HUNT class escort destroyers were conceived to be quickly and cheaply built destroyer designs. Unfortunately, design miscalculations required the 23 Type 1s to be under armed, with only four 4" dual-purpose guns in twin turrets, one fore and one aft. (Once this defect was discovered, new hulls building were "kippered" -- split down the middle -- and widened, so that the 33 Type "2"s could mount the originally intended six 4" dual-purpose guns.
The 28 "Type 3s" reverted to four 4" guns but included a set of (only) two 21" torpedo tubes amidships. (There were also 2 "Type 4s," but they were essentially different -- bigger -- in design.)

The German "Raubvogel" -- "bird of prey" -- torpedo boats were built soon after World War I as small destroyers. Although they carried comparatively heavy armaments of three 4" guns and (no less than) six 24" torpedo tubes, they were not good sea boats with their narrow bows and they lacked the range for open sea (convoy and escort) operations that the British HUNTs had.
The "Raubvogel"s consisted of ALBATROSS, FALKE, GREIF, KONDOR, MOEWE, and SEEADLER. Being old by the time of World War II, they were considered "expendable" and saw much action in the English Channel, even up to the D-Day landings.

There was a later class of six more slightly larger interwar torpedobooten, the "Raubtier -- beast of prey -- Klasse," consisting of ILTIS (a kind of predatory polecat), JAGUAR, LEOPARD, LUCHS (bobcat), TIGER(i), and WOLF.

Bibliography:

• DESTROYER! GERMAN DESTROYERS FROM WORLD WAR II, by M.J. Whitley, 1983.
• DESTROYERS OF WORLD WAR TWO: AN INTERNATIONAL ENCYCLOPEDIA, by M.J. Whitley, 1988.
• GERMAN SURFACE VESSELS 1 (NAVIES OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR), by H.T. Lenton, 1966.
• HUNT CLASS ESCORT DESTROYERS (MAN O' WAR 4), by Alan Raven and John Roberts, 1980.
  A beautiful book, showing detail and camouflage schemes.

(20Aug02, rev. 21Oct03)