CANADIAN PACIFIC'S MONOCLASS M's: R.M.S. MISSANABIE & METAGAMA

 

Far from the glamour and world girding cruises of their "White Empress" fleetmates, below the "Duchesses" in the pecking order, Canadian Pacific's stalwart fleet of "M" class cabin boats were the mainstays of the inter-war fleet, catering to the core traffic on the St. Lawrence route-- the waves of immigrants from every corner of the British Isles and farther afield who helped to settle the expanses of Canada's Western Prairie, building new lives and a greater Dominion. 

Of these, none had more of a memorable role in Canadian ties with the Mother Country than Missanabie and Metagama.  Undertaking their maiden voyages during the First World War, they carried legions of Canadian Expeditionary Force volunteers across the Atlantic whilst being among the few liners to  maintain a wartime commercial trans-Atlantic service.  As with almost all Canadian route sister ships, one-- Missanabie-- would not survive the War but together through most of it, they did "their bit" for King & Empire.  

Metagama went on to serve for more than a dozen years as one of the most memorable immigrant ships of the inter-war years, earning a reputation as the "Bride Ship" and figuring more in the remarkable Scottish and Irish migration to Canada during this period than any other single vessel.  In war and peace, the  humble little Metagama earned a memorable place in the lives of  Canadians, a true national flagship. 

R.M.S. Missanabie & Metagama, painting by Norman Wilkinson. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection. 

Aspiration spurs enterprise and the great Canadian Pacific Railway Co. exemplified "Make No Little Plans" from their very foundation. The Trans-Continental Railway unified the new Dominion and ranked  with the Suez Canal as the wonder of the Victorian Age. It was Canadian ambition that it, too, rival it in imperial commerce, facilitating an "All Red Route" from Britain to Asia via Canada rather than the canal. In 1891 CPR began their express Vancouver-China service and in 1903 entered the Britain-St. Lawrence trade.  Added to trans-imperial commerce, came also the desire to divert trans-Atlantic traffic from the U.S. middle west away from New  York with new ships of size, speed and splendour to  rival all others. All this produced, just before the First World War, a remarkable  generation of iconic vessels like Empress of Ireland,  Empress of Asia, Alsatian and Niagara. 

Yet somewhat neglected in it  all was the  "meat and potatoes" trade of the Canadian North Atlantic run--- emigrants and middle class "second cabin" passengers. Not perhaps as glamorous or the stuff of imperial aspirations, but a substantial bill paying trade that constituted 89 per cent of CPR's total traffic on the Liverpool-St. Lawrence run in 1913.   It was a trade finally afforded its own distinct tonnage, a need that was not fulfilled until the final weeks leading up to the war or, in the case of Missanabie and Metagama, after it had started. 

One of the more  popular innovations among Atlantic intermediate liners in the decade before the Great War, were the so-called "Cabin boats," a development perhaps at odds with the prevailing class-consciousness of the Edwardian Era.  Ironically, the Cabin Boat's egalitarian rationality was ruined in the norm bending "Roaring  Twenties" by the contrivance of "Tourist Third."  The Transat's Chicago of 1908 is often cited as the first true cabin boat, offering what was  called Classe Democratique as the sole saloon class accommodation, but White Star's Cymric of 1898 had only one "saloon class" in addition to steerage so must take precedence here. The Canadian route quickly embraced the concept with Donaldson leading the way with Saturnia of 1910, then Cunard's Ascania a year later. The newbuildings for Cunard in 1913, too, were cabin ships and the type became a Canadian run staple. 

However, nomenclature  mattered in the Trans-Atlantic Passenger Conference,  so pre-war there was technically no such thing as a "cabin" or "one-class" liner, rather "one-class (second class)" to qualify for the second class tariff.   Irrespective of what it was called, the appeal remained for Second Class passengers who could  now enjoy "top class" status and enhanced accommodation, deck space and public rooms at the same fare as being sandwiched in the middle on the big steamers.  It also rationalised the layout on smaller intermediate-sized ships as well offering an acceptable trade-off of comfort for speed.  

For the 1909 season, CPR converted the Lake-class steamers to "One Class Cabin Service Second Class," a surfeit of words to appease the Transatlantic Passenger Ship Conference and permit charging the prevailing Second Class rate. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection. 

After converting the Lake-class steamers to two-classes (Second and steerage) in 1909, CPR were thereafter otherwise occupied with the new Pacific Empresses and acquiring Allan Line for which the splendid Alsatian and Calgarian were commissioned. Further development of the cabin intermediate component had to wait.  Also somewhat neglected was  Montreal, Canada's largest city, whose further ambitions as a trans-Atlantic port were frustrated by the constraints in width and depth of the shipping channel in the St. Lawrence past Quebec. The new Empress of Britain and Empress of Ireland and Allan's Alsatian and Calgarian  were too big to come into Montreal which remained served by the small, pokey Lakes. 

It's worth noting that Missanabie and Metagama were only the second new pair of ships CPR commissioned for their trans-Atlantic service, coming eight years after the first Empresses.  The competition finally inspired a reply after Cunard (new to the St. Lawrence trade after purchasing Thompson Line in 1911) ordered two new 13,000-ton liners in early February 1912. 

Announcement was made yesterday that the C.P.R. had placed an order for two passenger and freight steamers for the St. Lawrence service. They will be 12,000-ton, 16-knot vessels and will go  into commission during the summer of 1914. They will  be equipped for two classes of  passengers, second and third, 1,230 of the latter and 530 of the former. An innovation is to be in the construction of the ships. Their bunkers will be constructed so  that they can carry oil. At first, in any case, they will burn coal.

Gazette, 13 December 1912

The C.P.R. have ordered two new ships for their Montreal service from Barclay, Curle & Co., of Glasgow. The new steamers are being designed to  meet the special requirement of this trade. They will each have accommodation for 1,250  third-class passengers, and will carry only two class, second and third. In the former the carrying capacity will be 550 people. With a tonnage of 12,000 tons, the new boats will be able to carry 3,000 tons of cargo and steam at from 15 to 16 knots per hour. The ships will burn coal  at first but provision is to be made for oil fuel eventually.

