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HMAT A60 Aeneas

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HMAT A60 Aeneas
HMAT A60 Aeneas 1.jpg
HMAT A60 Aeneas Leaving Port Melbourne.jpg
HMAT A60 Aeneas Leaving Port Melbourne
History
Name HMAT A60 Aeneas
Owner Ocean Steam Ship Co, Ltd, Liverpool (Blue Funnel Line)
Builder Workman Clarke at Belfast
Yard number 294
Completed 1910
Out of service 4 Jul 1940
Fate sunk by German bombers
General characteristics
Type Passenger liner
Tonnage 10,049 tons
Length 150.3m
Beam 18.4 m
Depth 11.3m
Propulsion twin screw
Speed 14 knots (25.93 kph)
Capacity 180 x 1st class passegers



Remarks

Built for Ocean Steam Ship Co (Blue Funnel Line) for the South Africa - Australia service. Trip took 39 days and operated every six weeks.


Requisitioned by the Commonwealth for use as a troopship for four voyages from Australia and one as a cargo ship in 1917. Fitted out at Cockatoo Island in Sydney to carry 1,820 troops. She made several trips to England carrying reinforcements. Management was transferred to the British Admiralty on 22 Jun 1917.


In May 1918 after she left Commonwealth control, she ran aground, but was refloated, and in 1920 resumed her peacetime Australian service with capacity for 180 first class passengers. She was in convoy 21 miles S.E. of Start Point on July 2nd, 1940, when she was attacked by German bombers and finally sank on July 4th. As the vessel was the largest in the convoy she received particular attention from the enemy, one bomb passing through the port side and another going down the after cross-bunker trunkway and blowing out the starboard side. This bomb, which exploded deep within the ship, is assumed to have killed nearly all of the engineers and stokers on duty. 19 lives were lost.

Soldiers carried

Port Suez to Melbourne 31 October 1915 - 26 November 1915

Sailed on 3 Nov 1915

Fremantle to Port Suez 17 April - 14 May 1916

Melbourne to England 3 October - 19 November 1916

Melbourne to Devonport 30 October - 27 December 1917

England to Fremantle 19 December 1918 - 27 January 1919

England to Fremantle 31 May - 12 July 1919

England to Melbourne 22 November 1919 - 9 January 1920

Other Journeys

  • 29-Jun-1915: from Brisbane, Queensland
  • 20-Dec-1915: from Sydney, New South Wales
  • 17-Apr-1916: from Freemantle, Perth