 Empire Windrush | |
| History | |
|---|---|
| Name |
|
| Namesake |
|
| Owner |
|
| Operator |
|
| Port of registry | |
| Route | 1931: Hamburg –Buenos Aires |
| Builder | Blohm+Voss, Hamburg |
| Yard number | 492 |
| Launched | 13 December 1930 |
| Maiden voyage | 28 March – 30 June 1931 |
| Identification |
|
| Fate | Caught fire and sank, 1954 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class & type | Monte-classpassenger ship |
| Tonnage | |
| Length | 500.3 ft (152.5 m) |
| Beam | 65.7 ft (20.0 m) |
| Draught | 26 ft4+1⁄2 in (8.04 m) |
| Depth | 37.8 ft (11.5 m) |
| Decks | 4 |
| Installed power | 6,880 bhp (5,130 kW) |
| Propulsion |
|
| Speed | 14 knots (26 km/h) |
| Crew | 222 |
| Sensors & processing systems |
|
| Notes | sister ships:Monte Olivia,Monte Sarmiento,Monte Cervantes,Monte Pascoal |
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HMTEmpire Windrush was apassengermotor ship that was launched in Germany in 1930 as the MVMonte Rosa. She was built as anocean liner for the German shipping companyHamburg Süd. They used the ship to carry German emigrants to South America, and as acruise ship. DuringWorld War II, she was taken over by theGerman navy and used as atroopship. During the war, she survived twoAllied attempts to sink her.
After World War II, theUnited Kingdom seized the ship as aprize of war and renamed her HMTEmpire Windrush. She remained in British service as a troopship until 1954.
In 1948,Empire Windrush arrived at thePort of Tilbury near London, carrying 1,027 passengers and twostowaways who embarked atTrinidad,Jamaica,Mexico andBermuda. The passengers included people from many parts of the world but the great majority wereWest Indian.[1][2]
Empire Windrush was not the first ship to carry a large group of West Indian people to the United Kingdom, as two other ships (theSSOrmonde and theSSAlmanzora) had arrived the previous year.[3] But her 1948 voyage became very well-known and a symbol of post-war migration to Britain.[4]British Caribbean people who came to the United Kingdom in the period after World War II, including those who came on other ships, are often referred to as theWindrush generation.
On 28 March 1954, while in the westernMediterranean Sea, an explosion and fire in the engine room killed four people. The fire could not be controlled and the ship was abandoned; the other 1494 passengers and crew were all rescued. The empty ship remained afloat and on-fire for nearly two days, eventually sinking during an attempt to salvage her.
Monte Rosa, was the last of five almost identicalMonte-class passenger ship [de]s that were built between 1924 and 1931 byBlohm & Voss inHamburg forHamburg Süd (Hamburg South American Steam Shipping Company).[5]
In the 1920s Hamburg Süd believed there would be a lucrative business in carrying German emigrants to South America. (See "German Argentines".) The first two ships,Monte Sarmiento andMonte Olivia, were built for that trade with single-class passenger accommodation of 1,150 passengers in cabins, and 1,350 in dormitories. However, the number of emigrants was less than expected so the two ships were repurposed ascruise ships, operating in Northern European waters, the Mediterranean and around South America. This venture became a great success.[5]
Until the 1920s, cruise holidays had been the preserve of the very wealthy. But by providing modestly priced cruises, Hamburg Süd could profitably attract a large new clientele. The company commissioned another ship,Monte Cervantes, to meet the increased demand. But she sank after only two years' service when she struck an uncharted rock in theBeagle Channel. Hamburg Süd then ordered two more ships:Monte Pascoal andMonte Rosa.[5][6]
Monte Rosa's registered length was 500.3 ft (152.5 m), herbeam was 65.7 ft (20.0 m), her depth was 37.8 ft (11.5 m),[7] and her draught was26 ft4+1⁄2 in (8.04 m).[8] Hertonnages were 13,882 GRT and 7,788 NRT.[7]
All fiveMonte-class ships were motor ships. The first two to be launched,Monte Sarmiento andMonte Olivia, were the first large Diesel-powered passenger ships to serve with a German operator.[9] The use of diesel engines drew on the experience Blohm & Voss had gained by building diesel-poweredU-boats inWorld War I.[5]
