In 1922 an Argentinian shipping company bought Anselm and renamed it Comodoro Rivadavia. In 1942 the Argentinian government bought it and renamed it Rio Santa Cruz. It suffered a boiler explosion in 1952 and was scrapped in 1959.
Building
Anselm was designed as a larger version of Booth's 1903-built Ambrose. She had a length overall of 400.4ft (122.0m), a beam of 50.1ft (15.3m), and a depth of 19.1ft (5.8m). Her tonnages were initially 5,442GRT and 3,139NRT.[1]
The ship had one propeller powered by a vertical triple-expansion steam engine made by the shipbuilders, rated at 819 nhp[1][2] or 4,500ihp (3,400kW) and supplied by four coal-fired cylindrical boilers, giving her a service speed of 12 knots (22km/h).[2][3]Ambrose had berths for 149 passengers in first class and 200 in steerage as originally built.[2]
Workman, Clark and Company built Anselm in Belfast as yard number 214 for the Booth Steamship Company of Liverpool for £89,000.[4] She was launched on 10 January 1905, delivered on 20 March and registered at Liverpool with the UK official number 120834 and code letters HCFR[1][2][3]
Booth Line service
Anselm served Booth's main route between Liverpool and the Brazilian Amazon ports of Para (Belém) and Manaus in the Amazon rubber boom.[2][5][a] Her maiden voyage, from Liverpool to Manaus, with calls at Le Havre, Lisbon, Funchal and Belém, began on 29 March 1905.[2][5] On a later voyage, inbound to Manaus from Madeira, Anselm collided in the River Amazon with her running mate, Booth Line's Cyril, on 5 September 1905.[b] The latter was outbound with a valuable cargo of rubber and due to complete loading at Belém. After the collision, Anselm put back to Belém for repairs to her bow and stem.
On a claim by some owners of Cyril's rubber cargo in the Admiralty Court, it was held that, although both ships had failed to comply with the Collision Regulations, Anselm's failure had not caused the collision, and the Cyril was solely to blame.[9] The Court of Appeal overturned that judgement and held that both vessels were at fault.[10]
Less than three months after the collision, Anselm ran aground in the Amazon 50 miles (80km) above Belém on about 27 November.[11] She was later refloated by the Liverpool Salvage Association's salvage steamer Ranger, which had just completed the successful recovery of most of the Cyril's cargo of rubber.[12]
In the First World WarAnselm was chartered as a troop ship for a number of voyages to France in 1914–15 before returning to her regular liner service. She survived the war, and in 1918 was transferred to Booth Line's service between New York and the Amazon.[2] In 1922, with the fleet being reduced following the end of the rubber boom, Anselm was sold to an Argentinian shipping company.[2][5]
Argentinian service
In 1922 Argentina Compañía General de Navegación SA (ACGN) bought Anselm and renamed her Comodoro Rivadavia, after Patagonia's main port. She was re-registered in Buenos Aires and her code letters were changed to HBJP. By 1930 her gross register tonnage had been revised to 5,450.[14]
ACGN had been founded in 1920 to replace the former Linea Nacional del Sud, an operation of the German shipping line Hamburg Südamerikanische Dampfschifffahrts-Gesellschaft serving Argentinian domestic routes between Buenos Aires and Patagonia with their own ships under Argentinian flag. Stronger cabotage restrictions introduced in the First World War made it expedient to establish a more clearly Argentinian-owned company. Hamburg Süd's long-serving and loyal principal agent in Argentina, Antonio M Delfino, and his family provided 45 per cent of the capital for ACGN, the German company provided another 45 per cent through a group led by lawyer Ernesto Aguirre, and the remaining 10 per cent was held by independent shareholders. In addition the management of the fleet was entrusted to Delfino's agency company, A M Delfino y Compañia.[15]
