WW1 Russian Convoys

[johnvoe]

Looking for any information on merchant ships routing to/from the White Sea area during WW1 - list of names, dates, convoy numbers etc. I have just finished transferring written records for the port of Lerwick, Shetland onto computer for the period August 1914 until December 1917 and am now trying to match arrivals up to convoys or establish where a number of vessels sailed to - in particular any to/from Russia. Sail dates and destinations were more than often not noted in the port records. Would really like to find anyone with a particular interest in this area who might be able to help me fill in some of the blanks in my records as regards ships heading for or arriving from Archangel, Murmansk and White Sea area that routed through Lerwick, Shetland during WW1.

On a separate matter I would also like to find out a little more about the merchant ship Tobol (ex Sunderland 1901) as regards voyages to/from Archangel. She was sunk by uboat off Scotland 11 Sept 1917 whilst in convoy to Archangel via Lerwick. Any records of previous voyages would be most welcome as would any photographs of her.

Many thanks

John

[Arthur]

Hi John!

 

Information taken from The Ship List and the Dictionary of Disasters at Sea During the Age of Steam 1824-1962.

 

Tobol 1901 ex- Cheltenham, 1904 captured by Russian warships renamed Tobol for Imperial Russian Navy, 1916 transferred to Russian Volunteer Fleet Association, 1917 torpedoed and sunk by U.52 off Duncansby Head, Scotland. Built W. Doxford & Sons 3,741 tons 342.2 X 46.6 X 24.9 301 n.h.p. Triple-expansion engines.

 

Regards

Arthur

[johnvoe]

Thanks Arthur, much appreciated!

 

John

[Arthur]

Hello John 

 

Check this site out it might be of help!

 

http://uboat.net/wwi/ships_hit/6038.html

 

Regards

Arthur

[johnvoe]

Thanks once again Arthur, I've already checked out the excellent Uboat.net site along with a few others but without any success sadly. Was hoping that I'd find someone on here with a particular interest in the movements of merchant ships that sailed between the UK and Russia during WW1 -  early days yet though!

 

Brgds/John

[Felix C]

Find the convoy prefix and the National Archives should have a separate folder. As in the Lerwick Bergen route has its own. 

[wallace2]

Johnvoe,  

 

Do yopu have anything in your Lerwick records about the whaler SS Active (Dundee)?  She was lost on passage from Dundee to Russia, probably 25 December 1915 and foundered bewtween Orkney and Shetland with all hands.  I have seen a report in the Shetland Times in 200? about a letter recovered from a body/bottle and two of the crew are buried in the Orkneys.  In particular any details of cargo.  

 

Regards! 

[johnvoe]

Hi Wallace2,  

Quick check of the records for Lerwick WW1 era unfortunately only has a fishing vessel named Active making a call - Peterhead registered PD361 Active. I don't recall seeing the article in the Shetland Times but if you can narrow it down to a specific year I can try and find it and send a copy if required. 

John

[johnvoe]

Hi Felix C

 

Thanks for your suggestion however my problem is that I'm not sure if there actually were convoys to Russia or was it simply ships sailing independently or a few ships together with no escorts. There was certainly vessels sailing to and arriving from Russian ports according to our records although port of destination or arrival from were not always noted unfortunately. Was hoping to find someone online who might have researched the subject and be able to give me a few pointers which would allow me to check out TNA if there were indeed convoys. By 1917 it's possible that some ships bound for Russia were part of the Lerwick - Bergen convoys but prior to this what happened? I did read somewhere previously, when looking for something else, of several Russian bound vessels being escorted from Lerwick to a position approx 60 miles north of Muckle Flugga (top part of the Shetland Islands) before being left to continue on their own. Sadly I didn't note it down at the time to check if anything else was mentioned. But perhaps this didn't constitute a convoy?! Many questions still unanswered!

