"The Story of “Grey Ghost”, the Largest and Fastest..." Topic

…Troopship of World War II

"Construction of "Hull Number 534", as it was called when commenced, started in 1930. John Brown & Company in Clydebank, Scotland, built it for Anglo-American cruise line Cunard. This ship aimed to compete with German superliners "Bremen" and "Europa", that were already in service at this time, and to get ahead the construction of "Oceanic" by White Star Line that started two years before "Hull Number 534".

King George V chose the name Queen Mary for the ship in honor of his wife. Her first maiden voyage happened on May 27, 1936 when she reached the speed of 33 kn (61 km/h; 38 mph). It was a large 81,237-ton liner, 1,019.4 ft (310.7 m) in length and 118 ft (36.0 m) in width. Wider than Panama Channel, she had to go around South America and Cape Horn when sailed on her last trip from Southampton to the port of Long Beach, California…"

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Amicalement
Armand

I would query the epithet of "largest". The other Cunard liner Queen Elizabeth was both slightly longer and had a slightly greater grt. However, I do certainly agree she was the fastest. She captured the "Blue Riband of the Atlantic" from the French Normandie in 1936, and amazingly seemed to get faster as she grew older.

The stories of both the Queens is a fascinating one, both of their days on the trans-Atlantic service and the wartime years as large, fast transports. They were the only ships capable of transporting an entire Division of troops at a time. The organisation required to feed over 10,000 men while transporting them at speeds of 30kts or more is staggering.

Thanks!.

Amicalement
Armand

These fast liners also typically sailed alone w/o A/S escort. Their speed was such that there was simply not enough time after initial sighting for a U-Boat to get into an intercept position and set up a firing solution for a proper attack (unless the submarine had the extremely unlikely good fortune to find itself directly in the liner's path).

The rule of thumb was that any ship capable of a cruising speed of 15 knots or more was typically routed for independent sailing. It was statistically more vulnerable if forced to maintain a convoy speed.

Interesting factoid.

B

An indication of the speed of the Queens is that when Queen Mary ran down HMS Curacao the latter's speed of advance in a straight line was less than QM's while zig-zagging. Hence the board of enquiry had two conflicting rights-of-way to consider. a) Overtaking vessel keeps clear, b) Escort keeps clear of the escorted. I think the speeds were QM 26.5 kts, Curacao 25 kts.