[2] Derwent was one of seven Type III Hunt-class destroyers ordered for the Royal Navy on 4 July 1940, as part of the 1940 War Emergency Programme.

[3] The Hunt class was meant to fill the Royal Navy's need for a large number of small destroyer-type vessels capable of both convoy escort and operations with the fleet.

[11][15] On 4 February 1943, Derwent formed part of the escort for the Operation Pamphlet convoy, comprising the liners Aquitania, Île de France, Nieuw Amsterdam, and Queen Mary, which was to carry the 9th Australian Division from Suez to Australia, providing anti-submarine escort through the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden.

[19] Derwent sustained major damage being holed on the port side causing flooding in her Boiler Room and six fatal casualties.

More repairs were carried out in HM Dockyard Devonport but the decision was taken to suspend work in January 1945, and she was reduced to the reserve and scrapped in 1947.