Sister ships

Trip on historic vessel something to anticipate

It was a day that I had been looking forward to for quite some time, ever since I first read about this historic ship at least six months earlier.

At that time I had been doing some online research about the American merchant ship that had been towed into Sydney Harbour in August of 1943, and beached on the western shore of Point Edward.

That ship, the SS J. Pinckney Henderson, had been in a fog induced collision with an oil tanker, while sailing in a wartime convoy between Cape Breton and Newfoundland. As a result of the raging inferno that immediately broke out on both ships, the Henderson lost a total of 64 crew members (out of 67), while the oil tanker lost a total of 67 (out of 72) crew.

Even though there were serious fires burning in all five of the Henderson’s cargo holds, the decision was made to try and salvage the damaged vessel, mainly because the hull appeared to be intact, and not seriously damaged. The Henderson was also a brand new cargo ship, which had been on her maiden voyage, and at that stage in the war the allied merchant navies needed every ship that they could get.

After being towed into Sydney Harbour, and beached on the west side of Point Edward, it took another 24 days for navy firefighters from both the Point Edward Naval Base and the Halifax Dockyard to extinguish the flames. Although 64 of her crew had died in the collision and the resulting fire, only 32 bodies were recovered. They were buried in a common grave in the Hardwood Hill Cemetery in Sydney. About five years after the end of the war in 1945, the bodies were exhumed and returned to the United States.

The SS J. Pinckney Henderson was a “liberty ship,” one of more than 2,700 such vessels that were

built in the United States during the Second World War. Built in shipyards on both the east and west coast, they were basically mass produced to a common design, and carried more than two-thirds of all the military cargo that was shipped from that country to both the European and Pacific theatres of war.

How big was the liberty ship that was beached on the west side of Point Edward?

The SS J. Pinckney Henderson was 441 feet long, 56 feet wide, and could carry almost 10,000 tons of mixed cargo in five holds. How much cargo is that?

For those of us of a certain age, who can remember when freight trains ran on a daily basis from Cape Breton to the rest of Canada, that would be enough cargo to fill approximately 300 railroad boxcars. Can you imagine a train leaving downtown Sydney, and pulling 300 boxcars loaded with everything from beans to bullets, aircraft engines to tanks, and let’s include steel rails from our local steel plant.

That is a lot of cargo! Today, of the 2710 liberty ships that were launched between 1942 and 1945, there are only two that are still afloat. Both are floating “museum ships,” that are open to the public. The SS Jeremiah O’ Brien is located in San Francisco, on the west coast, while the SS John W Brown is tied up in the historic city of Baltimore, just down the east coast from New York City.

However, further research revealed an important difference between these two historic vessels, both of which were “sister - ships” to the ill-fated SS J. Pinckney Henderson that was beached in our harbour. Of the two, the SS John W Brown is the only one that is still capable of going to sea. And, much to my surprise, on two or three occasions each summer that ship does go down to the sea again, for a six hour cruise from Baltimore Harbour.

Here was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to sail on a Second World War era merchant ship

that represents the more than 7,500 merchant vessels that sailed in convoy from Sydney Harbour during the six years of the Second World War. It was too good a chance to pass up.

And so, on Saturday, June 13, 2015, I found myself standing on the cruise ship dock in Baltimore, Maryland, preparing to board this historic vessel for a nostalgic voyage back in time. I would get to experience first hand, just what it was like to sail from a wartime convoy port such as Baltimore or Sydney, during the dark days of Second World War.

Next month: a fascinating six-hour voyage on the SS John W Brown.

SUBMITTED PHOTO/NELSON RICE The Liberty Ship “SS J. Pinckney Henderson” on the west side of Point Edward, after the fires had been put out.

SUBMITTED PHOTO Columnist Rannie Gillis is shown in front of the SS John W Brown at the cruise ship terminal in Baltimore, Maryland.

SUBMITTED PHOTO Rannie Gillis is shown with Captain Brian H. Hope, on the deck of the SS John W Brown.