John

[johnvoe]

Hi Wallace 2, I think this is the article you are referring to

 

06/12/2009 , by Shetland Times, in Features, Shetland Life

Drewie Laurenson recounts the story of his great uncle, James Scott Jamieson, who lost his life in the sinking of the Active, 94 years ago. 

Some readers of this magazine may recall the article written by James Irvine entitled “Last Voyage of the Active” in Issue No. 312 (October 2006).

I, along with my sisters, May Anderson, Lerwick and Nessie Taylor, Tain, Ross-shire are the only surviving relatives of the late James Scott Jamieson, who lost his life through the sinking of HMW Active on 25th December 1915. Jamie Scott, as he was known to his family, was an uncle to my mother, the late Margaret C. Laurenson, and a brother to Andrew Jamieson (my grandfather), after whom I am named.

I hold the letter which Jamie Scott wrote whilst the ship was sinking and for those who may not have read it already, or even heard of the incident for that matter, I will reproduce it here:
“Dear Family, this will be my last letter to you. We are sinking to the North and East of Lerwick. God bless you all as he has given me strength to die, my soul is resting on the finished work of Jesus. A navy boat passed us and we told him we were sinking. I have been under the boat all night trying to get the water out . . . filled . . . (blanks illegible). The water is at my knees on the cabin floor. Don’t mourn for me, meet me in heaven, Mother, Father, Agnes, Andrew, Ann, Margaret, Coventry. Again God bless you all. I leave everything among you. Ta ta.  James S. Jamieson.”

What courage it must have taken to have the presence of mind to sit down and write such a poignant letter to his family in the face of what was inevitable. It was thought that the letter had been put in a bottle and thrown overboard, but some think it was in his pocket when he was found off the coast of Orkney. However, it eventually ended up in the hands of the Jamieson family, where it belonged.

Jamie Scott was a second officer on the HMW Active. The Orcadian, in its issue of 16th January, 2003, carried an article entitled “Tragic truth of a wartime wreck”, which told the story of the loss of the Active. It was stated that the body of Jamie Scott Jamieson, along with another crew member by the name of Peter Brymer, were washed ashore on Rousay in Orkney just after Christmas, 1915. It further stated that “those two bodies now lie in a small graveyard in Rousay where two tall stones mark their graves”.

I have been a seaman myself, having followed in the footsteps of my father, the late Magnus Thomson Laurenson, who also tragically lost his life at sea during World War II,  leaving my mother to care for my two sisters and myself, all under the age of three. Over the years I have had a desire to find out more about where my grand-uncle was buried and to visit his grave some day (unfortunately, due to Dad’s ship being torpedoed in the Atlantic Ocean, he was not afforded a resting place where we can visit).

Earlier this year my wife Elizabeth contacted Sheena Marwick, the registrar in Rousay, to make some enquiries, and we were told that he was buried in the Glebe Churchyard on Rousay. We were then able to print off a list from the internet that gave the names of all those buried there and the inscription on the tombstones. It stated that Jamie Scott’s inscription read “In loving memory of James Scott Jamieson who was drowned through the foundering of the S.S. Active on 25 December, 1915 aged 37. Son of Andrew Jamieson, Longhill, Sandwick, Shetland”.

Our son Scott Magnus Laurenson (who is named after his great-grand-uncle Jamie Scott, his late grandfather, Magnus T. Laurenson and Elizabeth’s brother, his uncle Magnus) and who now lives in New Zealand, was also very interested in finding out more. We did some further research and also bought a book entitled The Dundee Whalers, where there is also a mention of the Active.

Having thought about it long enough, Elizabeth and I decided to make the trip to Rousay, Orkney, in July this year to visit the grave of Jamie Scott. We were given directions to the graveyard by Sheena Marwick, who, unfortunately, we didn’t get an opportunity to meet.

