RMS Lady Hawkins
| History | |
|---|---|
 Canada
|
|
| Name: | RMS Lady Hawkins |
| Namesake: | Katherine, Lady Hawkins |
| Owner: | Lady Hawkins Ltd |
| Operator: | Canadian National Steamship Co |
| Port of registry: |
 Halifax, Nova Scotia
|
| Route: | Boston – Bermuda – Caribbean – British Guiana |
| Builder: | Cammell Laird, Birkenhead, England |
| Yard number: | 939 |
| Completed: | November 1928 |
| Identification: |
|
| Fate: | sunk by torpedo, 19 January 1942 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Lady-class ocean liner |
| Tonnage: | |
| Length: | 419.5 ft (127.9 m) |
| Beam: | 59.1 ft (18.0 m) |
| Depth: | 28.2 ft (8.6 m) |
| Decks: | 3 |
| Propulsion: | steam turbines; twin screw |
| Speed: | 14 knots (26 km/h) |
| Crew: | 107 |
| Sensors and processing systems: |
direction finding equipment |
| Armament: | DEMS |
| Notes: | sister ships: Lady Drake, Lady Nelson, Lady Rodney, Lady Somers |
RMS Lady Hawkins was a steam turbine ocean liner. She was one of a class of five sister ships popularly known as "Lady Boats" that Cammell Laird of Birkenhead, England built in 1928 and 1929 for the Canadian National Steamship Company (CNS). The five vessels were Royal Mail Ships that CN operated from Halifax, Nova Scotia and the Caribbean via Bermuda. In 1942 the German submarine U-66 sank Lady Hawkins in the North Atlantic, killing 251 of the 322 people aboard.
Cammell Laird of Birkenhead, on the Wirral in England built all five Lady-liners, and completed Lady Hawkins in November 1928.
Lady Hawkins was an oil-burner, with a set of four Cammell Laird steam turbines driving the propeller shafts to her twin screws by single-reduction gearing. She had three passenger decks, and by 1931 she was equipped with a direction finding device.
CN introduced the liners which became known as "Lady Boats" for mail, freight and passenger traffic between Canada, Bermuda and the Caribbean. The company wanted to develop Canadian exports including lumber, and imports to Canada including fruit, sugar and molasses. Each Lady-liner had refrigerated holds for perishable cargo such as fruit, and capacity for 100,000 bunches of bananas. Their hulls were painted white, which then was a relatively new fashion among shipping companies, and confined largely to passenger ships serving tropical or sub-tropical destinations.
Lady Drake, Lady Hawkins and Lady Nelson sailed fortnightly between Halifax and British Guiana via Boston, Bermuda, the Leeward Islands, the Windward Islands and Barbados. In summer the route was extended to the Montreal. CN named each of its five new liners after the wife of an English or British admiral who was noted for his actions in the Caribbean, and who had been knighted or ennobled. Lady Hawkins was named after Lady Katherine, the wife of the Elizabethan Admiral Sir John Hawkins (1532–95).
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Wikipedia