In 1923 Comodoro Rivadavia was put into service mainly on the Buenos Aires – Comodoro Rivadavia route alongside the passenger-cargo liner Buenos Aires (formerly Hamburg Süd's Camarones ex-Taquary), and replacing the same owner's Presidente Mitre ex-Argentina, which was sold to Chilean buyers.[16] On 6 May 1931 the ship stranded in the Second Narrows, Straits of Magellan, but was successfully refloated two days later by the Chilean Navy.[2][17][18]
In 1934 Comodoro Rivadavia's code letters were superseded by the call sign LOFL.[19]
In the decline in the Patagonian trade in the 1930s the main passenger route was reduced to a one-ship service, with first the Buenos Aires and then the Comodoro Rivadavia being withdrawn, with maintenance and painting being carried out during lay-up. In 1937, with continuing poor financial results, Hamburg Süd decided to withdraw and the ACGN company was liquidated, selling its assets to the newly-formed Argentina Nueva Compañía General de Navegación SA (ANCGN), which was wholly owned by the Delfino company.[16]
Early in the Second World War the Delfino company, with its close involvement with Hamburg Süd, was blacklisted by the Allies, with the danger that its ships could be captured at sea by Allied naval forces; Comodoro Rivadavia was therefore laid up in Buenos Aires. In 1941, faced by a desperate need to resume sea transport both domestically and internationally, the Government of Argentina established Flota Mercante del Estado ("state merchant fleet"), to operate many ships of the belligerents interned in Argentina, as well as ANCGN's ships, which were transferred in March 1942. In 1944 she was renamed Rio Santa Cruz, and later reduced to cargo-only service[18][20]
Explosion and disposal
At around 7am on 7 May 1952, en route from Puerto San Julián to Buenos Aires, Rio Santa Cruz suffered a major boiler explosion off Cabo Blanco, between Puerto Deseado and Comodoro Rivadavia, just as a storm was approaching. Six members of her engine room crew were killed when the casing of one boiler split, spreading 12 tons of boiling water in the boiler room and disabling the engine and generators. Nearby ships responded to an SOS call, but securing a tow-line was difficult in the storm conditions. After three days it was decided that the six dead crewmen would be buried at sea.[21] The ship was later towed to port and withdrawn from service. In 1957 she was sold for demolition and broken up at Rio de Janeiro in 1959.[2][18]
Notes
↑ At the time, the modern port city of Belém was referred to in English as "Para", the same as the name of the Brazilian state, and Manaus was spelled "Manaos"
↑ Sources differ on the location of the collision. Most contemporary reports place the collision near "Carnation" or "Carnaticu" Island, 4 miles (6.4km) below Curralinho, Marajó, which is about 80 miles (130km) above Belém;[6][7][8] others say about 30 miles (48km) below Belém;[2][5]
Related Research Articles
Comodoro Rivadavia, often shortened to Comodoro, is a city in the Patagonian province of Chubut in southern Argentina, located on the San Jorge Gulf, an inlet of the Atlantic Ocean, at the foot of the Chenque Hill. Comodoro Rivadavia is the most important city of the San Jorge Basin, and is the largest city in Chubut as well as the largest city south of the southern 45th parallel.
SS Royston Grange was a Houlder Line refrigerated cargo liner steamship that was built in England in 1959. In 1972 she collided with the tanker Tien Chee in the Río de la Plata. The resulting fire killed all 74 people aboard Royston Grange and eight people aboard Tien Chee. Royston Grange's burnt-out hulk was scrapped in Spain in 1979.
SS Hilary was a British steam passenger liner that was built in 1931 and scrapped in 1959. She spent much of her career on a scheduled service between Liverpool in England and Manaus in Brazil.
SS Zaanland was a cargo steamship that was built in Scotland in 1900 for Dutch owners, and sunk in a collision in 1918. She was built for the Zuid-Amerika Lijn, which in 1908 became Koninklijke Hollandsche Lloyd. The US Government requisitioned her in March 1918 as USS Zaanland, with the Naval Registry Identification Number ID–2746. She was sunk in a collision less than two months later.