Gazette, 25 December 1912.

Perhaps sated after all the hoopla associated with the Pacific Empresses and the Allan sisters,  the announcement on 12 December 1912 that CPR had ordered two new 12,000-ton ships from Barclay, Curle's yards, to "ready for sea by July 1914" was the extent of the press coverage. The new ships would be first built by the well-known shipbuilders following their acquisition that year by Swan, Hunter and their largest, to date, merchantmen. Ironically, too, they were to replace the Barclay, Curle-built Lake Champlain (b.1900/7.392 grt.) and the Swan Hunter-built Lake Manitoba (b.1901/8,852 grt.)

Laid down at Whiteinch as yard nos. 510 and 511 by that winter, their construction was accomplished, too, in relative obscurity and, as with so many newbuildings of the time, slowed by labour shortages, strikes and shortages as the naval build-up prior  to the  Great War reached its peak. 

In May 1914, their names were revealed: Missanabie and Metagama, evocatively Canadian (being named after two stops on the CPR Trans-Continental as well as rivers), they, like Assiniboa and Keewatin of 1907, were Native American names,  of Algonquin tribal origin. They also carried on the well-established "M" prefix for intermediary liners inherited from the original Elder Dempster fleet CPR purchased in 1903 to begin trans-Atlantic operations. However, as to how to pronounce them proved conflicting given two  accounts in the same paper on the occasion of Metagama's launch and maiden voyage respectively.

The name is of Algonquin origin, the correct pronunciation being 'Me-ta-ga-ma" with accent on the second syllable, and all the a's pronounced as in "Paul". The Missanabie also  borrows is name from the Algonquins, but the pronunciation usually given it as though it were the  name of a woman called Miss Ann Abbey. Purists contend, however, that is should also get an Algonquin sound by being  pronounced in the same manner as prescribed for Metagama.

Gazette, 7 January 1915

There was conflict on the way out among some of the passengers as to the correct pronunciation of "Metagama," but by means of appeal to some of the officials on board, the correct method became so well established that everybody arrived in Canada pronouncing it "Met-a-ga-mah". Metagama, which is the name of a station on the Canadian Pacific Railway, Lake Superior Division, is of Algonquin origin, taken from the river of that name which, the Missanabie, runs into James Bay. Metagama means 'the meeting of  the waters.

Gazette, 3 May 1915

 

It may the classic conflict of British vs. North American, but surely 'Me-ta-ga-ma" is truer to Native American pronunciation. 

Missanabie on the ways the day of her launching. Credit: Pacific Marine Review

On 22 June 1914 Mrs. G. MacLaren Brown, wife of CPR's European Manager, christened the first ship as Missanabie and sent her down the ways at Whiteinch and as The Scotsman the day later informed its readers, "the launch was entirely successful."

Missanabie's godmother, Mrs. G. McLaren Brown, wife of CPR's European  General Manager. She would also christen the CPR liner Montclare in 1921. 

Missanabie takes the water at Whiteinch, 22 June 1914. Credit: Canadian Railway & Marine World

Missanabie immediately following her launch. Credit: Pacific Marine News

At the post launch luncheon held in the model room of the shipyard at Whiteinch, Barclay, Curle's Chairman James Gilchrist said "Missanabie was the first vessel they had built for the Canadian Pacific Company and express hoped she might in the forefront of many others. Unfortunately, the Missanabie was a little behind time in delivery, not through any fault of the builders, but because of the  great flood  of unrest, not only in this country, but in other countries of Europe.  The working men would not help the builders do their duty in the way they ought to do, and the consequence was that, so far as he knew, everyone in the shipping world was behind time with the delivery of new shipping. It was quite possible, however, as far as the Missanabie was concerned, that they might be able to make up time in the fitting out. At any rate, the Canadian Pacific Company could rest assured that they were not more anxious to get delivery of the boat than the builders were get their money."

Of course, between her launching and completion, Great Britain declared war on the Central Powers and the British Empire, including Canada, was in the conflict.  Practically all of the Canadian route liners were immediately requisitioned for extended war service, many as armed merchant cruisers, and they and others transported the First Contingent of the Canadian Expeditionary Force  to England in October 1914.  Given the need to both clear the yard as well as add a vitally needed vessel to the fleet, either in her original capacity or as a transport, fitting out of Missanabie continued.  

Canadian Gazette, 17 September 1914

On 14 September 1914 it was announced Missanabie would sail from Liverpool on 7 October and scheduled to reach Montreal on the 14th or 15th and make her first sailing from the port on the 22nd. 

Missanabie arrived at Liverpool from her builders on 30 September  1914 and returned to  the Clyde, in a loaded condition with 2,500 tons of bunkers and ballast, to run her trials on 2 October. Of the six double runs on the Skelmorlie measured mile, the final two recorded an average speed of 17.5 knots or two in excess of contract speed. Aboard were James Gilchrist, Chairman of Barclay, Curle and Director N.E. Peck whilst CPR were represented by Major Maitland Kersey.

Missananbie on her trials in the Clyde. Credit: NMM

The fact that the power and might of the British Navy enables Canada's shipping and commerce to be carried on as in times of peace, although the Empire is engaged in the greatest war the world has known, is  making a very deep impression on the public mind of the Dominion. Tangible evidence of the fruit of Britain's naval strength is  brought home to Canadians in the recent announcement that on October 7 the Canadian Pacific's fine liner, the Missanabie, will undertake her maiden voyage from Liverpool to Canada.

Western Mail, 24 September 1914.

