SS Irish Willow

SS Irish Willow was one of the few ships which maintained Irish trade during World War II.

At the outbreak of World War II, known in Ireland as “The Emergency”, Ireland declared neutrality and became isolated as never before. The country had a substantial food surplus, but there were shortages of specific foods such as fruit, wheat and tea, and it had very few ships of its own: shipping had been neglected since independence, and the foreign vessels that had carried Irish cargoes before the war were soon unavailable.

“No country had ever been more effectively blockaded because of the activities of belligerents and our lack of ships…” Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Éamon de Valera, Saint Patrick’s Day address 17 March 1940.

Otto, an Estonian ship, was lying at Cobh when the Republic of Estonia was occupied by the USSR. In October 1941 trustees for her absent owners leased her to Irish Shipping and she was renamed Irish Willow. She made 18 voyages to Saint John, New Brunswick, returning with wheat, and also exported food to Britain and imported coal. Irish ships initially sailed in British convoys but, in the light of experience, chose to sail alone, relying on their neutral markings. German respect for that neutrality varied from friendly to tragic.

Construction

The ship was built for the United States Shipping Board by the Toledo Shipbuilding Company of Toledo, Ohio. A Standard World War I cargo ship, she was laid down as War Flag but named Lake Sunapee, after the lake in New Hampshire, and launched on 28 December 1917, while the war was still in progress. A single-deck vessel assessed at 2,009 GRT, she had a grain capacity of 130,000 cubic feet (3,681 m3) and was 252 ft (76.81 m) long, 43 ft 5 in (13.2 m) wide and 18 ft 9 in (5.7 m) deep.

Early history

As a Laker she was designed to navigate the canal locks bypassing Niagara Falls. Lake Sunapee served as a U.S. Army transport based at Cardiff, Glamorgan, bringing coal to France. She departed Cardiff for New York on 7 June 1919, arrived on 25 June and was decommissioned at Hoboken, New Jersey on 3 July.

Little is known of her service in the years that followed, though she is recorded arriving at New York from Pará on 29 May 1920. She was laid up until 1923, when she was sold to W. J. Gray Jnr. of San Francisco and renamed Frank Lynch, and her original coal-fired triple-expansion steam engine was replaced with a Werkspoor diesel. On 29 August 1929 the passenger ship San Juan collided with the tanker S.C.T. Dodd and sank with the loss of many lives; Frank Lynch, Munami and S.C.T. Dodd rescued the survivors.

In 1937 she was sold to the Greek company George D. Gratsos’ Sons and renamed Nestor. The following year she suffered a total engine failure and was towed to Rotterdam, where she was converted back to a steamer. In 1939 she was sold to K. Jurnas of Estonia and renamed Otto.

World War II

Background

The Irish government had pursued a policy of autarky, or self-sufficiency: international trade was discouraged and the mercantile marine ignored. At independence in 1923 there were 127 Irish ships; by September 1939 there were only 56, including 7 that carried no cargo. Imports such as wheat, maize, timber and fertiliser travelled on foreign, mainly British, ships, and with the outbreak of hostilities these were unavailable. Churchill explained: “we need this tonnage for our own supply”. In November 1939 American ships were excluded from Irish waters by the neutrality act.

By the end of 1940, nine Irish ships and ten neutral foreign ships carrying Irish cargoes, some chartered by Irish companies, had been sunk by U-boats, the Luftwaffe or mines. Against this background the government founded Irish Shipping and sought ships to charter or purchase. Irish Willow was one of them.

Soviet claim

In June 1940 the Soviet Union occupied the Baltic states, and on 6 August 1940 Estonia was annexed as the Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic. Industry was nationalised and Estonian ships were ordered to sail to a Soviet port. Several ships from the Baltic states were in, or heading to, Irish ports; all ignored the order. Peter Kolts, a crewman of Piret, another Estonian ship at Dublin’s south quays, hoisted the hammer and sickle and prevented Captain Joseph Juriska from removing it. The Garda Síochána were called and, after a court appearance before Justice Michael Lennon, the sailor spent a week in jail.

