SS Rotterdam (1908) — BrandWiki

SS Rotterdam (1908)

Overview

Rotterdam

country	Netherlands
namesake	Rotterdam
owner	NASM
operator	Holland America Line
registry	Rotterdam
route	Rotterdam – Hoboken
builder	Harland & Wolff, Belfast
yard number	390
laid down	6 November 1906
launched	3 March 1908
completed	6 June 1908
maiden voyage	13 June 1908
refit	1926, 1936, 1937
identification	code letters PRMN by 1913: call sign MHR 1914: call sign PEA by 1934: call sign PHEG
fate	Scrapped in 1940

SS Rotterdam was a steam ocean liner that was launched and completed in Ireland in 1908, and scrapped in the Netherlands in 1940. Holland America Line (HAL) owned and operated her throughout her career. She was the fourth of seven HAL ships to have been named after the Dutch city of Rotterdam. Until SS Statendam (1924) entered service in 1929, Rotterdam was the largest and swiftest ship in the company's fleet, and was the company's flagship.

Background

In the 1900s HAL increased the size of its largest transatlantic passenger liners. Between 1899 and 1902 it introduced three sister ships of about each, two of which were built by Harland & Wolff in Belfast. Then in 1906 Harland & Wolff completed SS Nieuw Amsterdam (1905), a new HAL flagship of almost. Nieuw Amsterdam was also HAL's first ship with quadruple expansion engines, and at 16 kn she was about 1 kn swifter than HAL's three liners.

HAL then ordered an even larger ship from Harland & Wolff. Early in 1906 HAL had sold its previous Rotterdam

Description

Hull

Rotterdam's registered length was 650.5 ft, her beam was 77.4 ft and her depth was 43.5 ft. Her tonnages were, and .[4] Her displacement was 36,870 tons at 35 ft draught.[9] The hull was divided into watertight compartments by 13 transverse bulkheads and one bulkhead along the centre line of the ship. The bottom of the hull was double.[10] She had bilge keels.

Propulsion

Rotterdam had eight double-ended and two single-ended boilers, heated by a total of 54 corrugated furnaces. They supplied steam at 215 psi to twin quadruple expansion steam engines, each of which had a 60 in stroke and cylinders of 33 in, 47 in, 68 in and 97+1/2 in bore. The engines drove twin screws. The combined power of the twin engines was rated at 2,451 NHP or 15,000 ihp.[4] Rotterdam was designed to cruise at 16+1/2 kn,[9] and comfortably maintained 17 knots.[3] She had two funnels and two masts, whereas Nieuw Amsterdam had one funnel and four masts.

Accommodation

Rotterdam had berths for 3,340 passengers: 525 in first class, 515 in second class and 2,400 in third class.

The first class dining saloon was 28 by and could seat about 500 diners. Its floor was covered in rubber. The lounge was 16 by and was finished with dark Spanish mahogany. It had a piano and an organ. The large lobby was finished in cream lacquered wood and had wide stairs with gilded wrought iron ornamentation and a copper handrail. It led to a palm court of 14 by, which was finished in cream lacquered wood in Louis XVI style. Its sides contained Delftware tile tableaux. In the center a large cupola with stained glass windows shed light on the garden and stairs. The library measured 10.5 by and was decorated in Louis XVI style in Italian juglans wood. The upper and lower smoking saloons measured 18 by and 9 by.[9]

There were 265 first class cabins, including 48 single person luxury cabins, and 12 state room suites with their own dayroom. There were about 100 first class bathrooms. The wide stairs gave access to the first class promenade decks. There were upper and lower promenade decks and a boat deck, totaling 28255 sqft. Parts of Rotterdam's promenade decks had glass covers that could be brought up against the sea spray. At the time this was a unique innovation among transatlantic liners.[9]

Cargo

Rotterdam's holds had capacity for 620000 cuft of grain or 570000 cuft of baled cargo.[4] This was slightly less than Nieuw Amsterdam,[11] although Rotterdam was a far bigger ship.

Crew

Rotterdam had a crew of 472: 51 on deck, 119 in her engine room and stokehold, and 302 serving the passenger. The Purser had an Assistant Purser and five stewards. There were 126 waiters in first class, 55 in second class and 31 in third class. There were 44 cooks and 15 linen maids.[10] The ship had three electric dishwashers: one with capacity for 4,000 pieces an hour, and two with capacity for 400 pieces an hour. There were also machines to peel potatoes and polish kinves.[12]

Between the wars

After the Armistice of 11 November 1918, Rotterdam was dry docked in Glasgow, as the Netherlands had no dry dock big enough for her.[26] On 24 January she left Rotterdam for Hoboken carrying fewer than 100 passengers, but in Brest, France she embarked many US troops. She continued to repatriate US troops for some months, and on 24 January 1919 she resumed civilian service between Rotterdam and Hoboken. In 1920 she was converted from coal to oil fuel.[27]

At the beginning of April 1921, a delegation of the World Zionist Organization sailed from Rotterdam to Hoboken aboard Rotterdam. They included Albert Einstein, Ben-Zion Mossinson, Menachem Ussishkin and Chaim Weizmann. Also in April 1921, Rotterdam became the first ship to use the new 46,000-ton dry dock at Wilton's Dok- en Werf Maatschappij in Schiedam.

