User:Dumelow/Hirano Maru
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THe Hirano Maru was a Japanese ship sunk off Ireland in October 1918.
Sailing from Liverpool to Yokohama with 320 passengers and crew on board, captined by Hector Fraser. Owned by the Nippon Yusen Kaisha Line. Travelled in a convoy escorted by the USS Sterett. Torpedoes 200 miles south of Ireland by UB 91 captained by Wolf Hans Hartwig. Sank in seven minutes, so quick that her lifeboats could not be launched. Sterett also came under attack, which prevented her from rtendering immediate assistance. At least 11 bodies washed up in Pembrokeshire and were buried in local cemeteries, some were not able to be identified. A wooden memorial with Japanese writing to ten unknown Japanese sailors was erected at St Mary's churchyard in Angle. This was replaced by a granite memorial on the centenrary of the sinking iwth an inscription in Japanese Welsh and English to Shiro Okosie and nine unknown shipmates.[1]
Steel hulled vessel. Registration was Tokyo Japan. 473 feet 9 inches (144.40 m) length, 54 feet 7 inches (16.64 m) breadth 31 feet 3 inches (9.53 m) depth. 8520 gross tonnage, 5283 net tonnage. 2 decks and 7 bulkheads. Her passenger deck was 61 feet (19 m) long, her boat deck 176 feet (54 m) long and her forecastle 64 feet (20 m) long. twin screws driven by 6 boilers and a 6-cylinger triple expansion 973 horsepower (726 kW) engine. At the time Japan was an ally of Britain in the war. Left Liverpool on 1 October 1918 and due to call at Durban, South Africa. Joined convoy OE-23 on 2 October. Also carried a mixed carbo. Fraser had 25 years service with the line and had been awarded the Medal of the Rising Son for his work during the Sino-Japanese and Russo-Japanese wars. UB-91 sighted the convoy at 05.05 and fired two torpedoes which both struck the Hirano Maru. Sterrett hove to at 7.05 to pick up survivors but spotted torpedo tracks and abandoned the rescue to attack UB-91 with depth charges; she escaped by diving the depth. STerrett returned to the rescue after 50 minutes, by which time most of the survivors had succombed to hypothermia. Called off the rescue at 7.58. Only 29 survivors. A signalman of the RNVR killed in the sinking is buried at Milford Haven cemetery.[2]
Wooden memorial at Angle had rotted away by 2018 and funds were raised by local villagers to replace it. Unveiled by Duke oF gloucester at an event attended by Japanese dignitaries from the UK embassy and the shipping line and descendents of the dead.[3] [4]
One of those killed in the sinking was Lt Col Shintaro Yamamoto. UB-91 had days earlier sunk the Tampa, a US coastgaurd cutter, killing all 131 passengers and crew. Hirano Maru's lifebaots were smashed against her sides in heavy seas. Hudnreds of surviros were swept into the sea. UB-91 survived the war to surrender to the British at Harwich after the armistice, it afterwards was sent, under a British crew, on a fundraising tour of Welsh ports. She was broken up for scrap at Briton Ferry in 1921; her deck gun was installed as part of Chepstow's wear memorial.[4]
Hirono Maru delivered in 1908 and sailed on the Yokohama-Liverpool route. [5] https://www.iwm.org.uk/memorials/item/memorial/86390
Other bodies washed up on Irish beaches. Around two-thirds of those on board were crew. The wooden memorial was erected 11 days after the sinkng. [6]
HYK believes the sinking was the greatest loss of life on a Japanese commercial vessel in the war.[7]
Built by Mitsu Bishi Dockyard and Engine Works in Nagasaki. Twin screw passenger steamer of 8,520 ton and 8,144 ihp. Bult for Nippon Yusen Kaisha.[8]
Captain H. Fraser perished with his ship.[9]
Commander Allan S Farquhar of the USN received the Navy Cross for his anti-submarine work and for service in rescuing passengers and crew of the isnking vessle with his ship, USS Sterett. [10]
En route from Liverpool to Yokoama. Torpedoes by UB-91 4 October and sank wit the loss of 292 lives.[11] THe German kaiser declared an end to the U-boat campaign against merchant vessels on 20 October and they were recalled to Germany for service with the fleet against Allied warships..[12]
The buddhist writer Anagarika Dharmapala travelled on her back to Ceylon after visiting the Hawaiian philanthropist Mary Robinson Foster in 1913.[13]
Sunk in the Atlantic, west of the Bristol Channel and south of Ireland at 51o 12' N, 7o 0' W.[14]
Teh future industrialist J. R. D. Tata travelled with his family on board during its last trip. Boarding in Japan they departed ths shup at Colombo, Seylon.[15]
Sank during a storm. The continued presence of the U-boat hindered rescue attemptes. many children were among the dead.[16]
A replacement vessel of the same name had been constrcued by 1922.[17]
- ^ "Japan & Pembrokeshire – the HIRANO MARU". Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales. Retrieved 24 November 2024.
- ^ "Hirano Maru". Coflein. British Government. Retrieved 24 November 2024.
- ^ "Historian humbled by heartfelt memorial". BBC News. Retrieved 24 November 2024.
- ^ a b "WW1: New memorial for Pembrokeshire's Japanese dead". BBC News. 4 October 2018. Retrieved 24 November 2024.
- ^ "Cenotaph Honoring Hirano Maru Sailors Established by UK Volunteer Group". NYK Line. Retrieved 24 November 2024.
- ^ Sinclair, Tom (8 September 2018). "Angle: Service 100 years after the sinking of a Japanese ship". The Pembrokeshire Herald. Retrieved 24 November 2024.
- ^ "Memorial to WWI Japanese boat sinking victims to be unveiled in Wales". Kyodo News+. 12 May 2018. Retrieved 24 November 2024.
- ^ Monthly Consular and Trade Reports. U.S. Government Printing Office. 1909. p. 96.
- ^ The Travel Bulletin. N.Y.K. Line. 1937. p. 65.
- ^ United States Congress Senate Committee on Naval Affairs (1920). Awarding of Medals in the Naval Service, Hearing Before a Subcommittee ..., on S.Res. 285. p. 49.
- ^ Warner, Guy (13 June 2011). World War One Aircraft Carrier Pioneer: The Story and Diaries of Captain JM McCleery RNAS/RAF. Pen and Sword. p. 230. ISBN 978-1-84884-255-7.
- ^ Warner, Guy (13 June 2011). World War One Aircraft Carrier Pioneer: The Story and Diaries of Captain JM McCleery RNAS/RAF. Pen and Sword. p. 232. ISBN 978-1-84884-255-7.
- ^ Kemper, Steven (13 January 2015). Rescued from the Nation: Anagarika Dharmapala and the Buddhist World. University of Chicago Press. p. 391. ISBN 978-0-226-19907-8.
- ^ Lecane, Philip (2005). Torpedoed!: The R.M.S. Leinster Disaster. Periscope Publishing Ltd. p. 48. ISBN 978-1-904381-29-7.
- ^ Lala, R. M. (25 October 2017). Beyond the Last Blue Mountain. Penguin UK. p. 42. ISBN 978-81-8475-331-8.
- ^ Gibson, R. H.; Prendergast, Maurice (November 2002). The German Submarine War 1914-1918. Periscope Publishing Ltd. p. 322. ISBN 978-1-904381-08-2.
- ^ The Far Eastern Review: Engineering, Finance, Commerce. G.B. Rea. 1922. p. 396.