For Canadian Pacific, Missanabie would replace the chartered Allan liner Virginian which, after her 4 November 1914 sailing, joined her sister Victorian on H.M. Service, as well as Lake Manitoba (last sailing 10  October) and would maintain a skeleton service with another chartered Allan liner, Grampian.  And whilst British papers could remind Canadians of the power and might of the Royal Navy, as the war on the Western Front ground to stalemate and the bloodletting of Ypres, the Dominion would be increasingly called on for  more drafts of men to augment the Canadian Expeditionary Force, all of whom had to be transported there. The ensuing months would see considerable changes, sudden cancellations as the dwindling number of liners on the Canadian run were long or  short term chartered for war service.  But in the meantime, CPR had a new ship to dispatch on her maiden voyage.

Credit: The Globe, 24 September 1914

Credit: The Gazette, 15 September 1914. 

The new twin-screw steamer Missanabie, of the Canadian Pacific fleet, has sailed, her maiden trip being taken as scheduled, notwithstanding war conditions. 

Gazette, 8 October 1914

Under Capt. G.C. Evans, formerly commanding Lake Manitoba, R.M.S. Missanabie sailed from Liverpool on 2 October 1914 with 466 Cabin and 462 Third Class passengers. It was the first maiden voyage, in commercial service, of a new liner during the war, but would not be the last. 

"The Meeting of the Waters"... after crossing the North Atlantic, Missanabie in the St. Lawrence River coming into Quebec. 

Quebec, October 15-- Another chapter has been added to the history of trans-Atlantic travel-- the arrival here of the elegant C.P.R. Missanabie on her maiden voyage. After a somewhat misty morning, the broke out towards noon and lit up the St. Lawrence flood with its cheery light. As she swung round Point Levis into the roadstead, the beautiful lines of the Missanabie were clear and sharp, the Quebec realized it was indeed a feather in her cap that she be should the first port in Canada to welcome so splendid a vessel. It was symbolic of the times that the Missanabie should be built with the new cruiser stern; indeed, except for the color of her hull and the number of her funnels, she is not unlike the Empress of Russia or Empress of Asia, the trans-Pacific fliers which the British Admiralty prompty requisitioned on the outbreak of hostilities for use as armored cruisers on far Eastern waters. Two flags, signifying the password of the day, showed that the Missanabie had the right of entry into port. She is a fine looking ship.

Gazette, 16 October 1914

 

'She is all right,' said Capt. Murray, the harbor master, as he scanned her with critical  eye," reported the Gazette whilst adding that "Nearly a thousand passengers travelled by the Missanabie… the passengers were full of admiration of the beautiful equipment furnishings of the ship..."Nearly a thousand passengers travelled by the Missanabie… the passengers were full of admiration of the beautiful equipment furnishings of the ship..."on her trial trip the Missanabie developed a speed of seventeen and a half knots, and though naturally this speed was not aimed at on her first trans-Atlantic trip, she made good time and proved herself a good sea-going boat.'

Proceeding up river, Missanabie became the very first new Canadian Pacific liner to call at the Port of Montreal when she came in the afternoon of 16 October 1914, docking at No. 9 shed, St. Suplice St.:

When the stately bulk of the Canadian Pacific twin screw steamer Missanabie swung slowly into dock yesterday afternoon with its decks filled with passengers, exclamations of admiration dropped from the lips of all those who had come to meet friends and had been attracted by the reports sent out from Quebec of the new steamer. Those who were able to on board after the passengers had disembarked there was nothing extravagant in the in the praise which has run ahead of the vessel, and the passengers who had come over spoke in terms of the highest praise of the excellent accommodation, the luxurious fittings and the steadiness of the boat in rough weather."

'There was only one day of rough weather,' said one passenger, 'but on that day we could notice little difference in the steadiness of the vessel. From the standpoint as well as others too high praise cannot be given it,' In other words, every passenger spoke to gave the same testimony.

Gazette, 17 October 1914

A notable day: 22 October 1914 when the very first new Canadian Pacific liner sailed from Montreal. Credit: Calgary Herald, 22 September 1914. 

Over 500 Montrealers visited Missanabie on 20 October 1914 and came away, according to  the Gazette, captivated with the vessel:

General  admiration was evinced at the handsome fittings and equipment of the vessel, surprise being expressed by many experienced travellers that such luxurious accommodation should be provided on a one-class cabin vessel. 

Surprise was exhibited at the manner in which the passenger quarters have been fitted  up so as to  break away from the old ideas of naval architecture, the interior more resembling a good hotel than a ship-- the idea being to take passengers' minds off seafaring traditions, so that seasick people would  have every opportunity to make speedy recovery. This principle extends even to the pictures, which instead of being the old time seascapes with vessels laboring in storms, are reproductions of the works of the world famous masters. While the dining room is a handsome roomy chamber, the smoking room seemed to attract many of the guests, and it is a decided innovation in marine architecture. It is finished in plaster with oaken beams and a general Tudor effect, with pictures of the Holbein school.

Another attractive feature is the card room, conveniently located, and with accommodation for half a dozen sets, while not far distant is the library, which is  kept equipped with the sort of books that people on a voyage like to read. For more vigorous passengers there is a well equipped gymnasium, with all sorts of muscle and appetite inducing devices, which proved very popular with the visitors during the afternoon.

At daybreak on 22 October 1914, Missanabie sailed from Montreal on her maiden eastbound crossing, with 366  Second Class and 654 Third Class passengers aboard. In addition to 2,000 bags of mail, among her outbound cargo was a special shipment of 1.2 mn one-pound tins of salmon, "British Columbia's gift to the motherland" which was dispatched from Vancouver on 10 October 1914 by special train to Montreal for loading on the new ship. On the 31st Missanabie arrived at Liverpool, the Liverpool Echo noting that  "A number of Canadian volunteers for the front were amongst those on board."

Credit: Saskatoon Daily Star, 10 October 1914

Beginning her second voyage on 6 November 1914, Missanabie left Liverpool with 321 Second and 332 Third Class passengers.

