Silvia (ship, 1901)
 Departure of the Silvia from Hamburg to South West Africa
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The Silvia of the Hamburg-American Packetfahrt-Actien-Gesellschaft (Hapag) was a ship built by the Flensburger Schiffbau-Gesellschaft to be used as a troop transport or emigrant ship. Her sister ship Sithonia was completed as a pure freighter. Together with the freighters Segovia and C. Ferdinand Laeisz , also completed by Blohm & Voss in 1901 , they were the first Hapag ships to test pure oil firing. However, as early as 1903, the ships were dismantled using coal.
On January 26, 1906, the Silvia ran after leaving with a Russian troop transport from Vladivostok on a floating mine . The ship could only be brought back into port with great difficulty.
The ship was supposed to supply the cruiser squadron with coal in 1914 . After its demise it remained in Montevideo and was confiscated by Uruguay in 1917 . Renamed Rivera , the ship was used as a cargo ship for another 20 years and was abandoned in Gdansk in 1938.
In the service of Hapag
The ship launched in Flensburg on March 21, 1901 was taken over by Hapag on May 25, 1901. It was the first Hapag passenger ship to be fired with oil. The Silvia , her sister ship Sithonia , which was completed as a pure freighter, and the freighters Segovia and C. Ferdinand Laeisz built by Blohm & Voss were the first Hapag ships to be fired with oil, which was supposed to reduce the heavy duty of stokers and coal-pullers. Technically, the attempt proved itself, but from 1903 the ships were dismantled to run on coal, as the shipping company's heating oil costs were too high. This although the oil requirement of the two Flensburg sisters had shown to be relatively low due to the related system. The Silvia then began her maiden voyage as an emigrant ship on the North Atlantic route to New York . In addition to deployments in the North Atlantic, there were also trips to South America.
In 1902 the Silvia was used for the first time as a troop transport with a replacement transport for the armed forces deployed in East Asia, when it left Wilhelmshaven on March 7th with the replacement for the garrison in the Kiautschou protected area . After staying in Tsingtau from May 20 to 29, she returned to Wilhelmshaven on June 15, 1902 with the relieved troops. In 1903 (March 11 to June 20) and 1904 (March 3 to June 15) she repeated these so-called garrison transports. In addition, other ships carried out the second annual transport to replace about half of the crews of the cruiser squadron .
After the Silvia was used as a replacement transporter to East Asia, it was used as a troop transport to South West Africa in 1904 because of the Herero and Nama uprising , for which the ship left Hamburg on August 20, 1904.
The mine hit off Vladivostok
In 1905 the ship was chartered to Russia. On January 26, 1906, the Silvia left Vladivostok with 19 passengers and a Russian troop transport of 37 officers and 2027 men. Shortly after leaving the island of Askold , she came across a drifting mine that tore a large hole in the hull. As a hatch cover flew up as a result of the explosion, the first victims came when soldiers were also thrown into the sea. Panicked soldiers tried to launch boats, with more casualties. The Russian officers struggled to restore discipline. The Silvia ran back to Vladivostok with the bulkheads closed, only room 3 was full of water. Silvia, sinking deeper and deeper, got stuck in the ice shortly before the harbor, which several soldiers used to flee again. Ice breakers came to the aid of the wrecked ship, but soon the ship got stuck again. All soldiers were ordered onto the solid ice and the ship was laid aground on a flat spot in the bay.
Further service and whereabouts of Silvia
After repairs, the Silvia was used again in 1908 as a troop transport for the detachment transport for the garrison of the Kiautschou protected area when she left Wilhelmshaven on January 11th. After a stay in Tsingtau from March 2 to 9, she returned to Wilhelmshaven on April 23 with the detached parts of the garrison.
After that she was mainly used as a freighter to South America. In 1914 it was in Argentina when the war broke out and was launched in Buenos Aires . After the appearance of the German East Asia Squadron on the west coast of South America, the ship was used to continue supplying the cruiser squadron with coal and moved to Montevideo . However, after the squadron's sinking in the Falkland Islands, the ship was no longer used, and the Silvia remained in the capital of Uruguay.
On September 14, 1917, the Silvia was confiscated in Uruguay and put into service under the name Rivera . Like other ships confiscated in Uruguay, she was likely made available to the American Naval Overseas Transportation Service in 1918 . In 1938 the ship was broken up in Danzig.
literature
- Arnold Kludas : The History of German Passenger Shipping. Vol. II: Expansion on all seas 1890 to 1900. Writings of the German Maritime Museum, Volume 19.
- Arnold Kludas: The History of German Passenger Shipping. Vol. III: Rapid growth 1900 to 1914. Writings of the German Maritime Museum, Volume 20.
- Hans Georg Prager: Blohm & Voss. Koehler Verlagsgesellschaft, Herford 1977, ISBN 3-78220-127-2 .
- Claus Rothe: German ocean passenger ships 1896 to 1918. Steiger Verlag, 1986, ISBN 3-921564-80-8 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ A b c Rothe: German Ocean Passenger Ships 1896 to 1918. 1986, p. 79
- ^ Kludas: The history of the German passenger shipping. Vol. II, p. 99
- ↑ Müller / Lier: The ship engine: its construction principles, arrangement and operation. P. 58
- ↑ Federal Archives, image 146-2008-0179
- ^ Kludas: The history of the German passenger shipping. Vol. III, p. 181 ff.