Further Information
SS Arandora Star
The SS Arandora Star was a British registered cruise ship operated by the Blue Star lines from the late 1920s through the 1930s.
At the onset of World War II she was assigned as a troop transport and moving refugees.
At the end of June 1940 she was assigned the task of transporting Italian and German internees along with prisoners of war to Canada. On 2 July 1940 she was sunk in controversial circumstances, by a German U-boat, with a large loss of life.
Construction
Initially named Arandora, she was built by Cammell Laird & Company Limited for the Blue Star Line in 1927. As completed the Arandora measured 12,847 gross tonnage, was 512.2 feet long, a beam of 68.3 ft and accommodated 164 first class passengers. She cruised at a service speed of 16 knots.
History
As Arandora she sailed from London to the east coast of South America from 1927 to 1928. In 1929 she was sent to Fairfield Shipbuilding & Engineering Co. of Glasgow for refitting. During the refit, her gross tonnage was increased to 14,694 and first class accommodation was increased to 354 passengers.
Upon completion she returned to service as a full-time luxury cruise ship. At the time of this refit, she was also renamed Arandora Star. The renaming was done to avoid confusion with Royal Mail ships which typically bore names beginning and ending in 'A'.
As a cruise ship, the Arandora Star travelled to many different destinations. These included Norway, the Northern capitals, the Mediterranean, the West Indies, Panama, Cuba and Florida to name a few. The Arandora Star also had two unique nicknames due to her colour scheme of a white hull with scarlet ribbon. The nicknames most frequently used were "The Wedding Cake" or the "Chocolate Box".
At the onset of World War II, the Arandora Star was refitted and was assigned as a transport ship. She evacuated troops from Norway and from France in June 1940 before undertaking what was to be her final voyage transporting nationals and prisoners of war to Canada.
Sinking
On July 2 1940, having left Liverpool unescorted the day before, under the command of Edgar Wallace Moulton, she was bound for St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador and Canadian internment camps with nearly 1,200 German and Italian internees, including 86 POWs, being transported from Britain.
There were also 374 British men, comprising both military guards and the ship's crew. The Italians numbered 712 men of all ages, most of whom had been residing in Britain when Mussolini declared war on June 10. The ship was bearing no Red Cross sign which could have shown that she was carrying prisoners, and especially civilians.
At 6.58 am off the northwest coast of Ireland, she was struck by a torpedo from the German submarine U-47, commanded by U-Boat ace Günther Prien. It is assumed that U-47 mistook her grey wartime livery for that of an armed merchant cruiser. U-47 fired its single damaged torpedo at Arandora Star.
All power was lost at once, and thirty five minutes after the torpedo impact, Arandora Star sank. Over eight hundred lives were lost.
At 7.05am hours Malin Head radio received the distress call which it retransmitted to Land's End and to Portpatrick. Throughout August bodies were washed up on the Irish shore. The first was 71-year-old Ernesto Moruzzi, who was found near Burtonport. Four others were found on the same day, 30 July.
During August 1940, 213 bodies were washed up on the Irish Coast, 35 were from the Arandora Star, there were a further 92 unidentified, most probably from the Arandora Star.
Lifeboats
The modified cruise ship carried fourteen lifeboats, of which one was immediately destroyed upon torpedo impact, another could not be lowered off its winches, and two were damaged during their launch and thus useless. At least four of the remaining lifeboats were launched with a very small number of survivors.
One other lifeboat was swamped and sank shortly after the sinking. Captain Otto Burfeind from the SS Adolph Woermann stayed aboard the sinking ship organizing the ship's evacuation until he was lost when it finally sank.
Rescue
After a brief scout by a Short Sunderland flying boat that was following their SOS distress-signal, the Canadian destroyer HMCS St. Laurent arrived to pick up survivors. There were 586 survivors out of the 1,216 detainees. The sick were taken to Mearnskirk Hospital.
Wreckage and Memorials
The wreck is located off the North Coast of Ireland. In the weeks following the sinking many bodies of those who perished on Arandora Star were carried by the sea to various points in Ireland and the Hebrides.
There are a number of memorials at places where the ill-fated passengers were eventually laid to rest in, Ireland and Scotland.
Taken from Wikipedia