Cabs, omnibuses, transfer wagons and motor vans in large numbers and assortments filled the space before the Canadian Pacific sheds yesterday afternoon in readiness for the Missanabie, which completed its second trip to Canada about 5 o'clock in the afternoon. There were 653 passengers on board, 321 second cabin and 332 third class. Many had left the boat at Quebec, but there was still enough of a crowd to make the shed a very lively place when all the passengers were ashore, looking for their luggage. The third class passengers had gone ashore at Quebec, as well, but the hundreds who remained indicated very well the nature of the people, and the kind of the business that was bringing them to Canada.

Gazette, 17 November 1914

To have sailed eastbound from Montreal  on 20 November 1914 (closing out the season), Missanabie (with 435 Second and 1,149 Third Class) and Allan's Corinthian were both detained at the pier for the day owing to a severe snowstorm sweeping the upper river and Gulf. The Gazette reported on how their passengers occupied themselves: 

So the ships, filled with passengers, lay beside their docks, and the life usual on shipboard went on with  the single variation that there was none of the movement that accompanies the wash of waves along the sides of a vessel that is steaming along at a good speed.

The scene on the Missanabie last night to one who had just board it, after ploughing keen deep through the snow that has fallen all along the water front, was a picture of pleasant cheer and home comfort. Little groups of friends were gathered around the tables in the card room or the drawing room playing bridge or indulging in conversation. Many of the women were knitting garments for the soldiers as they talked, and it looked more like a scene in a popular high class hotel where the guests were on intimate terms with each other than anything else. The promenades were freely used by those needing air, the orchestra played throughout the day and the gymnasium was the centre of a crowd of active young men who used all the novel apparatus installed there, and got great enjoyment as well as exercise out of it."

Missanabie docked at Liverpool 30 November 1914. 

Credit: The Victoria Times, 21 November 1914

Metagama's godmother, Lady Emma L. Biles, whose husband, John Harvard Biles, was of one of the pre-eminent naval architects of the Victorian Era.  From a painting by Maurice Greiffenhagen. Credit: artuk.org, Hunterian Art Gallery, University of Glasgow. 

If Missanabie was the first to make a commercial maiden voyage during the War, her sister was the first launched during it, when, on the afternoon of 19 November 1914, she was christened Metagama by Lady Emma L. Biles, wife of John Harvard Biles, the famous Admiralty naval architect and professor  of naval architecture who had designed such famous liners as City of Paris, City of New York and America.  "When the Metagama went down the ways she created a record which bids fair to remain unbroken by any shipping company engaged in Canadian or American business. She is the fourth vessel [in addition to Missanabie, Princess Irene and Princess Margaret] launched by the Canadian Pacific on the Clyde this year. In the light of present conditions, this is a glowing commentary on the substantial condition of her owners' exchequer." (Gazette, 20 November 1914).

Press coverage in the middle of a worsening global war of the launch of a new passenger ship was predictably low-keyed and centered mainly on the fact that she was among four new vessels launched in 1914 for Canadian Pacific in British yards. 

 To coincide with the announcement, a huge, highly detailed model of Metagama, some 12 ft. long, was unveiled at CPR's James Street booking hall in James Street, Montreal.  Indicative of wartime conditions, however, the launch was a low-keyed and publicised affair for which not  a single photograph appears to have been published. 

A year ago, Sir Thomas Shaughnessy, head of the C.P.R.Co. told the St. John Board of Trade that St. John was the winter port of  that big transcontinental system, and it was up to St. John to provide facilities for  the steamships of his company, otherwise the boats would have to go elsewhere. He was taken at his word. 

The city got busy, and was backed by the  Federal Government, they set out to provide the C.P.R. with the pier privileges asked for.

Night and day since then, the Maritime Construction, with concrete plants, dredges and reclamation engineers, have been at work, and when the first C.P.R. steamer Missanabie arrives on the 9th or 10th December, not only will the new pier and warehouse be ready for use, but sufficient reclamation will have been done to permit of the C.P.R. laying two lines of track to the new ocean berth.

The Board of Trade contemplates having a 'blow out' of the some kind to  mark the opening of the pier, when the big steamer comes next next month.

The Journal of  Commerce, 28  November 1914

With 125 Second and 176 Third Class passengers aboard, Missanabie cleared Liverpool on 2 December 1914 on her first winter crossing. This, too, would be her first to St. John, inaugurating both Canadian Pacific's service there and the new pier facilities that enabled it. She docked there on the 10th.  Her eastbound trip, getting underway on the 15th, was that year's Christmas Crossing and was very well subscribed with 346 Second and 1,083 Third Class. This reached the other side on Christmas Eve as reported by The Ottawa Citizen of the 26th:  "The Christmas ship Missanabie arrived in Liverpool in good time on Thursday (24th) after a fairly good voyage. She was filled in every part with people anxious to spend the Christmas season in the Old Country. It was agreeable to note that the passengers landed in good time for Christmas Day an experience which did not befall the voyagers the previous two seasons as they only only arrived here in Christmas day  itself."

In her first year, Missanabie completed four crossings and carried 4,896 passengers  (1,883 westbound and 3,073 eastbound).

Missanabie at Quebec when new and still in full peacetime livery.   

MONOCLASS MATES

She was built for a tough route and looked it. Not designed for speed, her engines and boilers were of the usual well-tried types and the essential  feature behind her design was, I should say, reliability and good sea-keeping qualities. If ships can be likened to people, and I think they can, she was one of those sturdy rugged types who take life as it comes, without worry and with good cheer and one can imagine her thumping her way across in North Atlantic weather quite happily and little worry as to speed.

J.H. Isherwood, Metagama of 1915, Sea Breezes, March 1963

The principal feature in her design is the very fine accommodation for passengers. What is nominally second-class is really first-class in character, and the passenger rooms and cabins all through are remarkably commodious and comfortable. 