We found the graveyard, which was a short walk from the road, down through a field and beside the sea. This graveyard is of course no longer in use and hasn’t been for many years. The entrance had been closed off and the graves were surrounded by a solid wall, where steps up one side and down the other had been put in. We climbed over the wall and anxiously read all the tombstones, soon falling on that of Jamie Scott.

It was indeed a tall tombstone, with the inscription barely readable, and standing right next to that of Peter Brymen. It was a wonderful experience – if that’s the correct thing to say. Although obviously we never knew him it felt as though we had done the right thing.

The tombstone was showing its age and was covered in green moss, which we scraped off as best we could until we could read the entire inscription and take some photographs. I have to admit it was quite an emotional time, just to stand there and think about how such a young man had lost his life so tragically and how he could have had the presence of mind to sit and write a letter to his family. What courage.   We stood there at the grave for a while in the quietness of a beautiful day with our thoughts.

Before leaving we laid some flowers in remembrance of someone I never knew, but whom I felt was close to my heart that day. It was quite special.
Elizabeth took some photographs of that special day, and we have no doubt that this is something that our son Scott will hold onto for the future.

 

 

Edited 25 September , 2016 by johnvoe

[dougmcco]

Johnvoe

 

I too am looking for information about the Tobol (11th September 1917 Duncansby Head).

 

My Grandfather Jacob Vishivanoff was Chief Engineer when she was torpedoed by U52. My main objective is to try to trace his movements from her sinking until he reached Vladivostok - probably sometime in 1918.

 

As a senior officer in Dobrovolny Flot he had been transferred from Odessa to Vladivostok but was obviously helping with the Russian war effort during WW1. I know that by 1923 he had become chieh engineer on another ship (SS Simbirsk) working out of Vladivostok or Nagasaki. With his wife (My Grandmother Ekaterina and my mother Zinayida) he moved to living in and working out of Shanghai in 1923. In 1924/25 he took the Simbirsk to Hong Kong as part of the British - Soviet agreement to hand over the remains of the Dobroflot to the Soviets.

 

At this stage I am getting a bit long in the tooth and my main concern is to apply to the MOD for the British War Medal and Mercantile Marine War medal on his behalf.

 

Jacob died in Shanghai in 1938 and my Grandmother went on to marry another WW1 Russian Veteran (Alex Shimordoff) and he has ample decoration for his efforts (Russian Western Front followed by massive treck to Vladivostok, via the ice crossing og Lake Baikal). I have a reasonable history of Alex but very little of Jacob and I would like to try to rectify this in my remaining years

[dougmcco]

Further to my last post, I would like to say that my sister (85 years old and still going) went to Lerwick to she if she could find anything more about the crew of the Tobol but unfortunately she drew a blank. I can only assume that because of the timing there would have been a mad dash to get back to Russia because of the imminence of the revolution, and that most of the crew of the Tobol would have hitched a lift to Archangel and take their chances of getting back to their families / loved ones.

 

As far as I know the Czech Army was blockading the trans-Siberian Railway and part of the missing history is how my Grandfather got to Vladivostok.

[Hyacinth1326]

According to the Admiralty Technical History, sailings to the White Sea and Russia from Britain were subject to limited convoy from June 1917.

 

On June 5  five British trawlers from Kola Inlet escorted a clutch of vessels as far as  Iokanski, half‑way between Murmansk and Archangel. At the beginning of July ships from Britain were directed straight from the Arctic into Iokanski, and thence despatched in convoys to Archangel. As the Kerensky government gradually lost control to the Bolsheviks, so Russian distribution tailed off.  Convoy operations ended in December 1917. Source Newbolt Vol 5

 

Some vessels may have sailed independently but a great many would have utilized the the 'OZ' convoy system, sailing for Bergen from Methil in Fife, hugging the Norwegian coast until they reached the Arctic circle.  Lerwick was abandoned as a convoy clearing station in favour of Methil by late 1917.  Source Admiralty Technical History: Convoy

Edited 18 September , 2020 by Hyacinth1326

[KizmeRD]

On 09/09/2020 at 23:07, dougmcco said:

At this stage I am getting a bit long in the tooth and my main concern is to apply to the MOD for the British War Medal and Mercantile Marine War medal on his behalf.

