Aviemore

The steamship Aviemore.

The steamship Aviemore.

Masters: June 1936 Alfred Thomas Church: 1939 Morton Forsythe.

On a voyage from Swansea for Montevideo & Buenos Aires with a cargo of tinplate & black sheets & a crew of 34 as Aviemore crossed in front of convoy OB-4 she was torpedoed by German submarine (U-31 Johannes Habekost) & sank 220 miles SW of Cape Clear in 49.11N/13.38W on 16 September 1939. She was the first ship to be sunk in World War 11 in an attack on a convoy. 11 survivors were picked up by HMS Warwick & landed at Liverpool. 23 lives lost including master.

Lives lost September 1939: Anderson, Charles Bernard, chief engineer, 58, Harrogate, Yorkshire; Blake, Alfred Herbert, boiler attendant, 37, Fforestfach, Swansea; Cardos, Augustus, donkeyman, 41; Cody, John, boiler attendant, 26; Cooke, Harold Victor, 3^rd engineer, 43; Ferguson, Duncan, able seaman, 56; Forsythe, Morton, master, 50; Jones, Edward Herbert, chief officer, 44, Crosby, Liverpool; Lynch, John Joseph, able seaman, 56 (son of John & Alice); McLuckie, John, sailor, 40; Morrison, Samuel Kirk, 2^nd engineer, 53; Nugent, Michael L, 4^th engineer, 47; Pilder, Johan, boatswain, 58; Pisani, Giuseppe, boiler attendant, 35; Rainbow, John William Max, steward, 23, Brussels, Belgium; Rees, Iorwerth, ordinary seaman, 17, Treboeth, Swansea; Rochfort, Maxwell Francis, sailor, 20, Palmyra, Western Australia; Shorland, William, donkeyman, 48, Bristol; Swain, George Wilson Paul, able seaman, 48, Grangetown, Cardiff; Tait, Henry Dale, cadet, 17, Hedon, Yorkshire; Wallace, James Douglas, donkeyman, 59, Antwerp, Belgium; Vickery, William Stanley, ordinary seaman, 17, Swansea.