ARA Comodoro Rivadavia (Q-11) is a survey ship of the Argentine Navy assigned to the national Hydrographic Naval Service which among other things is responsible of the maintenance of nautical charts and navigational aids
SS Almeda Star, originally SS Almeda, was a British turbine steamer of the Blue Star Line. She was both an ocean liner and a refrigerated cargo ship, providing a passenger service between London and South America and carrying refrigerated beef from South America to London. She was built in 1926, significantly enlarged in 1935 and sunk by enemy action in 1941.
SS Anselm was a British turbine steamship of the Booth Steamship Company. She was built as a cargo and passenger liner in 1935 and requisitioned and converted into a troop ship in 1940. A German submarine sank her in 1941, killing 254 of those aboard.
South African Argentines, also known as Boer Argentines, are Argentine citizens of South African descent, primarily Afrikaners who emigrated to Argentina in the early 20th century following the Second Anglo-Boer War. This migration was motivated by a desire to preserve their cultural identity and avoid British rule.
MV E Evangelia is a shipwrecked 7,355-gross register ton (GRT) refrigerated cargo ship at Costinești on the Black Sea coast of Romania. She was built in Northern Ireland in 1942 as the Empire ship Empire Strength, was operated by Blue Star Line from 1942 to 1961, was bought by Greek shipowners in 1965 and wrecked in 1968. The ship had four names in her career, having been renamed Saxon Star in 1946, Redbrook in 1961 and E Evangelia in 1965.
ARA Azopardo was a steam transport of the Argentine Navy, built in the Stabilimento Tecnico Triestino and sold to Argentina in 1884. It was based, among others, in the port of Buenos Aires and later Ushuaia, and was decommissioned in 1922 after being sunk in an accident; it was refloated and sunk in 1924 as a target. The vessel was named after the Juan Bautista Azopardo, a Maltese privateer and officer of the Argentine Navy during the Independence and Cisplatine wars, and was the first Argentine naval ship with this name.
ARA Ingeniero Julio Krause (B-13) was an oil tanker ship in service with the Argentine Navy from 1993 to 2015, and with YPF from to 1981 to 1993. She was the first ship in the Argentine Navy to bear the name of Argentine engineer Julio Krause, who discovered oil in Comodoro Rivadavia in 1907.
Sangstad was a steam cargo ship built in 1904 by the Robert Thompson & Sons of Sunderland for A. F. Klaveness & Co of Sandefjord. She was primarily employed as an ore carrier and collier doing tramp trade during her career.
Langton Grange was a refrigerated steam cargo ship built in 1896 by the Workman, Clark & Co. of Belfast for Houlder Brothers & Co. of London to transport meat and other produce from Australia and South America to United Kingdom.
SS Rio Tercero was a cargo steamship that was launched in England in 1912 as Eboe. She was renamed Fortunstella in 1938, and Rio Tercero in 1941. A U-boat sank her in the Battle of the Atlantic in 1942.
SS Massilia was an ocean liner of the Compagnie de Navigation Sud-Atlantique. She was launched in 1914 and completed in 1920. Massilia was the Roman city on the site of what is now Marseille.
SS Lutetia was a steam ocean liner of the Compagnie de Navigation Sud-Atlantique. She was completed in 1913. Lutetia was the Roman city on the site of what is now Paris.
Anglo-African was a steam cargo ship built in 1900 by the Short Brothers of Sunderland for Lawther, Latta & Co. of London with intention of operating on their Australian routes. The vessel operated mostly on South America to North America route during her career and was wrecked on one of her regular voyages in January 1909.
Companhia de Navegação Lloyd Brasileiro, usually just called Lloyd Brasileiro, Lóide or Lloydbrás, was a Brazilian shipping company founded on 19 February 1894. It became the only major shipping company in South America, in particular by taking over German ships confiscated in 1917 by Brazil's entry into the First World War. In 1931, Lloyd Brasileiro was among the 50 largest shipping companies in the world, owning 73 ships of 271,000 GRT combined.
↑ Castrillón, Ernesto G; Casabal, Luis (20 October 2002). "Rio Santa Cruz". La Nación. Buenos Aires. Retrieved 16 May 2018.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
