.gif)
RMS Empress of India (1891)
Encyclopedia
RMS Empress of India was an ocean liner
Ocean liner
An ocean liner is a ship designed to transport people from one seaport to another along regular long-distance maritime routes according to a schedule. Liners may also carry cargo or mail, and may sometimes be used for other purposes .Cargo vessels running to a schedule are sometimes referred to as...
built in 1890-1891 by Naval Construction & Armament Co., Barrow
Barrow-in-Furness
Barrow-in-Furness is an industrial town and seaport which forms about half the territory of the wider Borough of Barrow-in-Furness in the county of Cumbria, England. It lies north of Liverpool, northwest of Manchester and southwest from the county town of Carlisle...
, England for Canadian Pacific Steamships. This ship would be the first of two CP vessels to be named Empress of India, and on 28 April 1891, she was the very first of many ships named Empress arriving at Vancouver harbor.
The Empress of India regularly traversed the trans-Pacific route between the west coast of Canada and the Far East until she was sold to the Maharajah of Gwalior in 1914 and renamed in 1915.
Royal Mail Ship
This Empress enjoyed the "RMSRMS
-Science and technology:* Root mean square, a concept encapsulating the "average", in some sense, of a quantity. Frequently encountered in statistics, the physical sciences and electronics...
", meaning "Royal Mail Ship." This is the ship prefix still in use today by seagoing vessels which carry mail under contract by Royal Mail
Royal Mail
Royal Mail is the government-owned postal service in the United Kingdom. Royal Mail Holdings plc owns Royal Mail Group Limited, which in turn operates the brands Royal Mail and Parcelforce Worldwide...
.
In 1891, Canadian Pacific Railway
Canadian Pacific Railway
The Canadian Pacific Railway , formerly also known as CP Rail between 1968 and 1996, is a historic Canadian Class I railway founded in 1881 and now operated by Canadian Pacific Railway Limited, which began operations as legal owner in a corporate restructuring in 2001...
(CPR) and the British government reached agreement on a contract for subsidized mail service between Britain
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
and Hong Kong
Hong Kong
Hong Kong is one of two Special Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China , the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is renowned for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour...
via Canada; and the route began to be serviced by three specially designed ocean liners. Each of these three yachtlike vessels was given an Imperial name.
The RMS Empress of India and her two sister-ships -- the RMS Empress of China
RMS Empress of China (1891)
RMS Empress of China was an ocean liner built in 1890-1891 by Naval Construction & Armament Co., Barrow, England for Canadian Pacific Steamships...
and the RMS Empress of Japan -- created a flexible foundation for the CPR trans-Pacific fleet which would ply this route for the next half century.
History
Barrow-in-Furness
Barrow-in-Furness is an industrial town and seaport which forms about half the territory of the wider Borough of Barrow-in-Furness in the county of Cumbria, England. It lies north of Liverpool, northwest of Manchester and southwest from the county town of Carlisle...
, England. The keel was laid in 1890. She was launched on 30 August 1890 by Lady Louise Egerton, sister of Lord Harrington.
The 5,905-ton vessel had a length of 455.6 feet, and her beam was 51.2 feet. The graceful white-painted, clipper-bowed ship had two buff-colored funnels with a band of black paint at the top, three lightweight schooner-type masts, and an average speed of 16-knots. This Empress and her two sister-ship Empresses were the first vessels in the Pacific to have twin propellers with reciprocating engines. The ship was designed to provide accommodation for 770 passengers (120 first class, 50 second class and 600 steerage).
The SS Empress of India left Liverpool
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
on 8 February 1891 on her maiden voyage via Suez
Suez
Suez is a seaport city in north-eastern Egypt, located on the north coast of the Gulf of Suez , near the southern terminus of the Suez Canal, having the same boundaries as Suez governorate. It has three harbors, Adabya, Ain Sokhna and Port Tawfiq, and extensive port facilities...
to Hong Kong and Vancouver
Vancouver
Vancouver is a coastal seaport city on the mainland of British Columbia, Canada. It is the hub of Greater Vancouver, which, with over 2.3 million residents, is the third most populous metropolitan area in the country,...
. Thereafter, she regularly sailed back and forth along the Hong Kong - Shanghai
Shanghai
Shanghai is the largest city by population in China and the largest city proper in the world. It is one of the four province-level municipalities in the People's Republic of China, with a total population of over 23 million as of 2010...