Ivan Maisky, the Soviet Union’s ambassador to the United Kingdom, applied to the High Court in Dublin for possession of the ships, whose owners could not be contacted. The Soviet case rested partly on a letter from John Whelan Dulanty, the Irish High Commissioner in London, written when the ships had been ordered to the USSR, asking whether the three carrying cargoes destined for Ireland could first deliver them. Maisky had agreed, provided the Irish government guaranteed that after discharging their cargo the ships would be given food sufficient for the journey to a Soviet port. A. K. Overend K.C., acting for Maisky, argued that this showed Ireland recognised his client as “the proper person to give instruction to the ships”, and that his client was the only claimant.

John McEvoy, honorary consul of the Republic of Estonia in Dublin, opposed the Soviet claim along with Estonian representatives in Switzerland. Although he lacked diplomatic status, the Court recognised the right of Herbert Martinson, described as “an Estonian national, resident in Switzerland”, to vindicate the rights of the absent owners, and McEvoy and Martinson were appointed trustees. The High Court considered five ships: Otto, Piret and Mall from Estonia, and Rāmava and Everoja from Latvia. On 16 May 1941 it rejected the Soviet claim, and on 3 July the five-judge Supreme Court unanimously dismissed the Soviet appeal with costs. The Soviet Union made a ‘most emphatic’ protest.

Martinson leased the three Estonian vessels to Irish Shipping for the duration of the war plus three months. The two Latvian ships transferred to the British registry and sailed under the Red Ensign: Rāmava moved to Britain, while Everoja remained in Ireland until she was torpedoed and sunk on 3 November 1941 by U-203, in convoy SC-52 on passage from Canada to Dublin with 6,400 tons of wheat.

McEvoy had acted at his own expense, and the court directed that he be reimbursed from the income earned by Otto (Irish Willow). His role was acknowledged after Estonia regained its independence, when the President of Estonia, Toomas Hendrik Ilves, said: “…we are thankful that Ireland never recognised the illegal annexation of Estonia by the Soviet Union after the Second World War. We will never forget John McEvoy, Estonia’s honorary consul in Dublin from 1938 to 1960. Among other things, one of his good deeds was helping to protect the interests of the Estonian shipowners …”

Irish Willow

In October 1941 Otto was chartered by Irish Shipping at Cobh and brought to Dublin for extensive repairs under Captain G. R. Bryan of Rathfarnham, previously captain of City of Dublin. H. Cullen, previously of Irish Elm, was first officer, and H. Jurgenson, an Estonian national who had held the post when she was Otto, remained chief engineer. As engine components could not be located, the repairs had to be completed in Canada.

On 5 December she sailed on her first commercial voyage as Irish Willow, under Captain R. Shanks of Belfast. She took on fuel at Troon and joined convoy ON-47, which departed on 15 December 1941. Around this time Irish crews were refusing to travel in convoy, and Irish Willow “lost” hers. She arrived in Saint John on 12 January 1942 and loaded her cargo of wheat on 22 January; repairs delayed her a further two weeks, and although scheduled to return in convoy SC-68 she returned alone. A submarine was spotted on 3 February, but there was no contact. She unloaded her wheat at Waterford on 2 March and sailed again for a further cargo from Saint John. During the war she completed 18 such voyages.

Encounter with U-753

On the morning of 16 March 1942, U-753 sighted a lone ship (Irish Willow) south-west of the Rockall Bank and prepared to sink her, until her neutral markings (the Irish tricolour and the word EIRE) were seen. At 2 pm U-753 surfaced and signalled “send master and ship’s papers”. As Captain Shanks had been born in Belfast and could be regarded as British, sending him was considered unwise; Chief Officer Henry Cullen went instead, with four crew as oarsmen.

In the conning tower Cullen explained that his captain was too elderly for the small boat. He spoke about Ireland’s neutrality, reminded the Germans that the next day was Saint Patrick’s Day, and sensed he was making progress when tumblers of schnapps were produced in the saint’s honour. But then the Germans, who seemed apologetic, said they were awaiting instructions on whether or not to sink the ship; they would, however, fire a red flare five minutes beforehand if they were to do so. Cullen and the oarsmen returned to their ship with a bottle of cognac “for the crew”. After an anxious wait, the U-boat fired a green flare.

Rescuing the crew of Empire Breeze

Convoy ON-122 left Liverpool on 15 August 1942. Ten days later, in the mid-Atlantic, it was attacked by Wolfpack Lohs and four ships were torpedoed and sunk. The convoy retreated into a fogbank, with visibility under 300 metres, which probably saved it from further loss. The fog continued to thicken.

