Sicily, July 1943. Troops, guns, light tanks and transport are rushed ashore in the opening of the Allied invasion as Zero Hour approaches. (British Admiralty photograph BNA4183). Victor Sierra

Landing in Sicily

HMS Kingston (F64) was a K-class destroyer of the Royal Navy laid down by J. Samuel White and Company at Cowes on the Isle of Wight on 6 October 1937, launched on 9 January 1939 and commissioned on 14 September 1939. Kingston was involved in the evacuation of Greece in April 1941, and attacked and sank the enemy German submarine U-35 in the North Sea on 29 November 1939 in company with the destroyers Kashmir and Icarus. HMS Kingston took part in the Second Battle of Sirte, in March, 1942 where she was hit by a 15" shell fired by the Italian battleship "Vittorio Veneto". Whist in dry dock at Malta repairing damage from this encounter, Kingston was attacked by German Junkers 88 aircraft while on 11 April 1942 and damaged beyond repair, The HMS Kingston was scuttled in the channel between St. Paul’s Islands and St. Paul’s Bay to block submarines from accessing the shore.

HMS Kingston (F64)

Wreck of an Hawker Hurricane of the RAF destroyed, perhaps by an air-to-ground attack, in a Libyan airfield seized by Axis forces. Note in background a Luftwaffe's Messerschmitt Bf.110. Victor Sierra