You may find it difficult to obtain the British medals, as he was a foreign national serving on a Russian registered ship.

[wrightdw]

SS Stephen, SS Czar and SS Czaritza all made regular trips back and forth from UK to Arkhangelsk (Archangel) during the period of British military intervention in North Russia August 1918 to September 1919.

[dougmcco]

re KizmeRD 14/09/20

You are absolutely correct about the difficulty. I applied to the MOD not realising that the MOD only awarded medals based on military service. They however passed me on to the Seafarers' Registry. Very promptly they replied that had ceased awarding WW1 medals in 1980. I had also asked if there was any further info about the Tobol and its crew - the reply was they had transferred all their records to The National Archives at Kew. My sister had gone there a few years ago to try to find any records but without success. She had previous lived in Lerwick in the 1970's when we had no idea about our grandfather's sinking. She therefore went again to Lerwick to find out if there was any more information. The Shetland Times Office gave her some information of the crew members from the Tobol arriving there after the sinkink. There was also heresay information about the Tobol passing Lerwick "several" times from 1915. Unfortunately because the convoys did not come into force until later 1917, I am not sure that a Russian ship with a Russian Crew would have been noteworthy.

Since the Tobol was registered as being part of the Dobroflot Fleet, I have since tried to find out more from ru.wiki and essentially the Tobol was only handed over to Dobroflot for its use in the Artic Supply voyages - since its capture (as the Cheltenham) it was retained as part of the Russian Arctic Fleet based in Vladivostok where my Grandfather had been post by Dobroflot in 1913?? (guess because my mother was born there in 1915.

 

[Guest]

My grandfather was a crewman on SS Ivanhoe which was sunk on October 31, 1916 off Vardo Norway while transiting from Archangel back to England. In his recounting of the incident, he said that In September 1916, eighteen ships carrying food products left England bound for Archangel, Russia. Only two arrived at the destination, the others were sunk." Ivanhoe then had to leave Archangel before being fully reloaded due to fear that the harbor would be frozen and they would be stuck for the winter.  It was on the return voyage that she was sunk. Does anyone know if his journey to Archangel  would have been an "official" convoy and where might I find more information on this incident?

 

[seaJane]

The only thing I can find is a Norwegian vessel of that name sunk on November 1 (an easy confusion for a night sinking). 

https://uboat.net/wwi/ships_hit/3084.html

There were 6 ships sunk on Nov 1 

https://uboat.net/wwi/ships_hit/losses_year.html?date=1916-11

and several on October 31 including 2 other Norwegian vessels

https://uboat.net/wwi/ships_hit/losses_year.html?date=1916-10

but I haven't investigated whether they were part of a convoy.

[KizmeRD]

SM U-56 was out on patrol off the North Cape at the time and was able to sink a total of 5 cargo ships in 10 days (including S.S. Ivanhoe).

Rumours of mass sinkings became commonplace after Jutland, however there were no (WW2 style) U-boat wolfpacks capable of amassing 18 kills from a single convoy - or hunting groups of hostile surface warships operating in this area. 
Mines of course remained an ever present threat (especially for vessels hugging the coast) and sometimes the War Channels (authorised routes kept open by minesweepers) were closed whilst trawlers got to work on clearing reported dangers. This could then result in accumulations of merchant ships being provided with a lead-through of the freshly swept channel - but that’s not the same thing as a protected convoy for the entire voyage.

To the best of my knowledge, formal convoy arrangements were not implemented until the summer of 1917.

MB

PS For sake of clarification, the six casualties listed on U-boat.net for 1 November 1916 did not all occur in the Norwegian/Barents Sea area.
 

Edited 15 February , 2021 by KizmeRD