America (ship, 1930)
.jpg) The structurally identical sister ship Europa
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The Amerika was a passenger and cargo ship put into service in 1930, which was used by the Danish shipping company Det Østasiatiske Kompagni in passenger and mail traffic between Denmark and Great Britain , Canada and the USA . In 1940 the ship was handed over to the British Ministry of War Transport . On April 22, 1943, the Amerika was sunk south of Greenland by the German submarine U 306 . 86 people were killed.
The ship
The motor ship Amerika was built in Copenhagen at the shipyard Burmeister & Wain's Maskin- og Skibsbyggeri for the Danish shipping company Det Østasiatiske Kompagni (The East Asian Society). The ship had two funnels, two masts and a single propeller . The ship's measurements were 10,218 GRT and 6243 NRT, the dead weight was 11,375 DWT. The Amerika was 147.52 meters long, 18.9 meters wide and had a maximum draft of 8.53 meters. The ship was powered by a six-cylinder diesel engine from the shipyard, which developed 7000 hp and allowed a maximum speed of 14 knots (25.9 km / h).
The Amerika was launched by Burmeister & Wain on August 22, 1929 and was completed in January 1930. She was the first to be completed in a series of three sister ships . The other two were the Europa (built in 1931, 10,224 GRT), which was bombed and sunk near Liverpool on May 3, 1941 , and the Canada (built in 1935, 11,108 GRT), which ran into a sea mine on November 3, 1939 , stranded and was declared a total loss. The 64 people on board survived. With departing crossings, the America ¸ Europe and Canada called at the ports of Southampton , St. Thomas , Kingston , Cristóbal , Los Angeles , San Francisco , Portland and Seattle before heading for the final port in Vancouver . On the return voyage, San Francisco, Los Angeles, the Panama Canal , Kingston, St. Thomas, London , Rotterdam , Hamburg and Gothenburg were headed for before the ships returned to Copenhagen.
On May 12, 1931, the Amerika collided with a fishing trawler en route to Southampton in the English Channel . On February 11, 1933, the ship collided with the British steamship Silksworth in Vancouver harbor , damaging the stern of the Amerika . On March 29, 1939, the Amerika ran aground on the way from Aarhus to Kingston upon Hull in the Kattegat near the island of Hjelm . This resulted in a leak in Department No. 6.
Sinking
In May 1940, the Amerika was transferred to the British Ministry of War Transport (MoWT) and continued to operate under the British flag. The new operator was the London-based company United Baltic Corporation Ltd. On Thursday, April 22, 1943, the Amerika was under the command of Captain Christian Nielsen with 140 passengers, crew members and gunners on a crossing from Halifax to Liverpool. She left Halifax on April 14th. The ship had loaded 8,844 tons of cargo, including metals, meat, flour and 200 mail bags. Among the passengers were members of the Royal Canadian Air Force .
The Amerika drove in convoy HX.234. It was discovered and torpedoed south of Cape Farvel on the south coast of Greenland by U 306 , a submarine of the German Navy under the command of Kapitänleutnant Claus von Trotha. U 306 was part of the “Meise” submarine group, which consisted of a total of 28 units.
The submarine shot down two torpedoes, one of which hit America and caused it to sink at 1:54 a.m. at coordinates 57 ° 30 ′ N , 42 ° 50 ′ W. 42 crew members, seven gunners and 37 passengers were killed. Captain Nielsen, 29 crew members, eight gunners and 16 passengers survived and were rescued by the Corvette Asphodel (Lt. Cdr. Henry Patterson Carse, DCS ) and brought ashore in Greenock . Captain Nielsen was awarded the Lloyd's War Medal for Bravery at Sea.