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Can anyone identify this ship? Where and when was she built? Where was the photograph taken? Who was she operated by and who operated her originally?
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The mystery ship is the famous Empire Windrush, built in 1930 by Blohm + Voss as Monte Rosa for Hamburg South America Line. She was 13,882gt with a speed of 14.5 knots. Up to 1945 she was in German hands, and during the war was used as a barrack ship, troopship and a repair ship to Tirpitz. She was given to Britain in August 1945 as a war prize. In 1946 she became a British troopship, being fitted out by Alex Stephen’s on the Clyde and renamed Empire Windrush.
In June 1948 she became famous when she docked at Tilbury with 500 Jamaicans coming to Britain to start a new life. The photo was taken after her 1950 refit. In 1954 she left on what was her final voyage to Southampton from Japan with 1,265 passengers and 222 crew. On the leg from Port Said she caught fire off Cape Caxine. Her passengers and crew were picked up by rescue vessels but she sank the next day, being towed, still on fire, by HMS Saintes.
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Can anyone identify this ship? Where and when was she built? Where was the photograph taken? And when? And who was she operated by?
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The mystery ship is the paddle steamer Snowdon (2), operated by the Snowdon Passenger Steamship Company Limited. The SPSC was taken over by the New North Wales Steam Ship Company (NNWSS) in 1899, a company formed by the Fairfield Shipbuilding Company of Govan, Glasgow in 1890. She was built by Lairds of Birkenhead in 1892 and was fitted with compound diagonal machinery.
The 338gt vessel was mainly used for excursions from Liverpool to North Wales, sometimes going as far as Blackpool. During World War I she saw service as a minesweeper operating out of Harwich and Dover, returning to the passenger service for which she was built in 1920.
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The mystery ship shows Fairtry III, one of the three Fairtry stern trawlers built for Charles Salveson Co of Leith in the 1950s after their successful development of the stern ramp trawlers. Following the company’s withdrawal from whaling, new trading activities were pursued. This led the company to convert the surplus Algerine class minesweeper, HMS Felicity (1944), into the fishing vessel Fairfee. They decided to pull the trawling nets up a stern ramp instead of over the side. After five years of experimentation, she was laid up, but was followed by three purpose-built vessels: Fairtry (1954/2,605gt), Fairtry II (1959/2,857gt) and Fairtry III (1960/12,857gt). However, due to increased competition, the company were forced to withdraw all three vessels by 1968.
Tom Lamb, Lynnwood, USA
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Can anyone identify this ship? Where and when was she built? Where was the photo taken? Which company operated her? And what was her ultimate fate?
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Can anyone identify this ship? Where and when was she built? Where is she heading in this photo? Where was the photo taken? Which company operated her? And what was her ultimate fate?
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The Mystery Ship is HMS Mercury. She was laid down at Pembroke Dockyard on 16 March 1876, launched on 17 April 1878 and completed in September 1879. She differed from her earlier sistership Isis in having a straight stem instead of a clipper bow.
Initially classed as Despatch vessels, they were redesignated as Second Class Cruisers and were the first all-steel ships in the Navy. The photograph shows her after the original barque rig and almost all her armament had been removed, dating the photo between 1903 and 1905. She spent most of this time at Portsmouth as a Seagoing Navigation Training ship. After 1905 she was converted into a submarine depot ship, then in 1914 to a hulk at Chatham. She was sold for breaking in 1919.
Sandy McAuslan, Renton, Dumbarton
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