SS Cap Finisterre

Cap Finisterre depicted over Elbe tunnel
History
Name: SS Cap Finisterre
Builder: Blohm & Voss, Hamburg (Germany)
Launched: 8 August 1911
Fate: War loss; torpedoed 8 May 1942
General characteristics
Tonnage: 14,503 gross tons (GRT)
Length: 180 m (590 ft)
Beam: 19.8 m (65 ft)

The steam ship Cap Finisterre was a German transatlantic ocean liner of the early 20th century.

Career

She was built in Hamburg by Blohm & Voss for the Hamburg-South America Line. She was completed in 1911 and named for Cape Finisterre in western Spain. Cap Finisterre made her maiden voyage from Hamburg to Buenos Aires in November 1911 and served on routes to South America until the outbreak of World War I.

In the event of war Cap Finisterre was ear-marked by the Imperial German Navy for conversion as an auxiliary cruiser, and the outbreak of war in August 1914 found her at Hamburg.[1] However she was not requisitioned for service and remained at Hamburg for the duration of the war due to the Allied blockade.

At the end of World War I Cap Finisterre was seized by the Allies as war reparations and after service as a troop transport, was transferred in 1921 to Japan’s Toyo Kisen Line. As Taiyo Maru, she served on the Yokohama to San Francisco route. With the outbreak of World War II she was in service as a transport with the Japanese military, when, on 8 May 1942, she was torpedoed and sunk off Nagasaki by US submarine Grenadier.
The Taiyo Maru, was carrying 1,044 passengers, including 700 persons belonging to the Mitsui industrial organisation who were to undertake the industrial reorganisation of the countries of S.E. Asia seized by Japan. A total of 817 persons were killed. [2]

The famous engineer Yoichi Hatta, who built Wushantou Dam and Chianan Irrigation, was a passenger of the ship when it sank. His body was found in Hagi, Yamaguchi and, after cremation, his ashes were returned to Taiwan.

Notes

  1. ↑ Schmalenbach p46
  2. ↑ "Taiyo Maru (+1942)". Wrecksite. Retrieved 2016-09-18.

References

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