Lorna (ex-Beryl)

Lorna (ex-Beryl)
Rig Class.Steam Ship
Builder:Scotts Shipbuilding & Engineering, Greenock
Year built:1904
General characteristics
Ton:484 tons
Propulsion:Twin Triple Expansion Steam Engines

She was built as Beryl, Official Number 120472, twin triple expansion steam engines, built Scotts SB & Eng., Greenock, 1904. Owner originally Wyndham Francis Cook and in 1906 Lord Inverclyde of Castle Wemyss.

1911 sold to Lord Hollenden and renamed Lorna.

She was taken into war service in September 1914 and armed with one 12-pounder and one 6-pounder.  She was based in the Stornoway area in 1914 and 1915, and then in the Portland area between 1916 and 1918.

Lorna is the only club yacht credited with destroying an enemy submarine unaided.  This happened off Portland Bill on 26 May 1918 and a the Admiralty paid £1000 to the officers and crew,, while the CO, Lieutenant C L Tottenham RNR was awarded the DSO.

She was again requisitioned in 1939, and was used as an armed boarding vessel of the Contraband Control Service with a Chatham crew.

At the end of that year she was based at Gibraltar with the same duties, though later she was used for miscellaneous duties which seem to have included being an officers' mess.

She was returned in 1943.

In 1947 she was sold to Kavounides Bros. of Piraeus in 1947, renamed Thessalia and converted to a passenger ship.

1968 scrapped in Perama.

There is a more detailed history with photographs of her as THESSALIA on www.scribd.com/doc/19477628/Lord-Inverclydes-Yachts.

Owners

Namefromto
Lord Hollenden 1911 1916
Sir Walter R Preston 1918 1939

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