German destroyer Z38

Z38's sister ship, Z39, underway under American control, 1945
History
Nazi Germany
Name	Z38
Ordered	19 September 1939
Builder	Germaniawerft, Kiel
Yard number	G628
Laid down	15 April 1940
Launched	15 August 1941
Completed	20 March 1943
Captured	May 1945
Fate	Transferred to the Royal Navy, September 1945
United Kingdom
Name	Nonsuch
Acquired	September, 1945
Out of service	September, 1948
Fate	Sold for scrap, 8 November 1949
General characteristics (as built)
Class and type	Type 1936A (Mob) destroyer
Displacement	2,519 long tons (2,559 t) (standard) 3,691 long tons (3,750 t) deep load
Length	127 m (416 ft 8 in) o/a
Beam	12 m (39 ft 4 in)
Draft	4 m (13 ft 1 in)
Installed power	70,000 PS (51,000 kW; 69,000 shp) 6 × water-tube boilers
Propulsion	2 × shafts 2 × geared steam turbine sets
Speed	38.5 knots (71.3 km/h; 44.3 mph)
Range	2,293 nmi (4,247 km; 2,639 mi) at 19 knots (35 km/h; 22 mph)
Complement	332
Armament	1 × twin, 3 × single 15 cm (5.9 in) guns 2 × twin 3.7 cm (1.5 in) AA guns 10 × single 2 cm (0.8 in) AA guns 2 × quadruple 53.3 cm (21 in) torpedo tubes 60 mines

Z38 was a Type 1936A (Mob) destroyer built for the Kriegsmarine during World War II. She was laid down in 1941, and completed two years later. Her anti-aircraft armament was modified heavily under Project Barbara. She served with the 4th Destroyer Flotilla her entire time under German service, and spent much of her life escorting task forces, patrolling, laying mines, and bombarding land forces. She served in the Baltic briefly in 1943, before being reassigned to the Arctic area around Norway from 1943 to 1945, and then serving in the Baltic again in 1945.

After the war, she was taken by the Royal Navy, renamed Nonsuch, the sixth ship of her name. She was used for extensive machinery trials, before being used to test a 500-kilogram (1,100 lb) charge, which broke her keel and flooded her. She was too damaged to refloat, and instead sold to Arnott Young & Co., on 8 November 1949, to be scrapped.