HMS Ascension (K502)

Evidence

11 evidence entries recorded; each entry has a stable permalink (#ev-1 … #ev-11).

1. [1]DANFS, 'Ascension' (NHHC live page, verified 2026-10-04) [nhhc_danfs]

   Locator

   NHHC DANFS 'Ascension' entry, specification block and full service narrative

   Finding type

   vessel_history

   Finding

   DANFS record for this hull: the unnamed frigate PF-74, originally classed as gunboat PG-182, was laid down 30 April 1943 at Providence, R.I., by the Walsh-Kaiser Co., Inc., under a Maritime Commission contract (MC hull 1656); assigned to the United Kingdom under lend-lease 10 June 1943; launched 6 August 1943, sponsored by Mrs. A. A. Kirby; first named Hargood, renamed Ascension by the time the British accepted her; assigned pendant number K.502; transferred to the Royal Navy 24 November 1943. Trials and work-up off Casco Bay, Maine, then shakedown out of Bermuda; reached Ardrossan on the Firth of Clyde 'at the end of March' (the entry does not print the year; 1944 follows from the narrative sequence) for installation of British equipment; assigned to the 5th Escort Group operating from Londonderry and escorted three convoys between Londonderry and Gibraltar, returning from the third voyage 17 September 1944; then assigned to the 17th Escort Group as senior officer's ship in the northwest approaches to the Irish Sea and the western English Channel until the end of the war in Europe. Laid up in reserve at Dartmouth in mid-June 1945; reactivated April 1946; departed Londonderry 17 April 1946; arrived New York Naval Shipyard 17 May; decommissioned and returned to the U.S. Navy 31 May 1946; declared surplus 8 October 1946; stricken from the Naval Vessel Register 29 October 1946; sold 16 October 1947 to Hudson Valley Shipwrecking Corp., Newburgh, N.Y.; removed from naval custody 7 November 1947; broken up for scrap by December 1948. Specification block: dp. 1,430; l. 304'0"; b. 37'6"; dr. 12'0" mean; s. 20 k.; cpl. 120; a. 3 3", 4 40mm., 8 20mm., 2 dct., 4 dcp., 1 dcp. (hh.); class Tacoma; type S2-S2-AQ1.

   Verification

   verified

   Role

   supporting

   Documentation level

   ship_specific

   Accessed

   2026-10-04

   Study period

   1943-1948

   Population

   Walsh-Kaiser construction trades 1943; Royal Navy crew 1943-1946 (DANFS complement figure 120)

   Limitations

   DANFS documents construction, service chronology, and disposal — not materials or asbestos content. Its account of the 25 November 1944 action credits U-322, an attribution superseded by the modern reassessment carried at ev-hms-ascension-06. The 'cpl. 120' complement differs from the 190 class figure in the DANFS PF-74 specification block and NavSource — carried in gaps.

   Atlas source

   true

   Evidence ID

   ev-hms-ascension-01

2. [2]DANFS, 'Hargood (DE-573)' (NHHC live page, verified 2026-10-04) — combined entry covering both the PF-74 and DE-573 hulls [nhhc_danfs]

   Locator

   NHHC DANFS 'Hargood (DE-573)' page — PF-74 specification block and paragraph, then DE-573 paragraph

   Finding type

   vessel_history

   Finding

   The DANFS 'Hargood' entry covers two distinct hulls on one page. For this hull it reads: 'Hargood (PF-74), originally PG-182, was built under maritime Commission contract by Walsh-Kaiser Co., Inc., Providence, R.I. Intended for use by the United Kingdom, she was reclassified PF-74 15 April 1943; renamed Ascension; and launched 7 April 1943, sponsored by Mrs. A. A. Kirby. Ascension was then completed and transferred under lend-lease to the United Kingdom 24 November 1943 as a part of the 21-ship "Colony" class. She served as a patrol and escort craft until being returned to the United States 31 May 1946. She was sold 16 October 1947 to Hudson Valley Shipwrecking Corp., Newburg [sic], N.Y.' Its specification block reads cpl. 190, cl. Tacoma. The entry also documents the namesake — Captain William Hargood, RN, who commanded Belleisle at Trafalgar — and the separate DE-573 hull (Buckley class, Bethlehem-Hingham, launched 18 December 1943, commissioned RN as HMS Hargood (K582) 7 February 1944, returned 23 February 1946, struck 12 April 1946).

