BACKGROUND
to the WS CONVOYS
After
25 June 1940, when France
surrendered to Germany, Britain and the
Dominions became the only Allied nations free to
prosecute the war with Germany
and Italy, a condition that persisted until Italy
decided to provoke conflict
with Greece in the autumn of 1940.
In
those traumatic days, with the invasion
of Britain anticipated, and
indeed tentatively planned for mid September 1940,
it was an act of
considerable faith to despatch from Britain such
forces as were then available.
The reason for this decision was that Egypt and East
Africa had only garrisons
which were much reduced from even the pre‑war scale,
while Libya and
Italian East Africa contained considerable enemy
forces; indeed British
Somaliland was, perforce, evacuated due to lack of
British and Indian troops in
sufficient numbers to oppose the Italian advance.
As
the potential attacks from Libya and East Africa
were such as to
threaten not only the Suez Canal but also,
eventually, the oil resources of
Iraq and Persia, it became necessary to reinforce
the Egyptian garrison.
Despite the possible events at home therefore,
troops, as well equipped as
could be from the depleted arsenals in Britain,
were sent via the Cape of Good Hope to Egypt
to form what became known as the Desert Army under
General Wavell. This force
acquitted itself very well indeed, and stabilised
the situation in Egypt and
Libya in Britain's favour.
Thereafter,
as the fortunes of war swung like a pendulum in the
vacuum
of the North African desert, greater and greater
resources had to be committed,
whatever the position at home. Also, war was looming
further East with the
increasing menace of Japan, and the position in
India, Malaya and the Indies
generally was of major concern.
Faced
with such an obvious threat, and with the
possibility of the
invasion of Britain rapidly receding (it was
apparent as early as 10.1940 that
the original plans had been abandoned) reinforcement
of Egypt and India became
of prime importance. The early ad hoc convoys
(designated as AP 1, 2, 3 and 3½ )
were therefore replaced by a series known as WS.
Legend has it that these
initials, which oddly bear no relation to origin or
destinations as convoy
codes usually do, were derived from "Winston's
Special" as the first
convoy was organised on the explicit orders of the
Prime Minister.
The
first WS convoy set the scene dramatically both in
content and
conduct. The sight of three major Cunard liners,
QUEEN MARY, AQUITANIA and
MAURETANIA steaming at maximum speed in line ahead
in the peaceful seas of the
Indian Ocean escorted by HMS KENT
must have been magnificent. It certainly
appeared so to a young Midshipman onboard, known to
the Gunroom as "Phil
the Greek", more properly Midshipman Prince Philip
of the Hellenes, now
HRH Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.
The
initial convoy ‑ to Ceylon as such large ships could
not be
risked in the Red Sea with the Italian Regia Marina
still based in East Africa ‑
was followed by successive convoys routed through to
Suez. After the Italian
forces had been eliminated from East Africa, convoy
was no longer required in
the Red Sea and the WS convoys thereafter dispersed
off Perim, proceeding as
independent ships to Suez.
With
the rising menace in the Far East, which became war
in December
1941, troop convoys to sustain India were also
required. This need was
satisfied by extending the WS series, an arrangement
that continued until mid
1943. After that date the opening of the
Mediterranean to major vessels
following the defeat of the Axis in North Africa
shortened the route with the
Suez Canal once again accessible from the west. This
resulted in the demise of
the WS series and its replacement by the KMF convoys
which were extended to
Port Said from the North African ports, and by the
AB convoys from Aden to
Bombay.
The
most startling fact regarding all troop convoys in
World War II is
the non‑event they were. They proceeded, and almost
nothing untoward
happened! Given the very large numbers of personnel
transported over long
distances at a time of extreme danger at sea, it is
amazing that not only were
losses, in this and other series, minimal, but that
even unsuccessful attack
was uncommon. Indeed, the most successful strike at
a WS convoy occurred as a
result of minelaying some time prior to its arrival
by an undetected raider!
Both the participants personally, and the nation as
a whole should be supremely
grateful that such large, high risk, ventures with
so many young men on board
were able "to pass upon the seas on their lawful
occasions" without
undue hazard or loss.