Marine Engineer & Naval Architect, November, 1914

As bookends to the remarkable output of handsome liners that characterised the Edwardian Era, Missanabie and Metagama presented a "new  look" that  admittedly did not compare well with an Empress of Asia or Alsatian which preceded them.  Writing of them in his British Passenger Liners of the Five Oceans, Cmdr. C.R. Vernon Gibbs, characterised the Ms as "ugly ships" which is surely a bit harsh.  Incorporating the still novel cruiser stern, this was of a much heavier and straight profiled version which, mated to quite beamy hulls, contributed to an impression of "ruggedness" rather than grace.  The superstructure, too, was almost naval in its minimalist qualities, with two shorter than usual funnels for the era, which were set quite aft and bit close together, reflecting the compact arrangement of the machinery spaces.   In broader terms, Missanabie and Metagama looked "modern" and different, reflecting their progressive "one-class" Cabin virtues.

Sturdy, rugged stalwart: a profile that sums up the virtues of Missanabie and Metagama. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection 

"In their arrangement and equipment every attention has been paid to the special requirements of the Atlantic service, and in this respect mention must  be  of the work of Major H. Maitland Kersey, D.S.O., and his staff, under whose supervision on behalf of  the Canadian Pacific Railway Co. the vessels have been built."

Shipbuilder, December 1914

It is telling that Shipbuilder used the same paragraph, save for substituting "Pacific" for "Atlantic" when describing Empress of Russia and Empress of  Asia and no  other line seemed as reticent to name the specific naval architect(s) responsible for the design of their principal ships.  In a later newspaper description of Missanabie, it was added  "the vessel has been constructed under the personal supervision of Major H. Maitland Kersey and his staff, Mr. Gray, Captain Forster, Mr. Gilles, Mr. Baird, Mr. Bell and Mr. Russell" which is sufficiently vague to serve every purpose.  Of course, Metagama was launched by the wife of one of Britain's most  pre-eminent naval architects, Sir John Biles, but he is not believed to  have had direct hand in the design of this groundbreaking pair of CPR intermediates with the possible exception of their lifeboat arrangements as detailed later. Although their rather naval qualities of line certainly makes Biles' hand in their general profile an intriguing possibility. If they were indeed "designed by committee" in the end and possibly looked it, so be it. 

A wonderful quartering stern view of Missanabie on trials captures her rugged, businesslike quality. Credit: Shipbuilding & Shipping Record, courtesy William T. Tilley. 

With principal measurements of 12,469 tons (gross), 520 ft. length (overall), 500 ft. length (b.p.) and a beam of  64 ft., they were stubbier than their new Cunard competition, Andania and Alaunia, which had another 20 ft. in length, but the same breadth.

Each ship had seven decks:  Boat (A), Upper Promenade (B), Lower Promenade (C), Shelter (D), Upper (E), Main (F) and Lower (G) with Boat Deck extending 194 ft. amidships and Upper Promenade 250 ft. amidships and the others the full length of the vessel.  The scantlings and plating forward were specially  strengthened for navigation in the loose ice and growlers seasonally encountered in the St. Lawrence and its gulf. In addition, to a full double bottom, the hull was divided by ten watertight bulkheads and designed to stay afloat with any three compartments flooded. 

No other line did more to embrace and popularise the cruiser stern than CPR and with Missanabie and Metagama it assumed a fuller, squarer shape with no inward slope to add interior space and suit the placement of the stern anchor, a feature of St. Lawrence run vessels. Credit: Pacific Marine News.

The cargo capacity was considerable, amounting to a 400,000 cu. ft. capacity or a deadweight of 8,770 tons, carried in seven holds, four forward and three aft and the entire vessel, save for engine spaces and bunkers, below Main Deck was devoted to  the carriage of cargo. The working of cargo was entirely by mast-mounted booms (including one of 25-ton capacity) with just one short and unobtrusive pair of  kingposts aft of the bridge island, adding to the clean and neat visual effect. 

Following the post-Caronia doctrine that direct-drive turbines were not economical in intermediate sized ships below 18-knots, Missanabie and Metagama were powered by conventional reciprocating engines; indeed it was not until Montcalm of 1922 that CPR introduced their first all turbine-powered ship on the North Atlantic, nine years after they did so  on the Pacific. 

Elevation of the Port Engine. Credit: The Shipbuilder & Marine Engine Builder, January 1915.

In the new sisters, each of the two quadruple-expansion had cylinders of 26, 37½, 53½ and 77 in. diameter, balanced on the Yarrow, Schlick and Tweedy system, with a stroke of 51 in. and together developed 9,000 s.h.p., driving twin four-bladed screws. Steam was generated by eight single-ended cylindrical boilers, each with four furnaces, and working at 215 p.s.i.  These burned coal with a daily consumption of 150 tons a day and 2,380 tons was stored  all in wing bunkers, with no cross spaces, to  ease the movement of coal to the furnaces.  When announced, it was widely heralded that they were designed for easy conversion to oil-fuel  (then just introduced with Niagara), but remained coal-fired for their whole careers. All of this gave Missanabie and Metagama a normal sea speed of 15.5 knots and they topped this by two knots on trials.  Given the 13.5-knot Lake-class ships they replaced, this was a considerable improvement indeed. 

The most distinctive aspect of the  ships was their lifesaving equipment, specifically their lifeboats, both in type, quantity and method of handling and launching. Post-Titanic, this obviously assumed great urgency, appraisal and invention to provide lifesaving equipment for all (passengers and crew).  The Board Of Trade formed a Boats And Davits Committee headed by Sir John Biles to study the issue and make recommendations.  Therein lay the connection between Missanabie and Metagama (launched by Lady Emma Biles) and one of Britain's re-eminent naval architects.  They were the very first liners to accommodate all passengers and crew in full wooden lifeboats without use of collapsible or "decked" boats or rafts of any description.  These had been the expedient way to add lifesaving capacity, but were of dubious value in a real emergency given the considerable difficulties in moving, erecting and finally launching them as well as their seakeeping qualities.  

The Murray patented "nested boat" arrangement, at conventional davits aft on Missanabie. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London. 

Diagram for the Babcock & Wilcox Patent Double-Acting davits, first introduced by Missanabie and Metagama. Credit: Shipbuilding & Shipping Record, 16 April 1914.