Windrush had a set of fourfour-stroke, six-cylinder,single-actingMAN Diesel engines. She had two screwpropellers, each of which was driven by one pair of engines viasingle-reduction gearing. Her engines' combined output was rated at 6,880 brake horsepower (5,130 kW), and gave her a speed of 14knots (26 km/h). This was slower than Hamburg Süd's flagshipCap Arcona, but more economical for the emigrant trade, and for pleasure cruises.[5]
Electric power was supplied by a set ofDCelectric generators, powered by internal combustion engines in the engine room. As built,Monte Rosa had three 350 kW generators. A fourth generator was added in 1949. She had also an emergency generator outside the engine room. The ship also carried twoScotch marine boilers to produce high-pressure steam for some auxiliary machinery. These could be heated either by burning diesel fuel, or by using the hot exhaust gases from her main engines.[10]
TheMonte-class ships were named after mountains in Europe or South America.Monte Rosa was named afterMonte Rosa, which is a mountainmassif on the Swiss-Italian border, and is the second-highest mountain in the Alps.[citation needed] Hamburg Südregistered her at Hamburg. Her German official number was 1640, and hercode letters were RHWF.[7] By 1934 hercall sign was DIDU, and this had superseded her code letters.[11]
Under UK ownership she became one of about 1,300Empire ships. About 60 Empire ships were named after British rivers.[Note 1] Her namesake, theRiver Windrush, rises in theCotswolds, and joins theRiver Thames a few miles upstream ofOxford.[citation needed] The Ministry of Transport registered her atLondon. Her UK official number was 181561, and her call sign was GYSF.[8]
In UK service, her name had the prefix "HMT" which could stand for "His Majesty's Troopship", "His Majesty's Transport"[12][13] or "Hired Military Transport".[14][Note 2] Some official documents, including the enquiry report into the ship's loss, use "MV" (which stands forMotor Vessel), instead of "HMT".[10]
Blohm & VosslaunchedMonte Rosa on 13 December 1930. Early in 1931 she made hersea trials and was delivered to Hamburg Süd. Her maiden voyage was from Hamburg toBuenos Aires. She left Hamburg on 28 March 1931, and got back on 22 June.[15] For the remainder of 1931, all fourMonte sisters were scheduled to sail between Hamburg and Buenos Aires. They were scheduled to call atA Coruña andVigo on outward voyages only; and to call atLas Palmas,Rio de Janeiro,Santos,São Francisco do Sul,Rio Grande, andMontevideo in both directions.[16]
Monte Rosa entered service just as theGreat Depression was causing a global slump in shipping, including Hamburg Süd's passenger business. In 1933 trade began to recover, so Hamburg Süd returned the older ships,Monte Sarmiento andMonte Olivia, to their original role of taking emigrants to South America;[16] and putMonte Pascoal andMonte Rosa mainly on cruises to Norway and the UK.[5] By 1935Monte Rosa was back on her route between Hamburg and Buenos Aires.[16] She made more than 20 round trips on the route before the outbreak of World War II.[15]
Aftercoming to power in Germany in 1933, theNazi Party used ships includingMonte Rosa to further its ideology. In 1937 the Nazi governmentcharteredMonte Olivia,Monte Rosa, andMonte Sarmiento to provide cruise holidays for the state-ownedKraft durch Freude ("Strength through Joy") programme.[17] This provided concerts, lectures, sports activities and cheap holidays as a means of strengthening support for the Nazi regime and indoctrinating people in its ideology.[18] The cruises ranged from eight to 20 days in duration. One route went north from Hamburg, along the Norwegian coast and travelling as far asSvalbard. Another was through the Mediterranean, stopping in Italy and Libya, and travelling as far east asPort Said. Each voyage included a number of undercoverGestapo officers, tasked with spying on the passengers.[19]