- Nagasaki - Kobe
Kobe
, pronounced , is the fifth-largest city in Japan and is the capital city of Hyōgo Prefecture on the southern side of the main island of Honshū, approximately west of Osaka...
- Yokohama
Yokohama
is the capital city of Kanagawa Prefecture and the second largest city in Japan by population after Tokyo and most populous municipality of Japan. It lies on Tokyo Bay, south of Tokyo, in the Kantō region of the main island of Honshu...
- Vancouver route. In the early days of wireless telegraphy, the call sign established for the "Empress of India was "MPI."
Much of what would have been construed as ordinary, even unremarkable during this period was an inextricable part of the ship's history. In the conventional course of trans-Pacific traffic, the ship was sometimes held in quarantine, as when it was discovered that a passenger from Hong Kong to Kobe showed signs of smallpox, and the vessel was held in Yokohama port until the incubation period for the disease had passed. The cargo holds of the Empress would have been routinely examined in the normal course of harbor-master's business in Hong Kong, Yokohama or Vancouver.
On 17 August 1903, the Empress of India collided with and sank the Chinese cruiser Huang Tai.
The vessel was reported sold on 19 December 1914, to the Geakwar of Baroda (also known as the Maharajah of Gwalior). The former Empress was re-fitted as a hospital ship
Hospital ship
A hospital ship is a ship designated for primary function as a floating medical treatment facility or hospital; most are operated by the military forces of various countries, as they are intended to be used in or near war zones....
for Indian troops. On 19 January 1915, the ship was renamed Loyalty. In March 1919, she was sold to The Scindia Steam Navigation Company Ltd.
The Scindia Steam Navigation Company Ltd.
The Scindia Steam Navigation Company was one of the oldest Indian shipping companies. Founded in 1919, by Narottam Morarjee and Walchand Hirachand, it played a significant role in Indian independence...
Company in Bombay (now Mumbai
Mumbai
Mumbai , formerly known as Bombay in English, is the capital of the Indian state of Maharashtra. It is the most populous city in India, and the fourth most populous city in the world, with a total metropolitan area population of approximately 20.5 million...
). In February 1923, the ship was sold for scrapping at Bombay.
CP Empresses of India
In 1921, Canadian Pacific added two German-built vessels to the Empress fleet; and initially, both were confusingly re-named Empress of China. Within months, one of these ships will be re-named the SS Empress of India and the other will be re-named the SS Empress of Australia. A quick explanation will help distinguish these quite different ships which each sailed with the same name.
- The first SS Empress of India was a 5,905-ton vessel, launched in 1890 from Barrow, England. She would be sold in 1914, re-named SS Loyalty in 1915, and scrapped in Bombay in 1919.
- A CP sister-ship, the first SS Empress of ChinaRMS Empress of China (1891)RMS Empress of China was an ocean liner built in 1890-1891 by Naval Construction & Armament Co., Barrow, England for Canadian Pacific Steamships...
, was also a Barrow-built, 5,905-ton vessel; but she was launched a few months later, in 1891. She was wrecked on a reef at Tokyo Bay in 1911, and subsequently scrapped in 1912.
- A CP sister-ship, the first SS Empress of China
- The second SS Empress of India was a 16,992-ton vessel launched in 1907 from Gestemunde, Germany as the SS Prince Freidrich Wilhelm. The ship was purchased in 1921 by Canadian Pacific and then immediately, the ship was re-named Empress of China for only a short time.
- This second SS Empress of China and of India will be re-named several more times -- as the SS Montlaurier in 1922; and as the SS Montnairn in 1925. The ship was scrapped 1929.
In other words, this vessel from Barrow is the first of two CP ships named Empress of India.
See also
- CP ShipsCP ShipsCP Ships was a large Canadian container shipping company, prior to being taken over by Hapag Lloyd in late 2005. CP Ships had its head office in the City of Westminster in London and later in the City Place Gatwick development on the property of London Gatwick Airport in Crawley, West Sussex.The...
- List of ocean liners
- List of ships in British Columbia
External links
- The Ships List: Passenger ships web site
- Simplon Postcards: Canadian Pacific postcard images