REBUILDING ITS FLEET after losses sustained during World War II, Clan Line produced an attractive family of steam turbine-driven cargo liners. Roy Fenton relates the story of these 13 ships and their fortunes in service.
The sadly-missed Clan Line built some of the finest cargo liners to sail under the Red Ensign. Not for nothing had the company's ships often been chosen for dangerous wartime assignments such as Malta convoys.
After World War II the company required a massive fleet rebuilding programme to replace war losses, although as stopgaps it bought many war-built steamers of the 'Ocean' type (see SM, April), and some 'Empires'. Orders for the first new ships, the Clan Maclaren class, were placed as early as November 1944. Orders comprised four diesel- and two turbine-driven ships, a mix reflecting the patchy availability of marine machinery at time. Turbine propulsion was evidently preferred, and figured in subsequent orders for the twin-screw Clan Mactaggart and Clan Mactavish. Turbine engined ships were slightly cheaper to build than motor ships and required less maintenance, although their poor fuel economy eventually told against them.
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| Clan Shaw (S.A. Seafarer) |
A significant internal difference from her predecessor was that Clan Shaw's machinery drove a single screw. Steam turbines built by Parsons Steam Turbine Co, Wallsend-on-Tyne produced 10,340 shaft horse power to give a respectable service speed of 17 knots, a performance which a single installation of a contemporary diesel engine could not match.
Clan Line had controlled the Greenock Dockyard Co Ltd since 1919, and for many years the yard had delivered all the Line's new ships plus a few for other owners. With its three berths, the yard could build four or five ships each year. In May 1949, whilst all the yard's three berths were occupied with the class, the Clan Line Board thought it detected a downturn in trade. It was also concerned about the rising price of ships; and indeed Clan Shaw was to cost £765,200 compared with the £678,000 each of her immediate predecessors.
Pacific Steam
As a result, two of the ships building or planned were sold to Pacific Steam Navigation Company. The next hull in line for completion, yard number 472, was delivered to Clan as Clan Sinclair. But yard numbers 473 and 474, scheduled for completion as Clan Skene and Clan Stewart, emerged as Kenuta and Flamenco for Pacific Steam in August and December 1950. A fifth hull (number 475) was delivered to Clan as Clan Sutherland in March 1951, but four tankers and a Clan Line motor ship were then built before the last of Clan Shaw's true sisters was delivered in February 1954, finally giving the fleet a Clan Stewart.
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| Pacific Steam's Kenuta on the Thames |
Whilst the Clan Shaw class was being built, Clan Line was also taking delivery of three Clan Macintosh class motor ships. Their diesel machinery was definitely the way ahead, but Clan Line still had room for more turbine steamers.
The design of Clan Shaw was adapted by rearranging the passenger accommodation so that the lounge and dining room were now on the same deck as the ten cabins. This meant that accommodation for the more lowly members of the crew was trunked around No.4 hatch, ensuring that sleep was disturbed whenever this hatch was being worked.
Other changes were upgrading the heavy-lift derrick from 65 to 80 tons, and replacing the stump mast aft of the superstructure with a pair of kingposts. The first of the modified design, Clan Robertson, was launched on 17 March 1954 and towed into the James Watt Dock at Greenock for fitting out, to the accompaniment of bagpipes. However, it was not until almost two years later, in January 1956, that Clan Ross, a sistership, followed.
Subgroup
There was to be a third member of this subgroup, recorded in Board minutes as Clan Rose, an odd name not previously used by Clan Line. However, the design and name were then amended to give one of the finest post-war British cargo liners, the 9,299gt Argyllshire.
Although owned initially by Clan Line, as her name suggests she was intended for the services of a subsidiary, Scottish Shire Line Ltd, which operated mainly refrigerated ships in the Europe to Australia trade. The hull was lengthened by 32ft to incorporate an extra hold right aft, and N 0.1 hold was trunked through the lengthened forecastle.
The result when Argyllshire emerged in October 1956 was a well-balanced profile, and if anything she was more handsome than the original Clan Shaw. Cargo gear was and 2 were served by a pair of kingposts and a bipod was substituted aft between holds No.4 and 5. Four of the six holds were insulated for carrying refrigerated meat, fruit and dairy produce, whilst the 'tween decks were designed for stowage of baled wool.