When visiting South America, the ship was used to spread Nazi ideology among the German-speaking community there. When in port in Argentina, she hosted Nazi rallies forGerman Argentines. In 1933, the new German ambassador, BaronEdmond von Thermann [de], sailed to Argentina aboardMonte Rosa. He disembarked wearing anSS uniform in front of an enthusiastic crowd. He spent his time in office promoting Nazi ideology.[15] The ship was also a venue for Nazi gatherings when docked in London.[20]
On 23 July 1934Monte Rosa ran aground offThorshavn in theFaroe Islands.[21] She was refloated the next day.[22] In 1936 she rendezvoused at sea with the airshipLZ 127 Graf Zeppelin, and a bottle of Champagne was hoisted from her deck to the airship.[23]
When World War II began,Monte Rosa was in Hamburg. From 11 January 1940 she was abarracks ship at Stettin (nowSzczecin), and in April 1940 she was a troopship for theinvasion of Norway, mainly sailing toOslo.[24]
She was one of two ships used in 1942 todeport Norwegian Jews.[25] She made two trips from Oslo to Denmark on 19 and 26 November,[26] carrying a total of 46 people, including the Polish-Norwegian businessman and humanitarianMoritz Rabinowitz. All but two were murdered atAuschwitz concentration camp.[27][28] In September 1943 she was to be used for the deportation of Danish Jews. The German chief of sea transport atAarhus in Denmark, together withMonte Rosa's captain,Heinrich Bertram (captain) [de], conspired to prevent this by falsely reporting serious engine trouble to the German High Command. This action may have helped therescue of the Danish Jews.[29]
In September 1943, Royal NavyX-classsubmarines inOperation Source badly damaged thebattleshipTirpitz inAltafjord in Norway. Germany was unwilling to risk moving the ship to a German dockyard for repair, so in OctoberMonte Rosa was used to take hundreds of civilian workers and engineers to Altafjord, where they repairedTirpitz in situ.[30]Monte Rosa was docked alongsideTirpitz as an accommodation ship for the workers,[31] and as arepair ship.[24]
During the winter of 1943–1944,Monte Rosa continued to sail between Norway and Germany.[30] On 30 March 1944, British and CanadianBristol Beaufighters attacked her. The strike was planned to sink her, after a reconnaissance aircraft of333 (Norwegian) Squadron had tracked her movements.[32][33] The ship was sailing south, escorted by twoflak ships; adestroyer; and German fighter aircraft.[32] The attacking force comprised nine aircraft ofRoyal Air Force (RAF)144 Squadron, five of which carried torpedoes; and nine aircraft ofRoyal Canadian Air Force (RCAF)404 Squadron, all armed with armour-piercingRP-3 rockets.[33]
The attack was near the Norwegian island ofUtsira.[33] The RCAF and RAF crews claimed two torpedo hits onMonte Rosa. Cannon fire and eight rockets also hit her.[32][34] One GermanMesserschmitt Bf 110 fighter was shot down, and 404 Squadron lost two Beaufighters. The two crew of one aircraft were killed; the crew of the other (one of whom was the squadron commanding officer) survived and were made prisoners of war.[32][33][35] Despite her damage,Monte Rosa reachedAarhus in Denmark on 3 April.[32]
In June 1944,Max Manus andGregers Gram, members ofNorwegian Independent Company 1 (a British Army sabotage and resistance unit composed of Norwegians), attached limpet mines toMonte Rosa's hull while she was in Oslo harbour. The British had learned the ship was to take 3,000 German troops back to Germany. The raid's purpose was to sink her during the voyage.[36] The pair twice bluffed their way into the dock area by posing as electricians, then hid for three days as they waited for the ship to arrive. After she docked, they paddled out to her in an inflatable rubber boat and attached their mines.[37] The mines detonated when the ship was nearØresund. They damaged her hull, but she stayed afloat, and returned to harbour under her own power.[38][Note 3]
