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The Online Magazine of Clyde shipping, shipbuilding and the Clydeside area
itself. Past, Present and Future
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On This Day: 2nd December |
Notable events involving Clydebuilt ships, 2nd December:
Top: The VOLTAIRE, Middle: CLAN MACLENNAN, Bottom: CITY OF LONDON (With thanks to Stuart Cameron, Gavin Stuart and Paul Strathdee)
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On this day in 1876, the British & North American Royal Mail Steam Packet Company
lost their 1850 built ASIA after she was destroyed by fire at Bombay. The 2226 grt paddle steamer had been built by Robert Steele & Co.
A happier event today in 1886, the Caird-built ORINOCO began her maiden voyage for Royal Mail S.P. Co. today, from Southampton to the West Indies, shortly after completion at the Greenock yard. Ultimately her fate was the breakers in 1909
Another Caird ship featured in 1899 today, the MONTEVIDEO was wrecked off Lobos Island. She was later refloated and scrapped the following year. She started life as Hamburg America's SILESIA of 1869, from the Greenock yard.
Today in 1916 saw the loss of the VOLTAIRE, a Lamport & Holt steamer built by D&W Henderson Ltd. The 8406 grt ship was sunk by the German raider MOWE and was the first of 25 ships she would sink on her second cruise. VOLTAIRE had been built in 1907.
In 1939 on the second of December two ships built by Lithgows were lost.
The DORICSTAR completed by them in 1921 was captured by the German pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee and sunk by gunfire south of St. Helena .
Meanwhile the SAN CALISTO built by Lithgows only two years previously for the Eagle Oil and Shipping Company, was mined and sunk off Margate.
Another double blow for the British Merchant Navy occured the following year today. In 1940 the Armed Merchant Cruiser HMS FORFAR was torpedoed in the Atlantic. She had been the MONTROSE, a turbine liner of 16402 grt built by Fairfields in 1922 for Canadian Pacific Steamships.
In the Atlantic that same day, another Clydebuilt ship met a brutal end. The motor vessel STIRLINGSHIRE ( built as the CLAN MACDONALD at Greenock Dockyard in 1928 ), was torpedoed by U94.
To peacetime now and Holt's took delivery of their latest vessel, the motor vessel CYCLOPS today in 1948, five months after her launch at Scott's in Greenock. This vessel would end her days on the Clyde, being scrapped at Dalmuir by Arnott Young in 1977.
In 1961 the CLAN MACLENNAN (Greenock Dockyard 1947) collided with the British Tanker Company's BRITISH DEFENDER when approaching Beira. Worth mentioning, for almost exactly five years later she was to show her penchance for snuggling up to vessels of the tanker company by colliding with their BRITISH CRUSADER, this time in fog on the Thames Estuary.
In 1987 demolition began today of the mv CITY OF LONDON at Kaohsiung. This Ellerman City Line ship had been built by Upper Clyde Shipbuilders in 1970 at the Scoutsoun yard, with engines by Barclay Curle.
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| Copyright B.Biddulph, Clydesite 2005 - Unless otherwise stated. Any materials credited shows the name of the copyright owner where known. The pages are intended for private use, for educational purposes. Reproduction in any form is prohibited without the permission of the copyright owner. Reassemble the following to email address format to contact: editor at clydeshipping .co .uk |
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