The twelve passengers carried made the ship's total complement a massive 113, the rest made up of 28 European officers and 73 crew drawn from the Indian subcontinent. A sister ship, Ayrshire was completed at Greenock in May 1957, completing the 'family' of thirteen ships more than seven years after Clan Shaw had entered service. Initially, Argyllshire and Ayrshire worked equally on the Australian services as well as Clan Line's routes to South and East Africa. But gradually the Australian homeward trade declined, as Britain aligned itself more with its European trading partners and Australia traded more with South East Asia. The reputation of the two Scottish Shires, arguable the finest ships Clan that ever built, has been sullied by the loss of Ayrshire.
Casualties
Two of the family became casualties whilst owned by companies closely associated with Clan Line, or part of the Clan-dominated British and Commonwealth Group, although fortunately there were no lives lost. Most poignant was the loss of Ayrshire , the flagship of the fleet. On 22 March 1965 she sailed from Aden for the Indian port of Cochin, where she was to change her Lascar crew before proceeding on her voyage to Brisbane, Gladstone and Sydney. Setting a direct course for Cochin, whilst passing the uninhabited island of Abd-al-Kuri at 17 knots, she hit a submerged object in what, according to her chart, was water at least 17 fathoms deep,which was confirmed by her echo sounder. 
On 1 November 1955 Clan Line merged with its erstwhile rival in the South African trade, Union-Castle Mail Steamship Co Ltd. The resulting British and Commonwealth Group acquired or set up subsidiaries trading mainly to South Africa, and henceforth ships were transferred amongst group companies seemingly at the whim of accountants.
Names did not always reflect ownership, as with the former Clan Stetoart and Clan Ross. Although this pair returned to The Clan Line Steamers Ltd in April 1962, they were given the Union-Castle names Kinpurnie Castle and Kinnaird Castle, and Union-Castle funnel colours. Atgyllshire and Ayrshire, prior to the latter's loss, were transferred to Scottish Shire Line in the autumn of 1960, with no change to either vessel's colour scheme or trading pattern.
Clan Line's Board minutes give no reason why ships of the Clan Shaw type were singled out for transfer when older ships remained on Clan services throughout their careers. It could have been some peculiarity of their design which suited them to South African routes, or perhaps it was their turbine machinery, trouble-free if well-maintained, but increasingly expensive to operate as oil fuel prices rose.
This may well explain why only three of Clan's six surviving ships found other buyers. In stark contrast to the Clan ships, all five of the Pacific Steam vessels remained with this owner until their sale for scrap or further trading in the late 1960s or early 1970s.
First to go was Flamenco, sold in 1966 to an Indonesian company who renamed her Pacific Abeto for use in the pilgrim trade. She carried a massive total of 1,550 passengers, mainly in basic accommodation fitted in her 'tween decks, but also in deckhouses extended aft from the superstructure and trunked around number four hatch, exactly as with Clan Robertson.
From the few photographs known of Pacific Abeto, she looked to be well kept and was probably well maintained, as she remained in service until 1976, although not scrapped until 1981. Of the other Pacific Steam ships, one was broken up at Antwerp in 1971, whilst the other three were sold in 1972 to tile Greek Gourdomichalis group, who gave them names beginning Kavo -. Heavy lifter
Only Clan Sutherland of tile original group of seven ships carried her name throughout her career with what became the British and Commonwealth Group. Her saving feature was the 165-ton derrick fitted to her foremast by Greenock Dockyard in the autumn of 1960. As well as the massive derrick, the alteration required a new foremast with heavy stays and winches and strengthening of the surrounding deck. But the investment paid off in terms of her capability of carrying massive pieces of heavy equipment to and from ports without major craneage. It is said that the freight on one such item could virtually cover the costs of an entire voyage from Europe to Australia.
Clan Sutherland appears to have had a posthumous career, as she was definitely reported to have been sold by Clan Line to breakers in Kaohsiung in November 1971, at which point she was deleted from 'Lloyd's Register'. However, eight years later she was photographed in Chinese waters as Zhe Hai 3, readily identifiable as tile former Clan Sutherland from the massive stays for her replacement foremast.
Her fate is not known, and with the former Flamenco she vies for the title of last survivor of the family of thirteen steamers which, with heir distinctive profiles, were a memorable part of the post-war British cargo liner fleet. Thanks to "Ships Monthly" magazine Sept 2010
©Kelsey Publishing Ltd