In September 1944 another explosion, possibly by a mine, damagedMonte Rosa.Odd Claus [no], a Norwegian boy with German parents who was being forcibly taken to Germany, was one of those aboard when it happened. In his memoirs, published on 2008, he wrote that the ship was carrying German troops, plus Norwegian women with young children, who were being taken to Germany as part of theLebensborn programme. The explosion was at 0500 hrs, and about 200 people aboard were trapped and drowned as the ship's captain closed the watertight bulkhead doors to limit flooding and keep the ship afloat.[40]
On 16 February 1945 a mine explosion near theHel Peninsula in the Baltic damagedMonte Rosa, flooding her engine room. She was towed toGdynia for temporary repairs. She was then towed to Copenhagen, carrying 5,000 German refugees fleeing from the advancingRed Army. She was then taken toKiel, where on 10 May 1945 British forces captured her.[41][42]
In summer 1945 a Danish dockyard repairedMonte Rosa's war damage. On 18 November 1945, ownership was transferred to the UK as aprize of war.[42] In 1946 she was refitted atSouth Shields as a troopship.[24] On 21 January 1947 she was renamed HMTEmpire Windrush. She was registered as a UKmerchant ship, and assigned to the UK Ministry of Transport, who contracted TheNew Zealand Shipping Company tomanage her.[10][43]
By then she was the only survivor of the fiveMonte-class ships.Monte Cervantes sank nearTierra del Fuego in 1930. Two members of the class were sunk inKiel harbour by separate wartime air-raids,Monte Sarmiento in February 1942 andMonte Olivia in April 1945.[44]Monte Pascoal was damaged by an air raid onWilhelmshaven in February 1944. In 1946 she was filled withchemical bombs, and the Britishscuttled her in theSkagerrak.[15][44]
As a troopship,Empire Windrush made 13 round trips between Britain and the Far East.[24] Her route was betweenSouthampton andHong Kong, viaGibraltar;Suez;Aden;Colombo; andSingapore. Her route was extended toKure in Japan during theKorean War.[citation needed] She also made ten round trips to the Mediterranean; four toIndia; and one to the West Indies.[24]
In 1948,Empire Windrush travelled from the United Kingdom to the Caribbean, to repatriate around 500 West Indians who had served in the Royal Air Force during World War II. She was also carrying 257 civilians, including women and children. The officer in charge of the servicemen wasSierra Leonean Flight LieutenantJohn Henry Clavell Smythe. He later became Attorney General ofSierra Leone.[45] With him on the voyage was Flight LieutenantJohn Jellicoe Blair from Jamaica.[46] The ship departed fromSouthampton on 7 May and arrived inTrinidad on 20 May. She then stopped atKingston, Jamaica,Tampico, Mexico,Havana, Cuba andBermuda, before returning to the United Kingdom.[47][Note 4]
Several weeks before the ship left the United Kingdom, opportunistic advertisements had been placed in a Jamaican newspaper,The Daily Gleaner, offering cheap passage on the ship's return voyage; advertisements were also placed in newspapers inBritish Honduras, British Guiana,Trinidad and Tobago and other places. However, the cheapest fares were only available to men, who were accommodated in the large, dormitory areas usually allocated to troops. Women were required to travel in the ship's two and four-berth cabins, that cost considerably more.[47]
Many former servicemen took this opportunity to return to Britain in hope of finding better employment. Some wished to rejoin the RAF. Others decided to make the journey just to see what the "mother country" was like.[48][49] One passenger later recalled that demand for tickets far exceeded supply, and there was a long queue to buy one.[50]
TheBritish Nationality Bill to give the status ofcitizenship of the United Kingdom and Colonies (CUKC status) to all British subjects connected with the United Kingdom or a British colony, was going through Parliament. Some Caribbean migrants decided to embark in anticipation that the bill would become anAct of Parliament. Until 1962, the UK had no immigration control for CUKCs. They could settle in the UK indefinitely, without restriction.[citation needed]
A figure often given for the number ofWest Indian migrants aboardEmpire Windrush is 492,[2][51][52] based on news reports in the media at the time, which variously announced that "more than 400", "430" or "500" Jamaican men had arrived in Britain.[53][54][55] However, the ship'smanifest, kept in theUnited Kingdom National Archives, shows that 802 passengers gave their last place of residence as a country in the Caribbean.[1]
