SS ''Mahratta'' was a
Brocklebank Line
The Brocklebank Line (formally named Thos. and Jno. Brocklebank) was an English shipping line that operated in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Daniel Brocklebank founded a shipyard in Whitehaven in 1785, and expanded in the following years into ope ...
steamship launched in 1917. She ran aground in the
English Channel
The English Channel, also known as the Channel, is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that separates Southern England from northern France. It links to the southern part of the North Sea by the Strait of Dover at its northeastern end. It is the busi ...
on the
Goodwin Sands
Goodwin Sands is a sandbank at the southern end of the North Sea lying off the Deal, Kent, Deal coast in Kent, England. The area consists of a layer of approximately depth of fine sand resting on an Chalk, Upper Chalk platform belonging to ...
in October 1939. She was the second and final Brocklebank Line ship with this name. The first
''Mahratta'' suffered a similar fate in 1909. After ''Mahratta'' broke up, the ship was found to be resting on top of the first ''Mahratta''.
History
SS ''Mahratta'' was launched on 20 October 1917.
Its name is an old spelling of
Maratha
The Marathi people (; Marathi: , ''Marāṭhī lōk'') or Marathis (Marathi: मराठी, ''Marāṭhī'') are an Indo-Aryan ethnolinguistic group who are native to Maharashtra in western India. They natively speak Marathi, an Indo-A ...
. On 6 April 1936, SS ''Matheran'' lost her propeller off
Port Sudan
Port Sudan (, Beja: ) is a port city on the Red Sea in eastern Sudan, and the capital of Red Sea State. Port Sudan is Sudan's main seaport and the source of 90% of the country's international trade. The population of Port Sudan was estimated in ...
. It was decided that ''Mahratta'' would tow ''Matheran'' the to
Suez
Suez (, , , ) is a Port#Seaport, seaport city with a population of about 800,000 in north-eastern Egypt, located on the north coast of the Gulf of Suez on the Red Sea, near the southern terminus of the Suez Canal. It is the capital and largest c ...
where another ship would tow ''Matheran'' to
Alexandria
Alexandria ( ; ) is the List of cities and towns in Egypt#Largest cities, second largest city in Egypt and the List of coastal settlements of the Mediterranean Sea, largest city on the Mediterranean coast. It lies at the western edge of the Nile ...
for repairs. Despite ''Matheran'' being a bigger ship than ''Mahratta'', the tow was completed at an average speed of .
Shipwreck
On 9 October 1939, ''Mahratta'' was inbound to
London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
from
Calcutta
Kolkata, also known as Calcutta (List of renamed places in India#West Bengal, its official name until 2001), is the capital and largest city of the Indian States and union territories of India, state of West Bengal. It lies on the eastern ba ...
when she ran aground on the Goodwins.
[ ''Mahratta'' had originally been bound for ]Liverpool
Liverpool is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. It is situated on the eastern side of the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary, near the Irish Sea, north-west of London. With a population ...
but received new orders at Gibraltar
Gibraltar ( , ) is a British Overseas Territories, British Overseas Territory and British overseas cities, city located at the southern tip of the Iberian Peninsula, on the Bay of Gibraltar, near the exit of the Mediterranean Sea into the A ...
to sail to London.[ ''Mahratta'' left Gibraltar as part of Convoy HG 1 on 26 September 1939.][ The ]Deal
In cryptography, DEAL (Data Encryption Algorithm with Larger blocks) is a symmetric block cipher derived from the Data Encryption Standard (DES). Its design was presented by Lars Knudsen at the SAC conference in 1997, and submitted as a proposa ...
hoveller ''Lady Haig'' was given charge of the salvage operations.[ A tug attempted to move ''Mahratta'' into deeper water the next day, but the plates on her port side buckled and by nightfall ''Mahratta'' had broken in two.][ The crew of ''Mahratta'' were transferred to the steamer ''Challenge'' in four trips. On the third trip, a lifeboat full of luggage salvaged from ''Mahratta'' was taken in tow, but a large wave almost capsized ''Lady Haig'' and the lifeboat was cast adrift after the ten crew from ''Mahratta'' on it were rescued.]Dover
Dover ( ) is a town and major ferry port in Kent, southeast England. It faces France across the Strait of Dover, the narrowest part of the English Channel at from Cap Gris Nez in France. It lies southeast of Canterbury and east of Maidstone. ...
.
''Pride of Canterbury'' ferry incident
On 31 January 2008, the roll on roll off passenger ferry '' Pride of Canterbury'' operated by P&O Ferries
P&O Ferries is a British shipping company that operates ferry, ferries from Scotland to Northern Ireland, and from England to Continental Europe (France, Belgium and the Netherlands). The company was created in 2002 through mergers and acquisi ...
struck the wreck of ''Mahratta'' while manoeuvring in severe weather into a holding position in The Downs. The ferry suffered extensive damage to her port propeller and had to be assisted to berth in Dover. It is not clear whether the wreck site named in the MAIB
maib (BC „Moldova Agroindbank” S.A.) is Moldova’s largest commercial bank and lender.
Background
MAIB started operations in 1991 as a joint-stock company by taking over assets and clients from the Soviet-era Agroprom Bank. Today MAIB is t ...
report is that of the first ''SS Mahratta'' or the later vessel.
References
External links
Lloyds Register entry
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mahratta (1917)
Shipwrecks in the Downs
Maritime incidents in October 1939
Merchant ships of the United Kingdom
1917 ships