In the 1920s Rotterdam resumed winter cruises from Hoboken to the Mediterranean, including in 1923, February 1924,[28] and February 1925.[29] In 1929 she was refitted as a two-class ship, with berths for 517 first class and 1,130 tourist class passengers.[4]

The Great Depression that began in 1929 brought a global slump in commercial shipping. On 24 December 1930, NASM revised its fares for 1931. Fares were seasonal, and until 1930 the company had divided them into summer, winter, and intermediate. For 1931, NASM abolished the intermediate seasons, simplified the fares to summer and winter only, and announced significant reductions. On Rotterdam, the minimum first class fare would be US$200 eastbound from August to April, and the same westbound from November to July. The minimum first class fare for summer, which now included the former "intermediate" seasons, would be $220.[30]

Rotterdam was a coal-burner. At the beginning of September 1932, members of the Bond voor Minder Marine Personeel (BMMP) trade union working for most Dutch shipping lines struck for better wages. As Rotterdam left Boulogne on 4 September on a westbound crossing, her ships' stokers demanded that she terminate her voyage and return to Rotterdam.[31] Her Master anchored her near the West Hinder lightvessel, where a detachment of 30 Dutch Marines boarded the ship from a pilot boat. The ship returned to Rotterdam, where 11 members of her crew were arrested for mutiny.[32] On 7 September, NASM announced that it would not re-hire 400 BMMP members.[33] Rotterdam and other NASM ships remained in Rotterdam as the strike continued.[34]

On 15 September some shipping lines reached an agreement with the BMMP, oncluding reinstatement of the 400 members that NASM had dismissed, but BMMP members at Rotterdam voted to reject it.[35] However, the "contact commission" between the shipping companies and the BMMP established that an aggregate of the votes from the separate mass meetings at Amsterdam and Rotterdam produced a majority in favour of returning to work.[36] NASM crews resumed service. SS Veendam (1922) left Rotterdam on 17 September, and all ships returned to normal their schedule.[37]

Late in 1933, Rotterdam was reconditioned, and an artificial beach was installed in one of her well decks. She started her cruising season on 18 November, leaving Hoboken with 450 passengers on a cruise to the West Indies.[38] On 23 December she left Hoboken on a nine-day cruise to Nassau and Kingston.[39] On 3 March 1934, she left Hoboken on a cruise to Central America.[40]

By 1930 Rotterdam was equipped with wireless direction finding. By 1934 the new four-letter call sign PHEG had replaced her code letters and three-letter call sign. Also by 1934, her hull had been repainted white.[4]

Volendam and her sister Veendam were rarely in the same port at the same time. One exception was on 16 March 1935 in Hoboken, when Veendam arrived from Rotterdam in the morning, and Volendam was already in port, waiting to start a cruise to Nassau and Bermuda on 23 March. Rotterdam, Edam and the cargo steamship Beemsterdijk were also at Hoboken on the same day. It was rare for five NASM ships to be in the same port on the same day.[41]

On 29 September 1935, Rotterdam was cruising off Jamaica at the time of the 1935 Cuba hurricane when she ran aground on Morant Cays.[42] The Elders & Fyffes banana boat SS Ariguani took off all of her 460 passengers and 70 of her crew, and landed them at Kingston.[43] On 1 October, NASM's SS Volendam left Hoboken, without passengers.[44] On 7 October she left Kingston carrying 350 of Rotterdam's passengers and crew,[45] and on 11 October she landed them at Hoboken.[46] Rotterdam was refloated on 5 October.[47]

In January 1936 HAL reclassified Rotterdam, Volendam and SS Veendam (1922) as "cabin class" ships. Rotterdam's one-way fares were reduced from $169.50 to $161.50 in the summer season, and from $161.50 to $153.50 in the off-season. HAL was the last major shipping line to adopt cabin class.[48]

In 1937 Rotterdam made a summer cruise to the North Cape and the Baltic. In Leningrad the Soviet authorities refused to let some passengers ashore from Rotterdam and three other ships. The reason why they chose certain passengers for exclusion was not clear.[49]