Among Caribbean passengers was Jamaican-bornSam Beaver King, who was travelling to the UK to rejoin the RAF. He later helped to found theNotting Hill Carnival, and became the first blackMayor of Southwark.[56] The Jamaican artist andmasterpotterCecil Baugh was also aboard.[57] There were a number of musicians who were later to become well known. These included theCalypso musiciansLord Kitchener,Lord Beginner andLord Woodbine, all from Trinidad; the Jamaican jazz trumpeterDizzy Reece[58] and the Trinidadian singerMona Baptiste, one of the few women on the ship, who travelled first class.[59] A small number of the Caribbean people aboard wereIndo-Caribbeans.[60] One of whom, Sikaram Gopthal, was the father of the record-label ownerLee Gopthal.[58]
There were also 66 Polish passengers who embarked when the ship called at Tampico, Mexico. They were women and children whom the Soviets had deported to Siberia after theSoviet invasion of Poland in 1939, but who had escaped and travelled via India and the Pacific to Mexico. About 1,400 had been living at a refugee camp at Santa Rosa nearLeón, Guanajuato since 1943.[61] They were granted permission to settle in the UK under thePolish Resettlement Act 1947.[1][2][62][63][64] One of them later recalled that they were given cabins below the waterline, allowed on deck only in escorted groups, and kept segregated from the other passengers.[62]
Of the other passengers, 119 were from the UK, and 40 from elsewhere in the world.[1] Non-Caribbean people aboard includedNancy Cunard, English writer and heiress to theCunard shipping fortune;[65][66] the travel writerFreya Stark (who shared a cabin with Cunard); Lady Ivy Woolley, the wife ofSir Charles Woolley, the governor of British Guiana;[47][67] Gertrude Whitelaw, the wealthy widow of the former Member of ParliamentWilliam Whitelaw.[68][Note 5] andPeter Jonas, who was only two years old and travelling with his mother and older-sister. He would be later well known as anarts administrator and opera company director.[69]
One of the stowaways was a woman called Evelyn Wauchope, a 27-year-old dressmaker.[70][71] She was discovered seven days out of Kingston. Some of the musicians on-board organized a benefit concert that raised enough money for her fare, and £4 spending money.[72][Note 6]
Empire Windrush's arrival became a news event. When she was in the English Channel, theEvening Standard sent an aircraft to photograph her from the air, and published the story on its front page.[74] She docked atTilbury, downriver from London, on 21 June 1948,[51][70] and the 1,027 passengers began disembarking the next day. This was covered by newspaper reporters and byPathé Newsnewsreel cameras.[53] The name Windrush, as a result, has come to be used as shorthand for West Indian migration,[75] and, by extension, for the beginning of modern British multiracial society.
The purpose ofEmpire Windrush's voyage to the Caribbean had been to repatriate service personnel. The UK government neither expected nor welcomed her return with civilian, West Indian migrants. Three days before the ship arrived,Arthur Creech Jones, theSecretary of State for the Colonies, wrote aCabinet memorandum noting that the Jamaican Government could not legally stop people from leaving, and the UK government could not legally stop them from landing. However, he stated that the Government was opposed to this migration, and both theColonial Office and the Jamaican government would take all possible steps to discourage it.[76]
The day after arrival, several MPs, includingJames Dixon Murray, warned the Prime Minister that such an "argosy of Jamaicans",[77] might "cause discord and unhappiness among all concerned".[78]George Isaacs, theMinister of Labour, stated in Parliament that there would be no encouragement for others to follow their example. Despite this, Parliament did not pass the firstlegislation controlling immigration from the Commonwealth until 1962.
