View source for SS Silesia (1869)

{{Short description|Hammonia class steamship}}
{{for|other ships of the same name|SS Silesia}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=March 2017}}
{|{{Infobox ship begin}}
{{Infobox ship image
|Ship image          =  Hammonia class frisia.jpg
|Ship caption        =A ''Hammonia'' class ship, the ''SS Silesia'' appeared very much like the ship pictured here, the ''SS Frisia''
}}
{{Infobox ship career
|Hide header         =
|Ship country        = [[Hamburg]] / [[German Empire|Germany]]
|Ship flag           = {{shipboxflag|Hamburg|admiralty}} / {{shipboxflag|German Empire}}
|Ship name           = SS ''Silesia''
|Ship namesake       = the province of [[Silesia]]
|Ship owner          =
|Ship operator       = [[Hamburg America Line|Hamburg Amerikanische Packetfahrt Actien Gesellschaft (HAPAG)]]
|Ship registry       = Hamburg
|Ship route          = [[Hamburg]] – [[Le Havre]] – [[New York City]]
|Ship ordered        = 
|Ship awarded        =
|Ship builder        = [[Caird & Company|Caird & Co.]]
|Ship original cost  =
|Ship yard number    =
|Ship way number     =
|Ship laid down      = 
|Ship launched       = 14 April 1869
|Ship sponsor        = 
|Ship christened     = SS ''Silesia''
|Ship completed      =
|Ship acquired       = 
|Ship commissioned   = 
|Ship recommissioned =
|Ship decommissioned =
|Ship maiden voyage  = 23 June 1869
|Ship in servic      = 
|Ship out of service = 1899
|Ship renamed        = ''Pacifica'' (1887), ''Citta di Napoli'' (1888), ''Montevideo'' (1891)
|Ship reclassified   =
|Ship refit          = 1877, compound engines
|Ship struck         =
|Ship reinstated     =
|Ship identification = 
|Ship motto          = 
|Ship nickname       =
|Ship honours        =
|Ship honors         =
|Ship captured       =
|Ship fate           = Transferred to Great Britain
|Ship badge          =
}}
{{Infobox ship career
|Hide header         =title
|Ship country        = United Kingdom
|Ship flag           = {{shipboxflag|United Kingdom|civil}}
|Ship name           = SS ''Pacifica''
|Ship namesake       = 
|Ship owner          = 
|Ship acquired       = 1887
|Ship fate           = Transferred to Italy
|Ship registry       = 
|Ship nickname       = 
}}
{{Infobox ship career
|Hide header         =title
|Ship country        = Italy
|Ship flag           = {{shipboxflag|Italy|civil}}
|Ship name           = P/fo ''Citta di Napoli''
|Ship namesake       = 
|Ship owner          = Fratelli Lavarello
|Ship acquired       = 1888
|Ship fate           = Acquired by new Italian owner
|Ship registry       = 
|Ship nickname       = 
}}
{{Infobox ship career
|Hide header         =title
|Ship country        = Italy
|Ship flag           = {{shipboxflag|Italy|civil}}
|Ship name           = P/fo ''Montevideo''
|Ship namesake       = 
|Ship owner          = La Veloce Line
|Ship acquired       = 1891
|Ship fate           = Wrecked off Lobos Island on the [[Río de la Plata|River Plate]] in [[Uruguay]], then sold for scrap
|Ship homeport       = Genoa
|Ship nickname       = 
}}

{{Infobox ship characteristics
|Hide header         = 
|Header caption      = 
|Ship class          = ''Hammonia''
|Ship tonnage        = 3,142 
|Ship displacement   = 
|Ship tons burthen   =
|Ship length         = {{convert|361|ft|abbr=on}}
|Ship beam           = {{convert|46|ft|abbr=on}}
|Ship draught        = 
|Ship hold depth     = 
|ship depth          = {{convert|35.5|ft|abbr=on}}
|Ship propulsion     = Steam expansion (single screw) and two masts; later retrofitted with second screw 
|Ship sail plan      = [[Square rig]]ged on both fore and main masts
|Ship capacity       = 600 passengers
|Ship complement     = 
|Ship notes          = 
|Ship speed          = {{convert|12|kn|km/h}})
}}
|}

The '''SS ''Silesia''''' was a late 19th-century [[Hamburg America Line]] passenger and cargo ship that ran between the European ports of [[Hamburg]], Germany and [[Le Havre]], France to [[Castle Garden]] and later [[Ellis Island]], New York transporting European immigrants, primarily Russian, Prussian, Hungarian, German, Austrian, Italian, and Danish individuals and families.  Most passengers on this route were manual laborers, including stonecutters, locksmiths, farmers, millers, upholsterers, confectioners, and tailors, though physicians and other professionals also bought passage on her.<ref>National Archives and Records Administration Film M237, Reel 462</ref>

==Building==
Built by [[Caird & Company]] of [[Greenock]], Scotland, the ''Silesia'',  along with the SS ''Germania'' (I) (1863), SS ''Germania'' (II) (1870), SS ''Frisia'' (1872), SS ''Pomerania'' (1873), SS ''Hammonia'' (I) (1855), and SS ''Hammonia'' (II) (1866), was a ''Hammonia'' class ship. Some sources report her as being {{convert|340|ft|m}} in length and {{convert|40|ft|m}} from side to side<ref name="clydesite.co.uk">{{cite web|url=http://www.clydesite.co.uk/clydebuilt/viewship.asp?id=15206|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120728225116/http://www.clydesite.co.uk/clydebuilt/viewship.asp?id=15206|url-status=usurped|archive-date=28 July 2012|title=ss Silesia built by Caird & Company Greenock Clydebuilt Ships Database|access-date=28 June 2011}}</ref> though other contemporary sources report her as somewhat larger.<ref name=plantation>{{Cite news |title= The steamship Silesia |newspaper= The Plantation |publisher= Plantation Pub. |location= Atlanta, Georgia |page= 167 |volume= 1 |issue= 11  |date= 2 April 1870 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=u5dQAAAAYAAJ |access-date= 11 June 2011 |oclc= 8464853}}</ref>