U-176 had hit the 7,457-ton Empire Breeze with two torpedoes. An SOS was transmitted and acknowledged, and the 47 surviving crew abandoned ship in three lifeboats; a fourth lifeboat was destroyed during launch, and one crewman died. Empire Breeze remained afloat. The rescue ship Stockport was detailed to pick the crew up but failed to find them in the fog and left to rejoin the convoy, while Irish Willow, 45 nautical miles to the west, was too far away to help. Twenty-four hours after the attack the crew were still in their lifeboats.

Repeated SOS messages from a portable transmitter carried in one of the lifeboats went unacknowledged. Since Empire Breeze was still afloat, Captain Thomson and some of the crew re-boarded her and the cook prepared hot meals. Joseph Brown, one of the ship’s three radio officers, connected the portable set to the ship’s aerial and rebroadcast the SOS, which was heard and acknowledged by Belle Isle radio station in Canada. The rescue tug HMS Frisky and the corvette HMCS Rosthern were sent to rescue the crew and, if possible, salvage Empire Breeze, but found neither her nor the survivors.

A serious problem was that days of fog had prevented astronomical observations, so no ship in the area knew its exact position. Accounts differ on the location: the convoy report gives 58°56′30″N 25°17′30″W, while the log of Irish Willow, quoted in Frank Forde’s book, gives 59°22′N 25°52′W.

Thirty-six hours after the attack the survivors sent another SOS. Irish Willow heard it and headed for the scene, asking how long they could hold out. Captain Thomson estimated six hours; Captain Shanks replied “Coming to you – with you in about five hours”. The fog became denser still, until visibility was zero. Rather than plotting positions by dead reckoning, Irish Willow steered towards the SOS signal using her direction-finding equipment. It was dangerous work: she knew the direction to take but not the distance, and in fog she could collide with Empire Breeze or endanger survivors in the water. Extra look-outs were posted along her bow and whistles were sounded every two minutes. The repeating SOS messages could also attract U-boats seeking to “finish the job”, and a U-boat finding Irish Willow at the scene might take a very different attitude to that encountered on 16 March.

In dense fog the survivors were located and rescued, and Irish Willow resumed her voyage to Waterford. As she rounded Hook Lighthouse she was met by the RNLI lifeboat Annie Blanche Smith from Dunmore East, carrying an advance party of doctors and Red Cross volunteers. The Dunmore East Parish Hall had been converted into a reception centre, where hot meals, medical facilities and a full team of Red Cross volunteers from Waterford awaited the survivors. They were landed at Dunmore East while Irish Willow continued to Waterford; two were taken by ambulance to Waterford Infirmary with fever.

On 4 September 1942 the Munster Express published an interview with Captain Thomson: “We are very pleased to land in Eire, and we certainly could not have found a better landing”.

Post war service

In May 1946 Irish Willow was returned to Egon Jurgenson, then sold to Cia. de Vapores Veraguas and renamed Veraguas under the Panamanian registry. She traded for a further 14 years before being scrapped at Tamise, Belgium in July 1960, at the end of a 42-year career.

Legacy

Irish Willow rescued the 47 survivors of Empire Breeze. Throughout the war, Irish ships answered SOS calls and stopped to rescue survivors irrespective of nationality, frequently, as in this instance, at risk to themselves. Ships in convoy were usually forbidden to stop, lest they become targets themselves: the Empire Breeze crew were in their lifeboats when Athelprince, with the convoy commodore aboard, altered course to avoid the abandoned ship but did not stop to rescue them. Irish ships rescued at least 534 seafarers during the war.

Before the war Irish Shipping Ltd did not exist, and the 15 ships it would operate sailed under other flags. During the war they imported more than a million tons of essential supplies: 712,000 tons of wheat; 178,000 tons of coal; 63,000 tons of phosphate (fertiliser); 24,000 tons of tobacco; 19,000 tons of newsprint; 10,000 tons of lumber; and over 100,000 tons of more than 500 other types of goods, in addition to the imports carried by other Irish ships.

On 16 May 1945, a week after VE Day, Éamon de Valera addressed the nation:

“To the men of our Mercantile Marine who faced all the perils of the ocean to bring us essential supplies, the nation is profoundly grateful.”

- Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Éamon de Valera, radio speech to the nation 16 May 1945

In June 1946 a contract was signed with John Redhead and Sons, shipbuilders of South Shields to construct a new Irish Willow.