Irish patrol vessel Muirchú
| History | |
|---|---|
 United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
|
|
| Name: | Helga II |
| Builder: | Dublin Liffey Dockyard |
| Launched: | 1908 |
| Christened: | 1908 |
| Completed: | 1908 |
| Commissioned: | 1915 |
| Renamed: | Helga 1915 |
| Fate: | passed to Irish Free State |
 Ireland
|
|
| Name: | Muirchú |
| Namesake: | Irish: Hound of the Sea |
| Builder: | Dublin Liffey Dockyard |
| Acquired: | 1923 |
| Commissioned: | August 1923 |
| Decommissioned: | 1947 |
| Renamed: | August 1923 |
| Reclassified: | 1923 |
| Fate: | Sold to Hammond Lane Scrap Merchants Dublin, sank on delivery voyage. |
| General characteristics | |
| Type: | Steam yacht |
| Displacement: | 323 tons |
| Length: | 155 ft (47 m) |
| Armament: |
|
| Notes: | |
Public Armed Ship Muirchú was a ship in the service of Irish Free State's Coastal and Marine Service (CMS). She was the former Royal Navy ship HMY Helga and was involved in shelling Liberty Hall in Dublin from the River Liffey with her pair of 12-pounder naval guns during the Easter Rising of 1916.
Helga was purchased by the Irish Free State in 1923 and renamed Muirchú (Irish: Hound of the Sea).
She sank off the Wexford coast after disposal in 1947. The wheel was recovered from the wreck by local divers and can now be seen in Kehoes Pub in Kilmore Quay.
The prefix LÉ is sometimes mistakenly used with Muirchú. The prefix was introduced in December 1946 when the Irish Naval Service was established with the purchase of three corvettes from the Royal Navy replacing Muirchú.
She was built in Liffey Dockyard in 1908 as a fishery research and protection cruiser and was named Helga II. Such was interest in her design that Canada ordered two ships to the same specification (Galliano and Misalpina).
She was then under control of the Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction (Ireland) until she was taken over by the Admiralty in March 1915 when she became officially described as His Majesty's Yacht Helga, an armed steam yacht - officially an "Armed Auxiliary Patrol Yacht". At this time the "II" was dropped from her name and she served as an anti-submarine patrol vessel as well as undertaking escort duty in the Irish Sea.
Helga was involved in the Easter Rising when the British forces used her to shell Dublin starting with Liberty Hall in April 1916.
In April 1918 she was credited with the sinking of a submarine off the Isle of Man and for the remainder of her career she carried a star on her funnel as an award for this achievement.
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Wikipedia