Enemy Ships Seized by the United States WW1

Discussion in 'World War 1' started by liverpool annie, May 24, 2009.

  1. liverpool annie

    liverpool annie New Member

    I'm not sure whether to put this under Naval or POW's but I'm sure somebody will tell me !! :)

    http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-civil/civsh-p/prinz-ef.htm

    DEPARTMENT OF THE NAVY -- NAVAL HISTORICAL CENTER
    805 KIDDER BREESE SE -- WASHINGTON NAVY YARD
    WASHINGTON DC 20374-5060

    Prinz Eitel Friedrich (German Passenger Liner, 1904).
    Later German Auxiliary Cruiser Prinz Eitel Friedrich, USS DeKalb (ID # 3010) and Commercial Steamer DeKalb and Mount Clay

    Prinz Eitel Friedrich, a 8797 gross ton passenger liner, was launched at Stettin, Germany, in 1904.

    She spent nearly a decade in commercial service under the flag of North German Lloyd. When the First World War broke out in August 1914 Prinz Eitel Friedrich was at Tsingtau, China, where she was quickly converted to an auxiliary cruiser for the German Navy. For the next seven months the ship operated on the high seas with Vice Admiral von Spee's squadron and as a detached commerce raider. Among her victims while in the latter role was the schooner William P. Frye, captured on 27 January 1915 and scuttled the next day, the first U.S. flag vessel sunk in World War I.

    On 10 March 1915 Prinz Eitel Friedrich, now low on supplies and burdened by many prisoners, arrived at Newport News, Virginia, where she was interned. Later taken to the Philadelphia Navy Yard, she remained under the German flag until seized by the United States in April 1917. She served from May 1917 to September 1919 as USS DeKalb, then returned to civilian control, initially as DeKalb and, after 1920, as Mount Clay. After briefly operating for the United American Lines during the first half of the 1920s, the ship was laid up. She was scrapped in 1934.

    http://www.deutsche-schutzgebiete.de/prinz_eitel_friedrich.htm

    Prinz Eitel Friedrich von Preu
     
  2. cally

    cally New Member

    Annie these were just two of the ships interned or seized by America during the First World War.

    The U.S. Government seized 109 German ships which had been interned in American ports. The Germans had attempted to damage these ships so that they would be useless, but they were all repaired, and many of them carried American troops and supplies in great quantities to France...

    Some of the most famous taken were the Hamburg-Amerika Lines brand new 54,000-tonner Vaterland, which was interned in New York. But also two ships of the Norddeutscher Lloyd express quartet soon found themselves in foreign hands. The Kronprinzessin Cecilie was interned in the port of Boston after a dramatic game of hide-and-seek on the North Atlantic, and the Kaiser Wilhelm II was retained at her NDL pier in Hoboken, New Jersey.
     

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  3. liverpool annie

    liverpool annie New Member

  4. Adrian Roberts

    Adrian Roberts Active Member

    Vaterland became the United States Lines Leviathan after the war.

    She and her sister Imperator were the largest ships in the world at the time - 8000 gross tons larger than the Titanic/Olympic/Britannnic. Imperator was handed to the UK as war reparations in 1919 and became Cunard's Berengaria - allegedly a replacement for Lusitania. An even larger German liner, Bismarck, not completed until 1919, became the White Star Line's Majestic - allegedly as a replacement for Britannic.
     
  5. cally

    cally New Member

    An interesting picture annie. In addition a 1919 picture showing both Imperator and Leviathan along with a postcard of Majestic and an excellent photograph of Imperator taken in 1913.
     

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