|
EMPRESS OF
CANADA
(ex DUCHESS OF RICHMOND
)
Built by John Brown & Co.Ltd., at
Clydebank
in 1929. Yard No.
523.
Gross Tonnage: 20,022, Nett:
11,821 Length:
600ft, Breadth: 75·1ft.
Owned by the Canadian Pacific Railway Co. (Canadian Pacific Steamships
– Managers)
6 steam turbines, single-reduction geared to twin screws.
Speed 18 knots, maximum 19.
The
Empress of Canada
following her post-war refit in 1947
photo: Canadian Pacific
The Duchess of
Richmond was launched on 18th June 1928 and
sailed on her maiden voyage from Liverpool on 26th
January 1929, this taking the form of a six-week cruise to the
Atlantic Islands and the west coast of Africa. Among her
passengers were the Chief Scout, Lt. General Sir Robert
Baden-Powell, and Lady Baden-Powell. The new Duchess
could carry 580 passengers in cabin class, 480 in tourist class
and 510 in third class, with a crew of 510.
The Duchess of
Richmond settled into her regular service runs on the
Canadian route when she left Liverpool on 15th March
1929 for
St John
,
New Brunswick
. A month later she grounded in fog at
St John
on 28th April, and her passengers were transferred to
the Montcalm.
In November 1932 the
Duchess of Richmond was in collision in fog with the Cunard liner Alaunia
off Sorel, Quebec, and three years later carried the Duke
and Duchess of Kent on their honeymoon cruise.
The Duchess of
Richmond had more than her fair share of relatively minor
incidents. On 18th December 1935 she was at Gibraltar
and involved in a collision which necessitated temporary repairs
being carried out and her 748 passengers missed their Christmas
at home in the UK due to the delays. Some eighteen months later,
in April 1937, the Duchess
broke away from her moorings in Haifa harbour during a full
gale, and her 1,000 passengers, pilgrims to the Holy Land, were
stranded on shore until the gale abated.
On 14th February 1940 the
Duchess of Richmond
was requisitioned as a troopship and left Liverpool for
Suez
. During the invasion of
North Africa
, the Duchess was
close to the P&O liner Strathallan
when that ship was sunk by two torpedoes on 21st
December 1942. In March 1945 she sailed to
Odessa
carrying 3,700 Russians who had been held prisoner in
France
.
Eight months later the Duchess
of Richmond arrived at Liverpool from
Rangoon
with the last of the prisoners-of-war from Sumatra and
Singapore
. On her return from
Bombay
in March 1946, the Duchess
was held in quarantine until four smallpox cases among the
service personnel on board were removed into isolation.
Coincidentally, the Georgic
also arrived at Liverpool with a smallpox case at this time, and
these incidents resulted in nearly 10,000 people taking part in
the largest mass vaccination of passengers and crew ever
undertaken at
Liverpool
.
In May 1946 the Duchess
of Richmond was sent to the Fairfield Yard at Govan for
complete refurbishing. She reappeared as the Empress
of Canada, and her passenger complement was reduced to 397
in first class, and 303 in tourist class. On 16th
July 1947 the Empress of
Canada sailed on her first post-war commercial voyage from
Liverpool to
Quebec
and
Montreal
under the command of Captain E.A.Shergold. On her return passage
one of the Empress’s
passengers was Tommy Handley of I.T.M.A. (‘It’s that Man
Again’) fame.
On 10th January 1953 the Empress
of Canada entered Gladstone Dock for her routine winter
overhaul. She was due to return to service on 11th
February. But this was a date that she was unable to keep…. On
Sunday 25th January, whilst lying in Gladstone No.1
Branch Dock, the Empress
caught fire and, in spite of tremendous efforts of firemen from
all over the north-west of
England
, she eventually slid on to her side and became a burnt out
hulk.
Work to right the liner commenced immediately as she was
completely blocking a much needed deep-water berth at
Liverpool
. Her masts, funnels and much of the superstructure had to be
cut away and it was not until over a year later, on Saturday 6th
March 1954, that the salvage operation was successfully
completed. It was the greatest operation of its kind ever
tackled in Europe and was a feat of skill rivalled only by the
salvage of the Normandie
at
New York
and the battleship Oklahama at
Pearl
Harbour
.
The hulk of the Empress
of Canada was uprighted by a combined system of parbuckling
and buoyancy. The Mersey Docks & Habour Board, responsible
for the cost of the salvage, pledged an expenditure of £380,000
to tackle the problem. When the 16 hawsers took the pull, the Empress
began moving without the slightest protest. Six pontoons, each
filled with 104 tons of water, pulled down on the exposed
starboard side. Eleven other pontoons, filled during the
previous night with compressed air, pushed upwards on the
submerged port side. The wreck moved silently and quickly
towards her point of balance. It took only thirteen minutes to
come from 88° to 44½°.
Then, however, a snag was encountered which the experts
had allowed for in their plans. The liner had slid twenty feet
along the mud of the dock bottom, rather more than they had
anticipated, and the blocks on the winch purchases had come
together. Adjustments took twenty minutes and with a final pull
of only 70 tons, the Empress
of
MORE...... |