So it was that Babcock & Wilcox, best known of course for its boilers, concocted an ingenious jib-boom type deck-mounted crane type davit. This would, uniquely, move and lower any number of nested lifeboats on either side of the ship, either individually or in tandem with the davit on the other side of the ship.  This worked with the patented nested-boat concept developed by Capt. P.D. Murray of Liverpool which stacked wooden boats of 30 ft., 28 ft. and 26 ft.to accommodate 170 persons total with three boats or 135 with two.  Canadian Pacific were among the first to  adopt this  to some  degree in Empress of Russia and Empress of Asia of 1913 although at conventional davits.  Now, with Missananbie and Metagama they combined the idea with the new Babcock and Wilcox  system with a pair of the new davits aft on the Boat Deck to work a set of four "nests' of boats.In addition, the ships, following the lead of Alsatian and Calgarian, had one motor lifeboat.  

The pioneering Babcock & Wilcox jib crane davit  system aft on Missanabie's Boat Deck. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London. 

Showing a boat being hoisted and traversed. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

The new davits were sufficiently successful to be installed, in double sets, in the later M-class cabin  ships, but they were, of course, unsightly and space consuming to say the least. There was also unanswered question as how passengers were mustered to facilitate embarkation with the boats clustered at a few locations. 

The real solution lay in the substantial reduction of passengers carried post immigration restrictions and the development of much larger capacity single boats carried in gravity davits over the deck and thus out of the way and more efficiently and quickly lowered whilst permitting easy mustering of occupants of passengers at each boat.  Here, again, CPR took the lead with their "Duchesses" of 1928 being the first British North Atlantic liners with gravity davits. 

R.M.S. MISSANABIE &  METAGAMA

General Arrangement & Deck Plans

from  The Shipbuilder & Marine Engine Builder December 1914

courtesy: William T. Tilley

(LEFT CLICK on image to view full size scan)

Profile & Rigging Plan

Boat Deck

Upper Promenade Deck

Lower Promenade Deck

Shelter Deck

Upper Deck

Main Deck

Lower Deck

Although a one-cabin boat every effort has been made to make its appointments second to none, and the dining-room, smoking-room, card-room, drawing-room, lounge, café, gymnasium and other features of the most modern vessels are furnished and decorated in accordance with plans of the best British architects and furnishings. The decoration is of the Georgian period.

Gazette, 14 September 1914

Famed English country house designer and decorator George A. Crawley was CPR's main interior designer from Empress of Russia (1913) to Empress of Canada (1922). 

The Cabin Class of these ships was exceptionally well laid out and impressively decorated. Indeed, their interiors were entrusted to the same interior architect who had designed Empress of  Russia, Empress of Asia, Alsatian and Calgarian: George A. Crawley (1864-1926). For Missanabie and Metagama, he perfected a pleasingly and suitably more modest interpretation of the Georgian era themes he employed in Empress of  Asia and Calgarian. Indeed, this "Edwardian Liner Georgian" decor was a  hallmark of an entire generation of liners of the era and one of their most appealing features. His involvement in these ships marked the first time a noted interior designer had a hand in intermediate "one-class" liners.  The furnishings were executed by the well-known firm of Wylie & Lockhead of Glasgow which had been outfitting Clyde-built passenger vessels since the 1870s and indeed pioneered this specialised trade.  

The interiors of Missanabie and Metagama, as were so many Clydebank-built liners since the 1870s, were fitted by the well-known firm of Wylie & Lochhead, Glasgow. Credit: The Syren & Shipping, 27 March 1908.

Amidst the evolving carnage and destruction of the Western Front, that any of this could have been accomplished was both a testament to the expansive qualities of British arts and industry and of the Empire itself for which the essentials of overseas commerce could still be realised with style, quality and workmanship.

General  admiration was evinced at the handsome fittings and equipment of the vessel, surprise being expressed by many experienced travellers that such luxurious accommodation should be provided on a one-class cabin vessel. 

Surprise was exhibited at the manner in which the passenger quarters have been fitted  up so as to  break away from the old ideas of naval architecture, the interior more resembling a good hotel than a ship-- the idea being to take passengers' minds off seafaring traditions, so that seasick people would  have every opportunity to make speedy recovery. This principle extends even to the pictures, which instead of being the old time seascapes with vessels laboring in storms, are reproductions of the works of the world famous masters. While the dining room is a handsome roomy chamber, the smoking room seemed to attract many of the guests, and it is a decided innovation in marine architecture. It is finished in plaster with oaken beams and a general Tudor effect, with pictures of the Holbein school.

Another attractive feature is the card room, conveniently located, and with accommodation for half a dozen sets, while not far distant is the library, which is  kept equipped with the sort of books that people on a voyage like to read. For more vigorous passengers there is a well equipped gymnasium, with all sorts of muscle and appetite inducing devices, which proved very popular with the visitors during the afternoon.

Gazette, 20 October 1914

Missanabie's Boat Deck looking aft from the flying bridge.  She is lying midstream in the Mersey having just arrived from her builders and trials. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

On Boat Deck, amidships in its own deckhouse between the funnels, was the Second (Cabin) Class gymnasium which was exceptionally large and "replete with every ingenious device for providing the voyager with suitable exercises." (Shipbuilder). Forward of the funnel, the deckhouse containing the wireless office and accommodation was raised over the main lounge directly below.  Separated by the no. 4 hatch (worked by a very inconspicuous pair of kingposts) was the bridge island with the wheelhouse and captain's accommodation.  

The Gymnasium. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London

The main Second (Cabin) public rooms were on Upper Promenade Deck, the forward island of which contained officers' accommodation.  In the main deck house was the lounge, a remarkably impressive room with windows on three sides and opening directly to the top of the main staircase.  Here, the extra height afforded the raised deckhouse was most apparent adding "considerably to their roomy and pleasant appearance, as well as giving increased air space and ventilation. Prominent among the many pleasing effects which are instituted is that provided by the bay windows, which afford comfortable recessed seats." (Shipbuilder).  Painted in warm white, contrasting with the oak staircase, it had full carpeting, floral or patterned soft furnishings and  full-length decorative mirrored panels in either end of the central area.