   Verification

   verified

   Role

   supporting

   Documentation level

   ship_specific

   Accessed

   2026-10-04

   Study period

   1943-1947

   Population

   Royal Navy crew 1943-1946

   Limitations

   Name-collision record: this single DANFS page covers both PF-74 (this hull, RN Ascension K502) and DE-573 (a Buckley-class hull, RN Hargood K582) — the two ships are distinct and must not be conflated. The PF-74 paragraph carries a known DANFS print defect: 'launched 7 April 1943' is impossible (before the 30 April 1943 laying down); the printed Vol. IV errata, the separate DANFS 'Ascension' entry, NavSource, and the Maritime Commission hull table all support 6 August 1943 — carried in gaps. Documents history only, not asbestos content.

   Atlas source

   true

   Evidence ID

   ev-hms-ascension-02

3. [3]NavSource Online, Frigate Photo Archive: HMS Ascension (K 502), ex-Hargood, ex-PF-74, ex-PG-182 (live at navsource.net, verified 2026-10-04) [other_primary]

   Locator

   NavSource PF-74 page — chronology bullets and 'Specifications' block

   Finding type

   vessel_history

   Finding

   NavSource record for this hull: MC type S2-S2-AQ1; originally authorized as patrol gunboat PG-182; reclassified patrol frigate PF-74 on 15 April 1943; laid down under a Maritime Commission contract at Walsh-Kaiser Co., Inc., Providence, RI (NavSource prints 'Welsh-Kaiser'); assigned to the Royal Navy under Lend-Lease and named Hargood; renamed Ascension and launched 6 August 1943; transferred to the Royal Navy and commissioned HMS Ascension (K 502) on 24 November 1943; returned to U.S. custody 31 May 1946 and decommissioned; declared surplus 8 October 1946; struck from the Navy Register 29 October 1946; sold for scrap 16 October 1947 to Hudson Valley Shipwrecking Corp. of Newburgh, NY; the Naval Vessel Register of 1 January 1949 lists the sale date as November 1947; removed from naval custody 7 November 1947; broken up for scrap by December 1948. Specifications: 1,246 t.; 304 ft.; 37 ft 6 in.; 14 ft draft; 20 kts; complement 190; three 3-inch/50 dual-purpose mounts, two twin 40mm mounts, nine 20mm guns, one Hedgehog projector, eight Y-gun projectors, two depth-charge tracks; propulsion three boilers, two 5,500 iHP turbines, two shafts.

   Verification

   verified

   Role

   supporting

   Documentation level

   ship_specific

   Accessed

   2026-10-04

   Study period

   1943-1948

   Population

   Construction yard workforce; Royal Navy crew 1943-1946

   Limitations

   Volunteer-compiled ship record; corroborates DANFS and supplies the surplus/striking/custody-removal dates and the NVR-1949 discrepancy. Not an official source and not asbestos documentation. 'Welsh-Kaiser' is a NavSource typographical variant of Walsh-Kaiser; the complement figure of 190 is the class design figure, in conflict with the 120 printed in the ship-specific DANFS 'Ascension' entry — carried in gaps.

   Atlas source

   true

   Evidence ID

   ev-hms-ascension-03

4. [4]ShipbuildingHistory (Tim Colton), Walsh-Kaiser Providence RI yard production table (live, verified 2026-10-04) [other_primary]

   Locator

   Walsh-Kaiser yard table, row for MC hull 1656

   Finding type

   historical_record

   Finding

   The Maritime Commission hull table for the Walsh-Kaiser Providence yard lists hull 1656, name 'Hargood', type S2-S2-AQ1 frigate, delivered 24 November 1943, disposition: 'PF 74, to Britain 1944 as HMS Ascension (K 502), returned 1946, scrapped 1947' — an independent corroboration of the MC hull number, the Hargood/Ascension name chain, the PF-74 designation, and the disposal arc.

