Britannia (ship, 1926)
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The Britannia (III) was a 1926 commissioned passenger ship of the British shipping company Anchor Line , which was used for the transport of passengers and cargo from Great Britain to Bombay . On March 25, 1941, the Britannia 720 nautical miles west of Freetown was attacked by the German auxiliary cruiser Thor with artillery fire. The lightly armed passenger steamer, which went without escort , went up in flames and sank. 249 passengers and crew were killed in the gunfire or later died in the lifeboats that drifted for days at sea.
The ship
The 8,799 GRT steamship Britannia was built in 1926 in the Linthouse district of Glasgow on the River Clyde in the renowned Alexander Stephen and Sons shipyard . The ship was built for the Glasgow-based shipping company Anchor Line. The steamer was also registered in Glasgow. The Britannia was 140.20 meters long and 17.98 meters wide. The ship had a single propeller , a funnel and two masts . The oil-fired quadruple expansion steam engine developed 558 nominal horsepower and helped the Britannia to a cruising speed of 13 knots. 175 first-class travelers could be accommodated in the passenger accommodation. On December 1, 1925, the ship was launched, in March 1926 it was completed and on March 3, 1926 it cast off in Glasgow on its maiden voyage to Bombay through the Suez Canal .
The Britannia was the first ship built for the Anchor Line in 18 years. She was also the third ship with this name. She was constructed as a passenger and cargo ship and was specially designed for the long crossings to Bombay . The ship remained on this route throughout its entire service life.
With the outbreak of World War II , the Britannia remained in regular passenger service and completed four more journeys on its route, two of them through the Mediterranean and two through the Atlantic and Indian Oceans via Cape Town . However, like many other British merchant ships , she was also requisitioned by the government and now also carried military personnel.
The last ride
Attack and sinking
On Tuesday, March 11, 1941, put Britannia in Liverpool under the command of the originating from Glasgow 65-year-old captain of the British Merchant Navy Alexander Collie to another trip to Bombay from. 203 crew members and 281 passengers were on board , a total of 484 people. The travelers included many members of the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy , but also numerous civilians, including twelve women. The ship was only equipped with a single light cannon and sailed without an escort . Two weeks after her departure, on March 25, 1941, the Britannia was intercepted at 6:45 a.m. about 600 miles west of Dakar on the West African coast by the three-year-old German auxiliary cruiser Thor , which was far more heavily armed.
The cruiser was on June 6, 1940 in Hamburg for its first war patrol expired and was under the command of Captain Otto Kahler . The wisps of smoke from the Britannia were sighted from the Thor , which then turned and pursued. With her 18 knots she was much faster than the Britannia . On board the Thor it soon became clear that it was a large British passenger steamer. However, the identity of the ship was initially unknown.
After about an hour, the Thor was sighted on board the Britannia , which then radioed “RRR” (attack by “raiders”, ie auxiliary cruisers). There was radio contact between the two ships, in the course of which the Britannia was identified. Then she wrapped herself in a thick curtain of smoke and fled at top speed. The battle broke out. With the sea war flag waving , the Thor opened fire on the fleeing steamer, which was difficult to make out because of the smoke and which wanted to evade the attacker with several changes of course. The massive gun salvos of the Thor fell on the Britannia , killing and wounding numerous people on deck. Some lifeboats were also badly damaged. Fire also broke out on the ocean liner, and it spread rapidly. A total of 159 volleys were fired at the Britannia .
The Britannia returned fire with her stern- mounted gun, but couldn't do much. The badly hit, burning ship eventually slowed and came to a halt. At 0920 the captain signaled to Thor that he was giving up, and captain Kähler thereupon ordered him to leave the ship. The evacuation of the Britannia was chaotic. Crew members of the Thor later reported that a fight broke out between the crew and the passengers for the places in the lifeboats. After all men were aboard the sunken Thor the Britannia with 16 shots from a 150-mm gun, which aimed at the area around the waterline of the steamer. She sank almost vertically, bow first, in a burning, boiling oil slick, the columns of smoke rising several hundred meters into the air.
The shipwrecked
Then Kähler instructed his crew to take the castaways on board. During the preparations, one of his radio operators reported to him that he had intercepted a radio message from another British ship to the Britannia . The other ship had announced that it was on its way at full steam and would arrive in a few hours. Since Kähler assumed that it was a warship , he decided against rescuing the passengers. He saw it as too risky to stay on site. Only one man who had been flushed from the Britannia took the Thor on.
Assuming the approaching ship would pick up the survivors, the Thor picked up speed and steamed away. However, no ship arrived at the scene of the accident. The overcrowded and partially damaged lifeboats were blown apart by wind and currents and spread across the ocean. The boats rolled in the sea and were constantly flooded with salt water. Abscesses developed in many people . Lack of water , hunger , hypothermia and exhaustion gradually reduced the number of survivors. Shark attacks also took place. Eleven men clinging to a life raft unanimously reported that one of them was dragged down by a large cephalopod ( giant squid ). In addition, the boats were constantly followed by sharks .
In the days that followed, several lifeboats were sighted from different ships. The Spanish steamer Cabo de Hornos, for example, saved 79 people on March 29, the Raranga 67 and the Bachi 51 or 63 (depending on the source). A few other people were picked up by other ships. 23 days after the sinking, lifeboat No. 7 reached the city of São Luís on the Brazilian coast after a journey of over 1,500 miles . Of the original 82 occupants, 38 were still alive. Crew member Frank H. West, who survived in the boat, later published a book about this experience called Lifeboat Number Seven .
A total of 235 people survived the sinking of the Britannia and the stay in the boats, including 154 passengers and 81 members of the crew. 122 crew members and 127 passengers were killed, including the captain. (The number of passengers and crew as well as the number of dead and survivors vary in the various sources.) When Kähler later learned of the fate of the castaways by radio, he was appalled. He had firmly expected that the Britannia's passengers would be rescued by the ship hurrying to aid. This ship could never be identified.
The surviving third officer, William McVicar (1914–1997), and the surviving ship's doctor, Dr. Nancy Miller, have both been named Members of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) for their work on behalf of the castaways .
literature
- Frank H. West: Lifeboat Number Seven - The Longest Voyage in a Lifeboat ever Undergone by an Officer of the Royal Navy. William Kimber & Co., London 1960.