Category:Athelking (ship, 1926)

Source: Tyne Built Ships, Miramar Ship Index

Ship[edit]

• ON 147359
• Type: Tanker
• Design by:
• Order date:
• Built by: Swan, Hunter & Wigham Richardson, Newcastle
• Yard No:
• Keel laid:
• Launch date: 30.12.1925 at Wallsend, by Sir S.G. Hunter on state of trade. Messrs Swan Hunter and Wigham Richardson Ltd.
• Date of completion: 1926
• Registered length: 474.9 feet (144.7 m)
• Beam: 64.4 feet (19.6 m)
• Draught: 36.5 feet (11.1 m)
• GRT: 9557
• DWT:
• NET:
• Main engine: Oil engines, 709 nhp
• Twin screw
• Speed: 10.5 kn

History[edit]

• 1926 Named: Athelking for the British Molasses Co Ltd. Athel Line, registered Liverpool
• 09.09.1940 Sunk on voyage Table Bay to Sourabaya, in ballast. 21.48S 67.40E Shelled by German raider Atlantis, she returned fire, but was hit badly. The engine room was flooding. The order to abandon ship was given. The bridge and aft were on fire. Captain Tomkins was killed on the bridge. Some crew members managed to take to the lifeboats, but all were captured. Weeks later, the prisoners were transferred to the Durmitor, a captured cargo ship, and they were taken to Somaliland. But Durmitor went aground near the coast. The prisoners were taken by Italian soldiers, as they reached the beach, and were taken on to the Italian POW camp in Mogadishu and later to a camp at Merca. They were liberated March 1941, by South East African forces and taken to Mombasa on the cruiser HMS Ceres. Four men died.