   Verification

   verified

   Role

   supporting

   Documentation level

   ship_specific

   Accessed

   2026-10-04

   Study period

   1943-1947

   Population

   Walsh-Kaiser construction workforce

   Limitations

   Compiled industry reference, not an official record; corroborates the hull identity and MC hull number but does not document asbestos content. Its 'scrapped 1947' shorthand conflicts in detail with NavSource's 'broken up by December 1948' and the NVR-1949 November 1947 sale listing — the disposal-date spread is carried in gaps.

   Atlas source

   true

   Evidence ID

   ev-hms-ascension-04

5. [5]uboat.net Allied Warships: HMS Ascension (K 502), Colony-class frigate (verified 2026-10-04) [other_primary]

   Locator

   uboat.net warship page — header table, 'Commands listed' section, and 'Notable events' convoy entries

   Finding type

   vessel_history

   Finding

   The uboat.net warship record corroborates the RN career: built by 'Walsch-Kaiser' [sic] at Providence, RI; laid down 30 April 1943; launched 6 August 1943; commissioned 24 November 1943; returned to the USN 31 May 1946; 'not listed as active unit in the October 1945 Navy List.' It lists wartime commanding officers — Lt.Cdr. Archibald Wilkinson, RNR (26 July 1943 to September 1944) and Cdr. William Josselyn Moore, DSC, RNR (September 1944 to mid-1945) — and convoy escort events consistent with the DANFS narrative, including the May-June 1944 combined convoys OS 78 / KMS 52 and SL 158 / MKS 49 in company with HMS Activity, HMS Exe, HMS Carisbrooke Castle, HMS Hadleigh Castle and others; escort of homeward convoy MKS 55(G) in the SL 164 combined movement of July 1944; anti-submarine exercises with submarine HMS Tiptoe off Larne on 9 and 10 August 1944; and escort duty on the fast troop convoys CU 56 (joined escort ~5 February 1945) and CU 72 (English Channel section, ~3 June 1945).

   Verification

   verified

   Role

   supporting

   Documentation level

   ship_specific

   Accessed

   2026-10-04

   Study period

   1943-1946

   Population

   Royal Navy crew; commanding officers Wilkinson and Moore

   Limitations

   Standard scholarly reference database (compiled, not official); used here for commanding-officer names, convoy detail, and the October 1945 Navy List note that DANFS does not carry. Its 'Ordered 10 Jun 1943' date actually corresponds to the DANFS lend-lease assignment date, not an order date. Does not document materials or asbestos content.

   Atlas source

   true

   Evidence ID

   ev-hms-ascension-05

6. [6]uboat.net U-482 fate entry (Axel Niestlé assessment, April 2005) and U-322 revised fate (verified 2026-10-04) [other_primary]

   Locator

   uboat.net/boats/u482.htm fate block; uboat.net/boats/u322.htm 'Previously recorded fate' block

   Finding type

   vessel_history

   Finding

   Corrects the DANFS attribution: the current assessed fate reads 'Sunk on 25 November 1944 in the North Atlantic west of the Shetland Islands, in position 60.18N, 04.52W, by depth charges from the British frigate HMS Ascension, after being located by a Norwegian Sunderland aircraft (330 Sqn RAF/G) on 24 November 1944. 48 dead (all hands lost)' — i.e., the boat sunk by Ascension on 25 November 1944 was U-482, not U-322 as the DANFS narrative states. U-322's fate is separately reassessed as sunk 29 December 1944 in the English Channel south of Weymouth by HMCS Calgary. DANFS additionally describes 'hedgehog' attacks launched by Ascension in company with frigate Moorsom; the revised uboat.net fate credits Ascension's depth charges without naming Moorsom — the weapon and participant discrepancy is documented, not reconciled.

   Verification

   verified

   Role

   correction

   Documentation level

   ship_specific

   Accessed

   2026-10-04

   Study period

   1944-11-25 (action); reassessment published 2005

   Population

   Royal Navy crew; German crew of U-482

   Limitations

   Compiled but standard scholarly reassessment (Niestlé); the underlying DANFS claim is a 1945-era wartime attribution. This row corrects which U-boat was sunk — it does not adjudicate the weapon type or Moorsom's role, both of which remain in gaps. Not asbestos documentation.

