Hansa (ship, 1940)

Hansa

The Glenearn , a sister ship of the Glengarry

Ship data flag  United Kingdom German Empire United Kingdom     other ship names Meersburg Empire Humber Glengarry Ship type Combined ship / general cargo ship class Glenearn class Shipping company Glen Line , Liverpool Hamburg-America Line , Hamburg Shipyard Burmeister & Wain , Copenhagen Commissioning May 1940

Ship dimensions and crew length 153 m ( Lüa ) width 20.1 m Draft Max. 8.7 m measurement 9138 GRT   crew 400

Machine system machine 2 × B&W 6-cylinder diesel Machine performance 9,000 PS (6,619 kW) Top speed 17 kn (31 km / h) propeller 2 × fixed propellers

Armament 8 × 15 cm L / 45 Sk 1 × 10.5 cm stop cannon 8 × 3.7 cm anti-aircraft gun 36 × 2 cm Fla- MK 4 torpedo tubes ∅ 53.3 cm

The Hansa was a British merchant ship that was captured in the Second World War under the name Schiff 5 for use in the Navy . It was originally the British cargo ship Glengarry and belonged to the Glenearn class of the Glen Line . Under the name Handelsstörkreuzer the ship was used as an auxiliary cruiser prepared, but then as a cadet training ship used.

Mission history

When German troops occupied Copenhagen on April 9, 1940 as part of the so-called Operation Weser Exercise , they captured the cargo ship Glengarry, which had been commissioned by the British shipping company Glen-Line, from the Burmeister & Wain shipyard . It then ran briefly under the name Meersburg for the German Hamburg-America line . It was later used by the 25th and 27th submarine flotillas, training flotillas stationed in the Baltic Sea , as a target ship.

From 1942, the Navy converted the Meersburg at the Wilton-Fijenoord shipyard in Rotterdam into an auxiliary cruiser and changed the name to Hansa . In April 1943, Captain Hans Henigst took command of the ship, which he held until August 1943, and in May 1943 the Hansa came to Blohm & Voss in Hamburg, where the weapons and camouflage devices were to be installed. As a result of a heavy air raid on Hamburg on July 25, 1943, the shipyard was badly damaged. On August 21, 1943, the naval war command ordered “the ship to be completed as an auxiliary cruiser so that it is fully operational and the armoring is ready for use. The not yet completed artillery fire control system must therefore be installed. The use of the ship as a training ship is approved and it is up to us to carry out the camouflage work necessary for an auxiliary cruiser and to set up the wagtail before or after this use. ”“ The use of ship 5 as an auxiliary cruiser is not intended for the time being and will probably only be considered in autumn 1944 . "

The Navy then put the Hansa into service as a cadet training ship in the Baltic Sea. There she was also used as a troop and refugee transport during the German retreat from the Baltic States and East Prussia. It was hit by a mine on May 4, 1945 off the Hela peninsula , but it did not cause any major damage. From February 1944 to May 1945 the ship was under the command of Captain Fritz Schwoerer.

The ship was returned to Great Britain after the Second World War and then sailed under the name Empire Humber , from 1946 again as Glengarry on the Glen Line.

literature

• Heinz Ciupa: The German warships 1939-1945 . VPM, ISBN 3-8118-1409-5 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} Heinz Ciupa: p. 120.
2. ^ War diary of the Naval War Command 1939–1945. Volume August 1943. Mittler & Sohn, Herford 1993, ISBN 3-8132-0637-8 . Page 394.