A parade through the streets of Pembrokeshire tomorrow will mark the end of an era for a warship named after a county town.

The HMS Pembroke, a Sandown Class mine hunter, is being decommissioned after 26 years in service.

The 52.5 metre mine counter-measures vessel (MCMV), which is stationed at HMNB Clyde, weighs 485 tonnes. She has travelled more than 2,500 nautical miles since she was first launched in 1997.

She is the eighth HMS Pembroke and has a crew around 40 men and women which includes highly trained mine warfare specialists and mine clearance divers, as well as engineers, officers and chefs.

Members of the ship’s company represent the Royal Navy in sports including rugby, football, badminton and hockey. Languages spoken aboard HMS Pembroke include English, German, French, Welsh and Spanish.

The musicians of HMS Pembroke play a range of instruments, including bagpipes, kettle drums, flute, saxophone and the didgeridoo.

The crew of HMS Pembroke will be exercising its freedom of the town of Pembroke tomorrow on their final parade before the ship is decommissioned.

They will be joined by local dignitaries and organisations including Fishguard, Fishguard, Tenby and Milford Haven Sea Cadets which are affiliated to the Pembroke.

The parade will leave St Michaels Square Pembroke at 11am tomorrow, Sunday, July 23 and will march through Main Street to Pembroke Castle.

HMS Pembroke is part of the Royal Navy’s ongoing mission to keep the global sea lines of communication open for trade.

One of her most successful missions was the finding of a Russian mine from the First World War.

During the mission off the coast of Lithuania, she deployed a remote underwater vehicle to dive down and positively identify the object, before Royal Navy mine clearance divers took to the water to get rid of the 100-year-old ordnance.