   Atlas source

   true

   Evidence ID

   ev-hms-ascension-06

7. [7]Fleischer WE, Viles FJ Jr, Gade RL, Drinker P. 'A health survey of pipe covering operations in constructing naval vessels.' J Ind Hyg Toxicol 1946;28:9-16 (PubMed PMID 21016030); context: Kelly RJ, 'When errors become etched in stone,' New Solutions 2026 (PMID 42307414) [other_primary]

   Locator

   PubMed records 21016030 and 42307414; Fleischer text describing amosite in Navy pipe covering (via the published article record)

   Finding type

   asbestos_application

   Finding

   Era documentation for the construction context of this hull: a 1943 Maritime Commission S2-S2-AQ1 frigate with a three-boiler steam plant would have carried period-standard thermal insulation, lagging, gaskets, and packing. The contemporaneous Fleischer et al. survey states directly that 'an important ingredient of pipe covering material used on U. S. Navy vessels is amosite' — an asbestos mineral — and documents dust exposure in pipe-covering operations at two Navy yards and two Navy contract yards (anonymized A-D) during wartime construction. Kelly (2026) documents the study's reach and its now-disputed 'not a dangerous occupation' conclusion. This establishes era-standard asbestos pipe covering in U.S. Navy new construction — it does not establish that any specific material aboard this hull contained asbestos.

   Verification

   inferred

   Role

   context

   Documentation level

   class_or_era

   Accessed

   2026-10-04

   Study period

   1943-1945 (survey era); publications 1946 and 2026

   Population

   Pipe coverers and insulators at U.S. Navy yards and contract yards, wartime

   Limitations

   Class/era inference only. The Fleischer yards are anonymized in the paper; no verified source located that names Walsh-Kaiser as one of the surveyed yards, so no yard-level attribution is made. This row supports archival prioritization only — no asbestos product is normalized from it and it cannot support 'documented aboard this hull' wording.

   Atlas source

   true

   Evidence ID

   ev-hms-ascension-07

8. [8]UK National Archives Discovery catalogue search, series ADM 53 (Admiralty ships' logs), keyword ASCENSION — plus Colony-class sisters ANGUILLA, BAHAMAS, DOMINICA, MONTSERRAT (verified 2026-10-04) [other_primary]

   Locator

   TNA Discovery results page, query ASCENSION with series filter ADM 53 (0 results; control query WARSPITE returns 231)

   Finding type

   historical_record

   Finding

   Royal Navy ship's logs for the commissioned period November 1943 - May 1946 should exist in TNA series ADM 53, but a keyword search for 'ASCENSION' within ADM 53 returns zero ship-titled pieces; identical searches for Colony-class sisters (ANGUILLA, BAHAMAS, DOMINICA, MONTSERRAT) likewise return zero, while the series filter itself is confirmed working (WARSPITE returns 231 pieces). The class's wartime logs are therefore not retrievable by name in the current catalogue — they may be uncatalogued, indexed under a different convention, or not held. This is the open archival lead for ship's-company and employment detail.

   Verification

   verified

   Role

   archival_lead

   Documentation level

   ship_specific

   Accessed

   2026-10-04

   Study period

   2026-10-04 catalogue state

   Limitations

   A catalogue-search result, not a finding about the records' existence: ADM 53 holds 213,035 pieces and cataloguing of WWII-era small-ship logs may be incomplete or under different title conventions. The negative is real for the stated search but does not prove absence. No log content was examined.

   Atlas source

   true

   Evidence ID

   ev-hms-ascension-08

9. [9]CourtListener API v4 authenticated sweep via cl-auth-search.py: "HMS Ascension" opinion + docket, "PF-74" opinion + docket (--limit 20 each) [court_record]

   Locator

   Search ledger sl-hms-ascension-08 and sl-hms-ascension-09; helper stderr 'fleet-wide request budget is momentarily spent' on every attempt 2026-10-04 ~09:10-10:05

   Finding type

   litigation_documented

   Finding

   The four required base queries were attempted through the authenticated helper across the session — direct attempts plus a spaced retry runner (~35 minutes, one attempt per ~4 minutes) — but the fleet-wide pacing limiter (shared 1,400/day quota, ~58/hr token bucket) never yielded a token: every attempt exited with the helper's pacing stand-down before a result payload returned. No qualifying or non-qualifying hit is asserted; the sweep is incomplete.

