HMAS Vampire was a V-class destroyer of the Royal Navy (RN) and Royal Australian Navy (RAN). Launched in 1917 as HMS Wallace, the ship was renamed and commissioned into the RN later that year. Vampire was loaned to the RAN in 1933, and operated as a depot tender until just before World War II. Reactivated for war service, the destroyer served in the Mediterranean as part of the Scrap Iron Flotilla, and was escorting the British warships and during their loss to Japanese aircraft in the South China Sea in December 1941. Vampire was sunk on 9 April 1942 by Japanese aircraft while sailing with the aircraft carrier from Trincomalee. Construction The destroyer was one of five Admiralty V-class flotilla leaders ordered by the RN in the 1916–17 construction program. Originally, there were to be differences in design between the V class leaders and the rest of the V-class destroyers, but in order to save time in designing the destroyers, changes were limited to the layout of the bridge and accommodation areas. Vampire had a standard displacement of 1,188 tons, and a deep load displacement of 1,489 tons. She was in length overall and long between perpendiculars, with a beam of , and a maximum draught of . Propulsion machinery consisted of three White Forster boilers supplying two Brown-Curtis steam turbines, which provided to the destroyer's two propellers. Maximum speed was , and Vampire could sail at . The standard ship's company was made up of 6 officers and 113 sailors. Main armament for a V-class destroyer consisted of four QF Mark V guns. This was supplemented by a QF 2-pounder gun (with a second installed in January 1942), two twin Lewis gun mountings, a single Lewis gun (later replaced by a 4-barrel Vickers .303 gun), and two torpedo tube sets (initially 3-tube, later replaced by 4-tube sets). Four depth charge chutes were fitted during construction, with two depth charge throwers installed later; the destroyer could carry up to 50 charges. The ship was laid down as HMS Wallace by J. Samuel White & Co Ltd at Cowes on the Isle of Wight on 10 October 1916, and was launched on 21 May 1917. In July 1917, the ship was renamed Vampire, and was commissioned into the RN on 22 September 1917. Operational history RN service On entering service, Vampire was initially assigned to the 4th Destroyer Flotilla. After the