WANGANELLA’S WAR SERVICE

Press, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25090, 23 January 1947, Page 6

WANGANELLA’S WAR SERVICE

MANY VOYAGES AS HOSPITAL SHIP

PACIFIC AND MIDDLE EAST

The liner Wanganella, still hard and fast on Barrett’s Reef at the entrance to Wellington harbour, had more than four years of war service as a hospital ship. Her first experience of warfare occurred before she was converted for this purpose, when she stood by the Niagara after that ship struck a mine off the North Auckland coast. In 1941 the Wanganella made her first trip.as a hospital ship from Australia to Singapore. Her next voyage was to Suez, to embark wounded Australians. During this trip she in her first bombing raid at Port Tewfik. After another two trips to the Middle East, the Wanganella carried Australians wounded in the New Guinea fighting from Port Moresby to Sydney. New Zealand wounded were brought from Port Tewfik to Wellington on the following trip, and then American casualties were transported from Townsville to Sydney. Serving two battlefronts, the Wanganella travelled alternately to the Middle East and to New Guinea, visiting Wellington and Lyttelton from time to time with New Zealand wounded from the Middle East. Explosion at Bombay

A sensational escape marked the Wanganella’s thirteenth trip, when an explosion occurred in April, 1944, in Bombay harbour. The blowing up of an ammunition ship resulted in 17 ships being sunk and others damaged, and 2000 lives were lost. Although the Wanganella was only two miles from the ship which exploded, she escaped damage, and for some days was used as an emergency hospital. The Wanganella’s next two assignments were to Taranto to collect New Zealand wounded and bring them home. Then followed a trip to Darwin to return a hospital unit. Several voyages to Pacific islands were made next, the vessel travelling farther and farther north as the Allies advanced.

She was one of the first ships into Balik Papan after the harbour was cleared, and with the ?nd of the war she was detailed to embark prisoners of war and internees at Labuan and Kuching for Sydney. After three more trips to Morotai. Labuan. and Lae, the Wanganella’s war service ended, and she returned to Melbourne to refit.

Under the control of the Australian Government, the Wanganella made her first post-war overseas trip with civilian passengers towards the end of last year. A pre-war incident was a collision with the 271-ton trawler Duraween on December 28, 1937, during a voyage between Sydney and Melbourne. Both vessels were damaged. The bows of. the trawler were buckled and twisted' for about six feet and two members of the crew were injured. A few plates were sprung in the Wanganella, but the damage was not serious, and the liner’s sailing for Auckland was delayed only a few days. Bought at “Bargain Price”

Originally named the Achimota, the Wanganella was built at a cost of £520,000 for the West African trade. She was to have been used by Elder Dempster Lines, Ltd., of the Royal Mail Line group, but because of the Royal Mail Line’s financial affairs at the time and the reorganisation of the group, she was not delivered and was left on the hands of the builders, Harland and Wolff, Ltd., to sell as a new vessel. The Australian shipping company, Huddart-Parker, Ltd., anxious to meet the challenge of the American Matson Line with new tonnage, bought the ship at a bargain price of £346,376. Her replacement cost to-day would be several times that figure. The Wanganella was launched in 1929, but was not completed until 1931. Her original trials were not run until 1032.