SS Sant Anna

History
France
Name: SS Sant' Anna
Owner: Compagnie de Navigation À Vapeur Cyprien Fabre & Cie (Fabre Line)
Builder: Société Nouvelle des Forges et Chantiers de la Méditerranée, La Seyne-sur-Mer
Completed: 1912
Fate: Torpedoed and sunk on 11 May 1918
General characteristics
Class and type: Ocean liner
Tonnage: 9,350 GRT
Length: 151 m
Beam: 17.5 m
Height: 20 m
Installed power: 10.000 PS
Speed: max. 16,5 knots
Capacity: 2,080 passengers

SS Sant' Anna was an Transatlantic ocean liner converted into a troopship in 1915, torpedoed and sunk in the Mediterranean Sea on 11 May 1918 with 605 casualties.

The Sant'Anna was built as an ocean liner for service between France and New York. The ship was operational between 1912 and 1915, when she was requisitioned by the Army and refitted as troop ship for use in World War I. On 19 September 1915 a fire broke out on board, which was thought to be an act of German sabotage. On 12 April 1916 the Sant'Anna made here first trip to the Salonika Front with 1027 Serbian soldiers and 129 horses on board.

On 11 May 1918 she was again destined from Bizerte for Thessaloniki under escort of 2 British sloops, HMS Cyclamen and HMS Verhana, with 2025 soldiers on board : 574 Senegalese, 429 Kabyle, 194 Annamite, 9 Greek and the rest French. She was attacked and torpedoed at 3:15 AM by German U-boat SM UC-54, commanded by Heinrich XXXVII Prinz Reuß zu Köstritz, and sank at 3:58 AM off the coast of Tunisia, some 26 miles east of Cape Bon, causing the death of some 605 soldiers. The survivors were rescued by the British sloops, French destroyer Catapulte, an English gunboat, French sloop Saint Jean and the Auguste Leblond and Marguerite Marie.

See also

Sources

Coordinates: 37°02′24″N 11°21′36″E / 37.0400°N 11.3600°E / 37.0400; 11.3600

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