Missanabie  lounge, looking forward. Credit: National Maritime Museum,Greenwich, London.

Missanabie lounge, looking aft. Credit: National Maritime Museum,Greenwich, London.

Metagama, lounge. Credit: National Maritime Museum,Greenwich, London.

Leading aft via wide passageways athwart the forward funnel casing which were arranged as seating areas with sofas and two writing alcoves with bay windows, one came to the drawing room, beautifully panelled and the most elegant room in the ship with an electric fire in a handsome  marble fireplace, typical Georgian style plaster ceilings overhead and full carpeting underfoot. These were the only rooms that were decorated quite differently in terms of panelling and upholstery in each ship.

 

Missanabie drawing room. Credit: National Maritime Museum,Greenwich, London.

Missanabie drawing room. Credit: National Maritime Museum,Greenwich, London.

Metagama drawing room. Credit: National Maritime Museum,Greenwich, London.

From the drawing room, one could proceed aft via a port side panelled corridor with windows overlooking the promenade deck.  On the starboard side, this area was arranged as a card  room, cleverly done as a series of alcoves with bay windows and accessible only aft from the smoking room so  not as to  act as another fore to aft corridor. 

Portside passageway linking the drawing room with the smoking room. Credit: National Maritime Museum,Greenwich, London. 

.

Metagama card room (on the starboardside) accessed from the smoking room. The domed ceiling light fixtures had yet to be installed before the photo was taken! Credit: National Maritime Museum,Greenwich, London.

Traditionally sited aft, the smoking room was the most derivative, being a simplified and reduced version of Crawley's similar space in Empress of Asia with its traditional timber and plaster treatment and the booth seating on the sides with table and chairs in the center whilst the ceiling incorporated the traditional camber of the deck overhead. 

Missanabie smoking room, looking aft. Credit: National Maritime Museum,Greenwich, London.

Metagama, smoking room, facing forward, on the starboard the card room is just visible past the aft foyer. Credit: National Maritime Museum,Greenwich, London.

Finally, and a real Edwardian hallmark, the veranda café, half-enclosed and looking over the stern.

Missanabie veranda café.  Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London

Missanabie promenade deck facing aft. Note the bay windows to the lounge. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London

Missanabie promenade deck facing forward. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London

The simplicity of Crawley's Georgian architecture and its clean contrasts of white enamel and quartered oak panelling and staircases was especially attractive in the ships' foyers, passageways and staircases. The aft staircase, in particular, was particularly well done with handsome panelling and balistrades with a skylight at its Promenade Deck summit. As a nice  foil to the period effects was the rubber decking in bold modern designs.

Missanabie aft staircase, Upper Promenade Deck. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

Missanabie aft staircase, Lower Promenade Deck. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

Missanabie forward foyer, Lower Promenade Deck.  Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

Situated just forward of amidships on Upper Deck, the Second (Cabin) Class dining saloon had seats for 272 at a mix of large and small tables, including a remarkable number tables for two for the era.  This had an open well in the centre portion extending through Shelter Deck.  Here, the  simple direct Georgian architecture was most apparent with all-white panelling and dark polished wood buffets and the traditional swivel chairs.  Here, the portholes were given a larger 16" dia. than the 12" standard ones.

Missanabie, dining saloon. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

Missanabie dining saloon. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

Missanabie and Metagama each had berths for 520 passengers in two and four-berth cabins, each "cabin class stateroom has a wardrobe, chest of drawers, folding lavatory with mirror and other conveniences." These were located on Lower Promenade Deck and Shelter Deck (starboardside and also aft). 

Missanabie cabin no. 2. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London

Missanabie, cabin no. 38. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

Missanabie, cabin no. 87. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

Third Class, with 1,200 berths, benefited, too, from being one of the only two classes and thus deriving excellent deck  aft normally assigned Second in three-class liners. Morever, the accommodation was  concentrated on but two decks and there were no inferior "portable" cabins.

Missanabie Third Class smoking room. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London

Missanabie Third Class ladies lounge. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London

The public rooms comprised a smoking room aft of the open deck space on Lower Promenade Deck and a ladies lounge directly below adjacent to the covered promenade on Shelter Deck.  A large additional room was forward on the same deck, below the Third Class entrance and open deck space. This was  fitted out either a temporary overflow dining area or a large common room.  The two permanent dining saloons were aft of the  galley separating them from that for First Class, each with 210 seats. 

Missanabie, Third Class after most dining saloon. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London

Missanabie, Third Class aft dining saloon. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London

Accommodation, all in private cabins, with two, four or six berths, was aft on Upper Deck (two sections of 82 and 64 total berths) and another three sections forward on the same deck with 112, 102 and 70 berths) and Main Deck with three sections aft (136, 104 and 48  berths) and three forward with 156, 98 and 66 berths.

Third Class four-berth cabin no. 16. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

Third Class four-berth cabin no. 206. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

Third Class six-berth cabin. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

Third Class open deck space aft on Lower Promenade Deck. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

Surviving the war, Metagama had the opportunity for the usual progression of alternations, redecoratings and re-arranging afforded ships with reasonably long careers, or ones whose initial design proved inadequate for subsequent service.  For Metagama, she had but a dozen years after the War and on a trade unchanged in its essentials from that before it, so the changes were comparatively few.  Her accommodation was then listed as being 518 Cabin Class and 1,138 Third Class. 

The one external alteration was to the bridge front.  The original siting of the wheelhouse was found to be too low, impeding a good view over the bows so the original bridge front was glazed in and an upper flying bridge with a small-enclosed wheelhouse and bridge wing boxes added as well.  This arrangement was similar to that in the new Montclare-trio.

Metagama (left) showing original bridge front and (right) post-war.