Passengers who had not already arranged accommodation were temporarily housed in theClapham Southdeep shelter in southwest London, less than a mile away from theColdharbour Lane Employment Exchange inBrixton, where some of the arrivals sought work. The stowaways were given brief prison sentences, but were allowed to remain in the UK after their release.[79]
Many ofEmpire Windrush's passengers intended to stay for only a few years. A number did return to the Caribbean, but a majority settled permanently in the UK. Those born in the West Indies who settled in the UK in this migration movement over the following years are now typically referred to as the "Windrush Generation".[80]
While the 1948 voyage of theEmpire Windrush is well-known, she was not the first ship to bring West Indians to the UK after World War II. On 31 March 1947,Orient Line'sOrmonde reachedLiverpool from Jamaica with 241 passengers, including 11 stowaways. The passengers included Ralph Lowe, who became the father of the author and poetHannah Lowe.[3]Liverpool Magistrates Court tried the stowaways and sentenced them to one day in prison, which effectively meant their immediate release.[81]
On 21 December 1947,Royal Mail Line'sAlmanzora reached Southampton with 200 passengers aboard. As withEmpire Windrush, many were former service personnel who had served in the RAF in World War II.[3] 30 adult stowaways and one boy were arrested when the ship docked; they were jailed for 28 days.[82]
In May 1949,Empire Windrush was en route from Gibraltar toPort Said when fire broke out aboard. Four ships were put on standby to assist if she had to be abandoned. The passengers were placed in thelifeboats, but the boats were not launched, and the ship was subsequently towed back to Gibraltar.[83]
In February 1950,Empire Windrush repatriated the last British troops stationed in Greece,[84] embarking the First Battalion of theBedfordshire and Hertfordshire Regiment atThessaloniki on 5 February, and other troops and their families atPiraeus.[85][86] British troops had been in Greece since 1944, fighting for theKingdom of Greece in theGreek Civil War.[87]
On 7 February 1953, around 200 nautical miles (370 km) south of theNicobar Islands,Empire Windrush sighted a smallcargo motor ship,Holchu, adrift with a broken mast.Empire Windrush broadcast a general warning by wireless. A British cargosteamship,Ranee, responded by changing course to investigate.Ranee found no trace ofHolchu's five crew, and towed the vessel to Colombo.[88]Holchu was carrying a cargo of bagged rice and was in good condition apart from her broken mast; the vessel was not short of food, water or fuel. A meal was found prepared in the ship's galley.[89] The fate of her crew remains unknown, and the incident is cited in several works onUfology and theBermuda Triangle.[90][91][92]
In June 1953Empire Windrush took part in theFleet review to commemorate theCoronation of Queen Elizabeth II.[93]
In February 1954Empire Windrush leftYokohama for the UK. She called at Kure; Hong Kong; Singapore; Colombo; Aden; and Port Said.[10] Her passengers included recovering woundedUnited Nations servicemen from theKorean War, including members of theDuke of Wellington's Regiment who had been wounded at theThird Battle of the Hook in May 1953.[citation needed]
The voyage was beset by engine breakdowns and other defects, including a fire after the leaving Hong Kong.[94] She took ten weeks to reach Port Said, where a party of 50Royal Marines from3 Commando Brigade embarked aboard her.[95][96]
Aboard were 222 crew and 1,276 passengers, including military personnel, and some women and children who were dependents of some of the military personnel.[97] Certified to carry 1,541 people, the ship was almost completely full, with 1,498 people aboard.[10]
At around 0617 hrs on 28 March,Windrush was in the western Mediterranean, off the coast of Algeria, about 30 nautical miles (56 km) northwest ofCape Caxine.[10] A sudden explosion in the engine room killed theThird; Seventh; and Eighthengineers and theFirst Electrician, and started a fierce fire. Twogreasers; one who was the fifth man in the engine room; and another who was in the boiler room, managed to escape.[10][Note 7]