   Verification

   partial

   Role

   negative_finding

   Documentation level

   ship_specific

   Accessed

   2026-10-04

   Study period

   2026-10-04 search session

   Limitations

   Access/pacing gap, not a no-litigation conclusion — no result page was returned for any of the four base queries, so no hit could be classified as qualifying asbestos litigation, other litigation, name collision, or no-result. Asbestos-qualified variants were not run (no base overflow was established) and alias queries ('USS Hargood', 'K502', 'PG-182') were scoped out by the four-query cap — 'Hargood' additionally collides with DE-573/HMS Hargood (K582). Completion deferred to a session with pacing budget.

   Atlas source

   true

   Evidence ID

   ev-hms-ascension-11

10. [10]UK National Archives catalogue, ADM 1/30263 (former H&A 393/45): 'Awards to 6 officers and men of HM Ships Ascension and Moorsom for sinking U322 in the Atlantic Nov 25 1944' (verified live 2026-10-04; open document, not digitised) [other_primary]

    Locator

    TNA Discovery piece record C4851372 — reference ADM 1/30263, date 1944-1945, former ref H&A 393/45

    Finding type

    historical_record

    Finding

    An official Admiralty honours file exists naming this ship: awards to six officers and men of HM Ships Ascension and Moorsom 'for sinking U322 in the Atlantic Nov 25 1944.' The catalogue entry independently corroborates (a) the wartime/era attribution of the kill to U-322 that DANFS repeats, and (b) Moorsom's co-participation in the action — contemporaneous Admiralty practice treated the sinking as a joint Ascension–Moorsom success. The piece is an open, undigitised document at Kew; its contents were not examined.

    Verification

    verified

    Role

    archival_lead

    Documentation level

    ship_specific

    Accessed

    2026-10-04

    Study period

    1944-1945 (action and awards); catalogue verified 2026-10-04

    Population

    Six decorated officers and men of Ascension and Moorsom

    Limitations

    Catalogue description only — the honours file itself is undigitised and was not retrieved, so award recipients, citations, and any operational detail inside are unexamined. The catalogue title reflects the 1945-era Admiralty attribution (U-322), which the modern Niestlé reassessment revises to U-482 (ev-06); the discrepancy stands. Not asbestos documentation.

    Atlas source

    true

    Evidence ID

    ev-hms-ascension-10

11. [11]Ship-specific asbestos documentation sweep: NHHC DANFS (Ascension + Hargood entries), NavSource PF-74 record, uboat.net warship record, TNA ADM 53 catalogue, Maritime Commission hull table, and PubMed-era industrial-hygiene literature [other_primary]

    Locator

    Search ledger entries sl-hms-ascension-01 through sl-hms-ascension-09

    Finding type

    historical_record

    Finding

    No ship-specific asbestos survey, abatement record, product inventory, material test, exposure finding, or qualifying litigation reference was located for this hull in the sources reviewed. All ship-specific documentation found concerns construction, propulsion, wartime service, transfer, and disposal. Asbestos-relevant content exists only at the class/era level (ev-07) and is carried as inference.

    Verification

    verified

    Role

    negative_finding

    Documentation level

    ship_specific

    Accessed

    2026-10-04

    Study period

    2026-10-04 research session

    Limitations

    A no-result finding within the sources searched, not proof that no documentation exists anywhere: the hull's wartime logs are not keyword-indexed at TNA (ev-08), RN muster records were not searched, NARA RG19 'General Information Books' per-hull material specifications were not retrieved, and the hull was scrapped 1947-48, leaving no museum-era abatement record. Ship-specific asbestos documentation remains unknown pending primary-source recovery.

    Atlas source

    true

    Evidence ID

    ev-hms-ascension-09