With both a steam engine and a set of traditional masts, she was one of a brief but large category of "transitional" (wind-to-steam) vessels. Like many of these ships, the ''Silesia'' had a steel hull, two masts, and one steam funnel. Her two engines drove a single {{convert|10|ft|m|abbr=on}} screw with 2,200 horsepower making 54 revolutions per minute. Twelve men shoveling coal continuously from her four coal bunkers kept her engines running around the clock, consuming 75 of her 1,100-ton capacity of coal per day. All of the steam generated in her boilers was recovered and reused during any given length of her journey. The smoke from the burning of coal quickly blackened many of her sails, which were as follows: on her foremast she had two [[staysail]]s (a fore staysail and a fore topmast staysail), a [[Course (sail)|course]], [[topsail]], and [[topgallant sail]]; and on her mainmast, the equivalent five sails (a staysail, topmast staysail, course, topsail, and topgallant sail) plus a [[spanker (sail)|spanker]] for a combined total of eleven sails.<ref name=plantation/>

==History==
She began her maiden voyage from Hamburg to Le Havre and New York on 23 June 1869.<ref name=NARAM237/> On 5 January 1872, she ran aground at [[Dartmouth, Nova Scotia]], [[Canada]] whilst on a voyage from New York to Hamburg. She was refloated.<ref name=Times180172>{{Cite newspaper The Times |title=Latest Shipping Intelligence |date=18 January 1872 |issue=27276 |page=6 |column=E }}</ref> ''Silesia'' ran aground in the [[Elbe]] downstream of [[Blankenese]] on 24 April 1874 whilst on a voyage from New York to Hamburg.<ref name=BNL250474>{{Cite news |title=Mail and Shipping News |newspaper=Belfast News-Letter |location=Belfast |date=25 April 1874 |issue=55933 }}</ref> She had been refloated by 29 April and taken in to Hamburg.<ref name=SH290474>{{Cite news |title=Southampton Mail Steam Shipping |newspaper=Southampton Herald |location=Southampton |date=29 April 1874 |issue=2908 |page=3 |volume=51 }}</ref> Her last voyage on this route began on 24 February 1875. After this she was fitted with a compound engine and supposedly began sailing the route from Hamburg to the West Indies, though passenger manifests continue to show her bringing immigrants to New York for many more years.<ref name=NARAM237>National Archives and Records Administration, Film M237, Reel 446</ref> On 17 February 1880, ''Silesia'' ran aground at [[Finkenwerder]] whilst on a voyage from Hamburg to New York.<ref name=LM190280>{{Cite news |title=Shipping |newspaper=Liverpool Mercury |location=Liverpool |date=19 February 1880 |issue=10017 }}</ref> On 12 November that year she collided with and sank the [[Guernsey]] [[schooner]] ''Squale'' in the [[English Channel]] {{convert|12|nmi|km}} south of [[Beachy Head]], [[Sussex]].<ref name=Renno>{{cite book |title=Beachy Head Shipwrecks of the 19th Century |first=David |last=Renno |page=311 |publisher=Amherst Publishing |location=Sevenoaks |year=2004 |isbn=1 903637 20 1}}</ref>

Accounts then differ as to the path of her ownership, with some sources claiming she was given to [[Armstrong Whitworth|W.G. Armstrong & Mitchell Company]] in 1887 before being sold to the H.F. Swan Company who renamed her ''Pacifica'', then  in 1888 sold to A. Albini of Genoa, then in 1889 sold to Fratelli Lavarello, also of Genoa, and renamed ''Citta di Napoli'', then in 1890 sold to the La Veloce Line, again of Genoa, and renamed ''Montevideo''.<ref name="clydesite.co.uk"/> Others record that once refitted she went to an unnamed British firm, then to an Italian company called Solari & Schiaffino, then year after that sold to Fratelli Lavarello, and then in 1891 sold to La Veloce.<ref>{{Cite book |title=North Atlantic seaway: an illustrated history of the passenger services linking the Old World with the New in four volumes |last=Bonsor |first=N.R.P. |edition=Enlarged and revised |volume=1 |year=1975 |page=390 |publisher=Arco Publishing |place=New York |isbn=978-0-668-03679-5 |oclc=1891992}}</ref>

Sources agree, however, that on 2 December 1899, she ran aground near the island of Lobos in the [[Río de la Plata|River Plate]] between Uruguay and Argentina and was eventually sold for scrap metal.<ref name="clydesite.co.uk"/>

==References==
{{Reflist}}

{{1872 shipwrecks}}
{{1874 shipwrecks}}
{{1880 shipwrecks}}
{{1899 shipwrecks}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Silesia}}
[[Category:Steamships of the Hanseatic League]]
[[Category:Steamships of the German Empire]]
[[Category:Ships of the Hamburg America Line]]
[[Category:Ships built on the River Clyde]]
[[Category:1869 ships]]
[[Category:Maritime incidents in January 1872]]
[[Category:Maritime incidents in April 1874]]
[[Category:Maritime incidents in November 1880]]
[[Category:Passenger ships of Germany]]
[[Category:Steamships of the United Kingdom]]
[[Category:Passenger ships of the United Kingdom]]
[[Category:Steamships of Italy]]
[[Category:Passenger ships of Italy]]
[[Category:Maritime incidents in 1899]]