Both theChief Officer and theMaster were on thebridge. They heard the explosion, and saw black smoke and flames coming from the funnel. Attempts were made to contact the engine room by telephone—it was heard ringing but was not answered. The Chief Officer immediately mustered the ship's firefighting squad, who happened to be on deck at the time doing routine work, and went with them to the engine room. They were able to fight the fire for only a few minutes before the ship's electricity supply failed, stopping the water pumps that fed the fire hoses (all four main generators were inside the burning engine room). The emergency generator was started; this was supposed to power the ship's emergency lighting, bilge pump, fire pump, and radio. But problems with the main circuit breakers made its electricity supply unusable.[10]
TheChief engineer and theSecond Engineer were unable to enter the engine room due to dense black smoke. The Second Engineer tried again after obtaining asmoke hood, but could not see because of the smoke. He was unable to close a watertight door that might have contained the fire. Attempts to close all watertight doors using the controls on the bridge also failed.[10]
At 0623 hrs the Radio Officer broadcast the firstdistress signal. This was acknowledged by two French ships, and by radio stations atGibraltar,Oran andAlgiers. After the electric power supply failed, radio signals continued to be sent via the emergency transmitter until 0645 hrs, when the fire stopped the Radio Officer from making further transmissions.[97]The order was given[clarification needed] to wake the passengers and crew and muster them at their boat stations. The order was passed by word of mouth, as the loss of electric power had disabled the ship'spublic address system, electric alarm bells, andair andsteam whistles. Passengers and crew had to evacuate in darkness, as the main lighting was also disabled.[10]
At 0645 hrs, firefighting was halted, and the order was given[clarification needed] to launch the lifeboats, with the first ones awaycarrying the women and children[10][97] and theship's cat.[99]
Although the ship's 22 lifeboats could accommodate all aboard, thick smoke and the lack of electric power prevented many of them from being launched. Each set of lifeboatdavits carried two lifeboats. But without electric power, raising the wire ropes to lower the second boat was by hand, which was arduous and slow. With fire spreading rapidly, the order was given to drop the remaining boats into the sea.[10] In the end, only 12 lifeboats were launched.[96]
Many of the crew and troops abandoned ship by climbing down ladders or ropes and jumping into the sea, after first throwing overboard any loose items at hand that would float[10] Some were rescued byEmpire Windrush's lifeboats, others by a boat from the first rescue ship, which arrived at 0700 hrs.[10][97] The last person to leaveEmpire Windrush was her Chief Officer, Captain W Wilson, at 0730 hrs.[97] Some people were in the sea for two hours[96] but all were rescued; the only deaths were the four crew killed in the engine room.[95]
The ships responding toEmpire Windrush's distress call were theKNSM motor shipMentor;P&Ocargo linerSocotra;Olsen & Ugelstad [no] steamshipHemsefjell; and Italian steamshipsTaigete andHelschell.[100][101] AnAvro Shackleton aircraft from224 Squadron RAF assisted.[102]
The rescue ships took the passengers and crew to Algiers, where theFrench Red Cross and theFrench Army looked after them. Theaircraft carrierHMS Triumph then took them to Gibraltar. Most had lost all their possessions, so new uniforms were issued to the service personnel, andSSAFA clothed the families.[103] From Gibraltar, they returned to the United Kingdom aboard aircraft chartered fromBritish Eagle.[104] The last group arrived on 2 April.[105]
About 26 hours afterEmpire Windrush was abandoned,HMS Saintes of theRoyal Navy's Mediterranean Fleet reached her. The fire was still burning fiercely more than a day after it started, but a party fromSaintes managed to board her and secure a tow cable. At about 1230 hrs,Saintes began to tow the ship to Gibraltar, at a speed of about3+1⁄2 knots (6.5 km/h). However, at 0030 hrs on 30 March 1954,Empire Windrush sank at position37°00′N2°11′E / 37.000°N 2.183°E /37.000; 2.183;[10]Saintes had only towed her about 16 kilometres (8.6 nmi). The bodies of the four men killed were not recovered and were lost when she sank.[15] The wreck lies at a depth of about 2,600 m (8,500 ft).[106]