Total
figures for troops lifted in troop convoys are not
easily
calculable, but the ships involved normally carried
between 2,000 and 4,000
troops apiece, which will give some idea of the
effort involved. Furthermore,
the convoys were not simply a transport of soldiers;
each WS convoy conveyed a
complete military formation of many thousands of
troops plus their personal
baggage and equipment, stores, MT, artillery, armour
etc so that the entire
force, on arrival, formed a complete fighting unit
at Divisional level. Royal
Air Force personnel, in large numbers, were also
lifted both to Egypt and to
India; Royal Navy drafts were, at the time of WS
convoys, in the minority. The
later KMF convoys, which were to supplement existing
formations, tended not to
be accompanied by the MT ships. Overall, it is
probable that well in excess of
2,000,000 Servicemen took passage in the WS and KMF
convoy sequences between
1940 and 1945.
The
following pages are a chronological listing of the
convoys,
(including for the sake of completeness the
preceding AP convoys) showing their
constituent ships and destinations and their
escorts.
It
is hoped that this work will, to some extent,
satisfy the increasing
enquiries from former Merchant Navy personnel and
Servicemen that can be summed
up by the question "I went to India in .........., I
remember sailing from
X in the liner Y on Z, can you tell me which convoy
I was in and what
happened?" This text should answer all such
enquiries providing the memory
extends to the date of sailing, not always easy
after a lapse of some fifty
years.
__________
THE
ROUTE
The
point has been made earlier that WS convoys were
routed via the Cape
of Good Hope to Egypt and, later, India. This set a
pattern of Clyde, Freetown,
Capetown/Durban and onwards; but, while this was the
normal route, it was
subject to inevitable alterations.
While
ships loaded and sailed from such ports as
Avonmouth, Liverpool
and the Clyde, only the latter provided an anchorage
large enough to sustain a
major convoy. Hence the major body assembled at Tail
o'the Bank and sortied
from the Clyde to assemble off Oversay with the
Bristol Channel and Liverpool
ships. Where the initial port of departure is known
positively, the appropriate
initial appears after the convoy position number in
the initial sailing
details:
A
- Avonmouth
C
- Clyde
L
- Liverpool
S
- Swansea
From
Britain, the first pause was at Freetown, where the
shorter legged
Atlantic liners and the coal burners required fuel
and the whole convoy water,
both boiler feed and potable. In fact, this enormous
demand on the limited
resources of Freetown was always a major problem
leading both to delays in the
troop convoys caused by the heavy demands upon
labour in coaling ship, and in
the homeward bound SL trade convoys by the depletion
of coal stocks, which
were, of course, shipped out from Britain. Water
supplies were also a problem
in that Freetown, while certainly not bereft of
rainfall, possessed only
minimal reservoir capacity which was very easily
overwhelmed by large demands.
Finally, Freetown was, basically, an anchorage where
all supplies had to be
loaded by hand from lighters (in the case of coal),
or by water boats which
were also in short supply.
From
Freetown the next call was South Africa; here again
the size of
these convoys caused problems as neither Capetown
nor Durban could accommodate
the whole convoy, hence the ships had to be divided
between the two ports, duly
sailing and re‑assembling off Durban for the onward
passage.
From
Durban the normal pattern was for ships to proceed
northward to the
latitude of Mombasa, there dividing, with the Bombay
ships steaming East, and
the Suez contingent going North to Perim where the
convoy dispersed and
proceeded to Suez independently.
Troops
destined for Singapore (and therefore a dreadful
fate at the
hands of the Japanese)
were in ships detached after Durban from the main
body
and sent direct to Singapore in a series of three
convoys designated DM (Durban
Military).
As
always, there were variants. Two convoys contained
ships destined for
Malta, which were detached when West of Gibraltar as
a separate body; one
convoy passaged from the Clyde to Brazil and thence
to the Cape as its route
lay athwart the invasion convoys proceeding to North
Africa in late October
1942. A further oddity was the convoy that consisted
entirely of American
troopships ‑ and commissioned ships of the USN at
that ‑ prior to 7
December 1941. That convoy carried troops that had
gone from Britain to Canada,
were transported and escorted by the USN to
Capetown, and there became a WS
convoy under British control and escort.
A
final variant was one convoy composed entirely of
ships loaded and
destined to seize the Azores if the political
decision to attack were taken.
This convoy made the lengthy passage from the Clyde
assembly anchorage to Scapa
Flow, duly returning to unload and disperse when it
was decided that the
political hazard was too great!
After
the successful invasion
of North Africa, the troop convoys for
that theatre, designated KMF (United Kingdom to
Mediterranean Fast) were, when
sailing dates coincided, amalgamated with the WS
convoys to the latitude of
Gibraltar, where they divided for Freetown and the
Mediterranean respectively.
