Sofia (ship, 1882)
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The Sofia (Bulgarian: София ) was a cargo and passenger ship built in 1882 and used by the Bulgarian shipping company Societé Commerciale Bulgare de Navigation à Vapeur from 1906 to 1932. From 1883 to 1894 it carried the British flag as Devonia , then the Ottoman flag until 1905 as Panormos . After the sale in 1932 it was the Turkish Ercumentnur , from 1934 the Greek Agios Nicolaos and in 1954 it disappeared from the registers.
Construction and technical data
The ship was as a cargo and passenger ship at the shipyard Murdoch & Murray in Port Glasgow with the hull number built 64 and expired on November 23, 1882 from the stack . The completion and delivery took place in January 1883. The ship was 42.78 meters long, 6.61 meters wide and had a draft of 3.08 meters. It was measured with 255 GRT and 138 NRT. A two-cylinder triple expansion steam engine from Dunsmuir & Jackson from Govan generated 80 hp and enabled a speed of 9.0 knots via one screw . The ship offered accommodation for eight first class passengers, eight second class and 80 third class. The crew consisted of 15 officers and men.
history
British Devonia and Ottoman-Greek Panormos
The British shipping company London & South West Coast Steam Ship Co. originally ordered the newbuilding and the ship was named Devonia when it was launched . Registration took place on January 16, 1883, and home port became London . In 1894 the shipping company sold the ship and the new owner was Panos Michael Courtgi's shipping company, the Société à Vapeur Egée ( Aegean Steamship Company ). The steamer was now called Panormos . The Greek PM Courtgi had set up his shipping company in Constantinople and belonged to the class of Greek shipowners and seafarers who at that time dominated maritime traffic in the eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea. His shipping company was one of the largest in Istanbul and covered numerous connections in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. The shipping company used the Panormos on the Constantinople, Thessaloniki and Volos line , but also operated routes to the Aegean Sea and Crete , which were extended to Mersin on the Turkish Mediterranean coast.
Bulgarian Sofia
There is a gap in the sources between the sale of the Panormos on November 9, 1904, their arrival in Varna on November 13, 1904, registration as Sofia on March 1, 1905, and the eventual state approval to hoist the Bulgarian flag on March 26 April 1906. All dates appear more or less synonymously in the literature and are due to the slowness of the bureaucracy. The new owner, the shipping company Societé Commerciale Bulgare de Navigation à Vapeur, registered them like all their ships in Varna . Together with the Varna and the Kyril, she was part of the first expansion of her fleet after the initial equipment in 1894. The Sofia was the smallest ship in her fleet. With the exception of the wars, the shipping company used the ship mainly for transports on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast.
During the First Balkan War in 1912, the Sofia initially remained in the port of Burgas due to the blockade of the Turkish Navy . There she was subordinate to the Bulgarian Navy and transported soldiers and supplies between Burgas, Sozopol and Nessebar . During the First World War , the Sofia was the only ship of the shipping company that was initially not taken over by the Navy. She continued to carry out transports on the coast and from 1916 was used with the Kyril for food transports between Balchik , Kawarna and Varna. In 1917 the chief of staff of the German garrison in Varna tried to buy the steamer, but the government forbade the sale of Bulgarian ships until the end of the war. Until the end of the war, the little Sofia was the ship that had carried out most of the supply transports. After the war it resumed civilian traffic along the Bulgarian coast and was taken out of service in 1926. The Kyril took over her duties until she was replaced by the new ship Evdokia . In 1930 or 1932 the shipping company sold the steamer.
Turkish Ercumentnur and Greek Agios Nicolaos
After the Sofia was sold by the Societé Commerciale Bulgare de Navigation à Vapeur, only a few key data about the ship are available: In 1932 (according to other sources, 1930) the Turkish businessman Yelkenci Zade Salih Zeki Vapurlari from Istanbul bought the steamer and named it Ercumentnur . He sold the ship again in 1934. V. Tsanopoulos became the new owner, the ship was named Agios Nicolaos and sailed under the Greek flag for the first time. Even from the time of the Second World War there is a lack of information - the steamer is not operated under the Greek ship losses of the war. Agios Nicolaos is said to have been listed in the Lloyd's Register until 1954, and then no longer. The whereabouts of the ship is unclear.
literature
- Michaēl Ant Kaitatzidēs: Atmoploia Aigaiou PM Kourtzēs & Sia, 1883-1911 / Aegean Steam Navigation PM Courtgis & Co. 1883-1911 [Greek / English], Verlag Ekdoseis To Donti, Patra 2009, ISBN 960-9885-70-5 .
- Evridiki Sifneos: PM Courtgi and the birth of a Greek-Ottoman liner company: The Aegean Steamship Company , In: Maria Christina Chatziioannou / Gelina Harlaftis: Following the Nereids. Sea routes and maritime business, 16th – 20th centuries , Kerkyra Publications Ltd, Athens 2006, ISBN 960-8386-40-3 , pp. 121-136.
- Gelina Harlaftis: A History of Greek-Owned Shipping: The Making of an International Tramp Fleet 1830 to the Present Day , Routledge, London / New York 1996, ISBN 978-1-138-97603-0 , ( limited preview in Google Book search )
Web links
- Scottish Built Ships: Devonia , accessed March 29, 2019
- Lloyd's Register 1934-35 , accessed March 29, 2019
- Seefahrts-Zeitung: the "Sofia" and her first captain (Bulgarian), accessed on March 29, 2019
- Seefahrts-Zeitung: The file of the steamer "Sofia" (Bulgarian), accessed on March 29, 2019
- Navibulgar news December 2012 - January 2013 (history of the shipping company with many photos) (Bulgarian), accessed on March 29, 2019
Individual evidence
- ^ A b Scottish Built Ships: Devonia
- ↑ a b c d e Seefahrts-Zeitung: The "Sofia" and her first captain
- ↑ a b c d Seefahrts-Zeitung: The files of the steamer "Sofia"
- ↑ Gelina Harlaftis: A History of Greek-Owned Shipping: The Making of an International Tramp Fleet 1830 to the Present Day , Routledge, London / New York 1996, ISBN 978-1-138-97603-0 , ( limited preview in Google - book search )
- ↑ Sevket Pamuk / Jeffrey G Williamson: The Mediterranean Response to Globalization before 1950 , Routledge, London / New York 2000, ISBN 0-415-22425-X ( limited preview in Google Book Search (without page count))
- ↑ Navibulgar news December 2012 - January 2013 (history of the shipping company with many photos)
- ^ Lloyd's Register 1934-35
- ↑ cf. Historical naval archive: Greek ship losses (during World War II)