The sinking of Windrush was debated in the House of Commons on 7 April 1954. Member of Parliament,Bessie Braddock asked questions to Minister of TransportAlan Lennox-Boyd regarding the ship's state of repair. One of the engineers killed, Leslie Pendleton, had been her constituent. She had in her possessions five letters he wrote to his father, which described the ship as being in a poor state of repair, subject to continuous serious breakdowns and a previous fire.[107][108]
An inquiry into the sinking ofEmpire Windrush was held in London between 21 June and 7 July 1954.[10] John Vickers Naisby, theCommissioner of Wrecks, led the enquiry.[109]Sidney Silverman, lawyer and Member of Parliament, represented the interests of the ship's crew. During the proceedings he tried to show thatEmpire Windrush was in an unsafe state and not fit to be at sea. Leslie Pendleton's letters were submitted to the enquiry as evidence.[109]
No firm cause for the fire was established, but it was thought the most likely cause was that corrosion in one of the ship's funnels, or "uptakes", may have led to a panel failing, causing incandescently hot soot to fall into the engine room, where it damaged a fuel oil or lubricating oil supply pipe and ignited the leaking oil.[10][110] An alternative theory was that a fuel pipe fractured and deposited fuel oil onto a hot exhaust pipe.[10] The inquiry concluded thatEmpire Windrush was seaworthy when she caught fire.[109]
It was thought that the fire consumed much of the oxygen in the engine room. This would have stopped the internal combustion engines that powered the four main electric generators, which would explain the rapid loss of electric power. The rapid depletion of oxygen, and the fire's noxious gases, were thought to have also killed the four engine room crew.[10]
As the ship was government property, she was not insured.[101]
In October 1954, one of the military personnel onEmpire Windrush during her final voyage was awarded theOBE, and two were awarded theMBE for their roles in the evacuation of the burning ship. Also, a military nurse became anAssociate of the Royal Red Cross for her role in evacuating the patients under her care.[111]
In 1998 a public open space inBrixton, London, was renamedWindrush Square to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the arrival ofEmpire Windrush's West Indian passengers. In 2008 a Thurrock Heritage plaque was unveiled at theLondon Cruise Terminal atTilbury to commemorate the "Windrush Generation".[112] On 27 July 2012 this part of the ship's history was briefly commemorated in the Pandemonium sequence of theOpening Ceremony of the Games of the XXX Olympiad in London. A small replica of the ship plastered with newsprint represented her in the ceremony.[113]
In the 2000s, Hamburg Süd commissioned tencontainer ships of a newMonte class. Several re-use the names of their passenger-ship predecessors, including the container shipMonte Rosa, which has been in service since 2005.[114]
ALondon Overground rail service in East London was named theWindrush line in 2024.[115] The line runs through areas with strong ties to Caribbean communities today as a celebration of theWindrush generation, and the wider importance of migration to London's culture.[116]
In 2020 a fund-raising effort was begun for a project to recover one ofEmpire Windrush's anchors, weighing about 1,500 kilograms (3,300 lb). This would beconserved, and then displayed as a monument to the Windrush Generation.[117][118][119] In June 2023 an organisation called the Windrush Anchor Foundation announced plans for the salvage. The project is to involve oceanographerDavid Mearns and is estimated to cost £1 million, which is to be raised by donations.[119]
There were more people who wanted to travel than places available. "There was a long queue, lots of people hustling and bustling to get tickets, offering to pay more – but my name was on the list," said Gardner, now 92.
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{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link){{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link){{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)Within 20 minutes of the order to abandon ship, all 250 women and children had been placed in lifeboats, as well as 500 of the servicemen and the ship's cat Tibby.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link){{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)Shipwrecks and maritime incidents in 1934 | |
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Shipwrecks and maritime incidents in 1954 | |
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