the ship preserved rather than pushed toward disposal. For now, the Q-ship Society is trying to turn a forced move into a chance to save one of the Royal Navy's last surviving World War I anti-submarine warships.
