HMS Sportsman was an S class submarine

British S class submarine (1931)

The S-class submarines of the Royal Navy were originally designed and built during the modernisation of the submarine force in the early 1930s to meet the need for smaller boats to patrol the restricted waters of the North Sea and the Mediterranean Sea replacing the British H class submarines...

 of the Royal Navy

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

, and part of the Third Group built of that class. She was built at Chatham Dockyard

Chatham Dockyard

Chatham Dockyard, located on the River Medway and of which two-thirds is in Gillingham and one third in Chatham, Kent, England, came into existence at the time when, following the Reformation, relations with the Catholic countries of Europe had worsened, leading to a requirement for additional...

 and launched on 17 April 1942. So far she has been the only ship of the Royal Navy to bear the name Sportsman.

In 1951 it was lent to the French Navy who named her La Sibylle. She was in service briefly being lost with her crew the same year.

Career

She spent most of the war in the Mediterranean, where she sank the French passenger ship Général Bonaparte, the Italian merchant Bolzaneto, the Italian fishing vessels Angiolina P and Maria Luisa B, the Italian sailing vessel Angiolina, two Greek sailing vessels, the Bulgarian troop transport Balkan, the small German tanker MT 3/Vienna, the German sailing vessel Grauer Ort and the German merchant Lüneburg (the former Greek Constantin Louloudis). Sportsman also sank the German transport Petrella

German ship Petrella

The Petrella was an German merchant ship, which sank on February 8, 1944 north of Suda Bay, Crete, killing some 2,670 Italian POWs.- Background :...

 (the former French Aveyron). 2670 out of 3173 Italian Prisoners of War who were aboard the Petrella were killed. The German guards did not open the prisoner of war rooms and fired at them when they tried to break out.

Sportsman also damaged the Greek sailing vessel Spiridon and attacked a landing craft with gunfire. The attack had to be broken off because the gun jammed. She also fired six torpedoes at the French tanker Marguerite Finally. The torpedoes missed their target.

Sportsman survived the Second World War and was lent to the French Navy

French Navy

The French Navy, officially the Marine nationale and often called La Royale is the maritime arm of the French military. It includes a full range of fighting vessels, from patrol boats to a nuclear powered aircraft carrier and 10 nuclear-powered submarines, four of which are capable of launching...

 in 1951, being renamed Sibylle. She was lost off Toulon

Toulon

Toulon is a town in southern France and a large military harbor on the Mediterranean coast, with a major French naval base. Located in the Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur region, Toulon is the capital of the Var department in the former province of Provence....

on 24 September 1951. The entire crew of 47 officers and men went down with the ship.