Once
the North African
coast and
Sicily has been
cleared of the enemy,
the passage of loaded troopships to Port Said became
possible, and the WS
convoys were accordingly cancelled, all personnel
for India thereafter
proceeding via the KMF series to Port Said, thence
to Aden where the convoy was
re‑formed as one of the AB (Aden to Bombay) series.
As
the initial convoys comprised a large part of the
personnel ships
then available, all such shipping had to return to
Britain to prepare for
further employment. Usually, this return was
effected by unescorted passage
from Suez or Bombay (as appropriate) via South
Africa and Freetown. However,
enemy submarine activity often imposed variations so
that passage to Trinidad
either direct from the Cape or via Freetown was
quite usual. Some ships even
made the passage via Cape Horn and Panama, while the
home run from the West
Indies could either be direct and unescorted, or via
New York or Halifax to
embark troops for Britain.
Some
ships, usually those with refrigerated capacity,
made their way
from Suez or Bombay to Australia and New Zealand
(after December 1941 via South
Africa to avoid Japanese activity), thence to
Britain via Panama and North
America.
The
smaller MT ships were not infrequently retained in
the Middle East,
where their (relatively) high speed made them a
desirable component for the
heavily contested convoys required to supply Malta
from the east.
__________
THE
SHIPS
Ships
used in the WS convoys, other than the aborted
Azores enterprise,
were either liners employed as personnel ships
("troopships") or fast
freighters requisitioned as MT ships. This latter
category often included
refrigerator ships from the Australasian and South
American trade, despite the
fact that the multiple sub‑division of their holds
made cargo handling a
complex and time consuming matter, the ability to
make a high constant speed
was the overriding consideration.
The
personnel ships were drawn from the North Atlantic,
South American,
Cape and the long distance Eastern routes, and
included coal and oil burning
steamships and motor vessels. As the war progressed
foreign liners became
common in these convoys.
The
inclusion of the North Atlantic steamers posed a
problem as, in the
main, these ships were not self sufficient in water
production (both feed and
drinking water) nor was their fuel capacity adequate
for the lengthy passages
involved as they were designed to load water and to
fuel at each end of the
trans‑Atlantic passage. Coal burners also caused
difficulties as, again,
fuel (and sometimes ballast) limitations became
apparent. In all cases
therefore, Freetown and South Africa were essential
ports of call for both
water and fuel.
In
the earlier convoys, some of the liners were still
engaged on
something approximating to their peacetime routines.
For example, the HIGHLAND
class liners with large refrigerated capacity, often
took passage with the WS
convoys to either Freetown or South Africa prior to
proceeding to the Plate to
load meat for the UK. In a similar fashion, the few
remaining Union Castle
liners that maintained a basic service to the Cape
in late 1940 and early 1941,
were also included in the convoys.
Where
troop capacities are known, and by no means all of
the records
have survived, the figure is shown in the Index
(identified by an asterisk*).
Individuals seeking more positive data are referred
to the P&O and Orient
Line records held at the National Maritime Museum,
where figures for individual
voyages 1940‑45 can be extracted for a number of
vessels.
Listing
of Public Record Office references for WS convoys
|
Convoy
ADM 199
ref
Number
1
1136
2
1136
2B
1136
3
1136,
75
3A
710
4A
1136
4B
1136
4C
1136,
11
5
11
5A
1136,
42
5B
1136
5BX
708
6B
1136
7
1138
8A
1138
8B
1138
8C
1138
8X
1138
9A
1138,
1211
9B
1138
9C
1138,
830
10
1138
10B
1138
10X
1136
11
1138
11X
1138,
831
12
1138
12J
1138
12Z
1138
14
1138
14B
1138
15
1211
15B
1211
16
1211
17
1211,
1887
|
Convoy
ADM
199
ref
number
17BZ
1211
18
1211
19
1211
19W
1214
19L
1211
19P
1211
19PB
1211
19W
1214
20
1211
21
1211
21A
1211
21P
1211
22
1211
23
1211,
1887
24
1211
25
1211
26
975,
978, 1026, 1423
27
975,
978, 1026, 1423
28
975,
978, 1026, 1423
29
975,
978, 1026, 1423
30
975,
978, 1026, 1423
31
1026
32
1026
Convoy
ADM 237 files
number
8A
267
15
268
17
269
19P
269
20
227
21
270
21P
270
21S
270
|
|