Internally, Metagama resumed commercial service with few changes, principal among them being the conversion of the Cabin Class gymnasium into a children's playroom and nursery.  The Cabin smoking room received more attractive (and comfortable) armchairs similar to  those found in Melita and Minnedosa and different furnishings were introduced in both the lounge and drawing room. In Third Class, the "overflow" dining saloon was permanently used as a enclosed deck and recreation area.  

The former gymnasium as converted into a children's playroom post-war. Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London. 

The smoking room with more attractive leather upholstered armchairs as fitted post-war. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection 

A late (c. 1929) redecoration of the Cabin Class dining saloon introduced contrasting colour enamelling and broke up the long centre tables. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection

The biggest change to the ship was in October 1927 when her accommodation was re-arranged for 290 Cabin, 229 Tourist Third and 1,011 Third Class.  Whilst the development of Tourist Third worked well for three-class ships, it was less easily  or attractively accomplished in the original Cabin Boats and, of course, defeated their  intended purpose and appeal. It inevitably involved "shoehorning" and contriving of separate public room and deck space on ships of already modest proportions in most cases. 

In Metagama, Tourist Third got the former Cabin accommodation on B Deck (229 berths total) and as public rooms, the Cabin card room and smoking room and the forward Third Class dining saloon. Deck space was the starboardside aft of the Promenade Deck and aft on A Deck.  To enlarge the space to serve as the lounge, the veranda cafe was enclosed and joined with the room with large windows facing aft. It worked, in a fashion, but the original handsome stem-to-stern Cabin arrangement was more attractive on every level. 

R.M.S.  METAGAMA

Deck Plans as a three-class vessel

January 1929

Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection

(LEFT CLICK on image to view full size scan)

Metagama as a three-class liner c. 1927-30

R.M.S. Missanabie, by Odin Rosenvinge, from a C.P.R. poster, c. 1914

CROSSING & TROOPING

The part played by  the Canadian Pacific Ocean Services in the  great European war will make a big chapter in Canadian history. Undoubtedly the sea supremacy of Great Britain was one of the most potent factors in the winning of the victory which was obtained, and the ships of the C.P.O.S. took a big part in making Great Britain supreme at sea… The Missanabie, a C.P.O.S. steamer, was the first big vessel to  sail on her maiden voyage from Great Britain to Canada after the outbreak of war in 1914, a sister ship, the Metagama, sailed on her maiden voyage from Liverpool, March 26th, 1915. 

Red Deer Advocate, 24 January 1919

Unusually if not uniquely, this was a pair of sister ships that managed to be completed and make their maiden voyages as fully fledged commercial liners during a world war, and in the case of  Metagama, also be launched during one.  By doing so, Missanabie and Metagama profoundly demonstrated the dominance of Great Britain as the supreme naval power, whose reach and presence extended to the Empire and the Dominions. No other belligerent power could have "carried on" with commissioning two new ocean liners in wartime nor was any other global empire was more dependent on them, as with every sort of merchant ship, to survive.  Such ships also facilitated the fullest measure of duty and devotion to the Mother Country by the transport of tens of divisions of men  from the Dominions to battlefronts in Europe and across the world. Missanabie and Metagama played a major  role in the transport of the Canadian Expeditionary Force en route to glory at Ypres, the Somme, Vimy Ridge and Amiens, repatriating wounded and invalided soldiers and carrying military dependents.  In all, they carried some 66,000 military passengers of every description. 

Missanabie and Metagama spent the first four years of their lives on the North Atlantic, but in a sometimes bewildering (and conflicting) dual role as commercial passenger liner eastbound and troop transport westbound. It was a blurring of functions that would be tested and further defined in the evolving Battle of the Atlantic waged mostly with submarines. And sufficiently unusual that the Trans-Atlantic Passenger Ship Conference routinely still listed every one of their crossings from the outbreak of the war through 1916, even those carrying only troops, with an exact accounting of passengers carried and according to which class. 

Not too many lines could promote two brand new ocean liners in 1915. Credit: Canadian Gazette, 25 February 1915.

1915

Having already broken ground with one wartime maiden voyage, CPR announced another on 6 January 1915: Metagama  from Liverpool on 26 March to St. John and her first eastbound crossing to begin 9 April.  Noting that her sister Missanabie had completed three round voyages, the Saskatoon Daily Star added: "The  cabin class of ship is particularly popular with those wanted a maximum of comfort at a minimum cost, and the policy of the Canadian Pacific in placing ships of this class in the Liverpool-Canadian service is being highly commended."

The war curtailed most immigrant traffic, but one somewhat unusual trade that CPR profited by during this period was the large number of Russians living in Western Canada  wishing to return home at the outbreak of the war, many being reservists in the army.  "In present conditions the Russians have a predilection for travelling by British routes, feeling safer under the Union Jack." Paying a flat rate of $54.25 a Russia-bound traveller could sail by CPR steamer to Liverpool and connect there for service to Sweden or Finland and thence overland to  Petrograd. "It is stated that a large number of Russians who have been in Chicago and the Western States are taking advantage of this service. One party will come through Montreal and sail for  Petrograd by the Missanabie, which leaves St. John on January 15, while another party will sail by the Grampian on the 29th" (The Windsor Star 12 January 1915).

Sailing from Liverpool on 5 February 1915 with 132 Second and 202 Third Class, Missanabie began a new pattern of calls to facilitate carriage of troops eastbound  with Halifax added to St. John for embarkation of troops and also calling at Plymouth where military personnel were landed at Devonport. Missanabie docked Halifax on the 14th and the next day at St. John. Among those landed at Halifax were 14 "alien suspects,"  of German and Austrian birth, who had enlisted in Canada's first contingent and being suspected of "disloyal  sentiment" were returned, and "marched, each man handcuffed to  a guard, to the Citadel, and there imprisoned." The Leader Post 15 February 1915. She docked at St. John the next day. 

The Dominion raised a second Canadian Division by December 1914 which was transported, unlike the first, not in one convoy, but gradually in individual vessels over three months. One of Missananbie and Metagama's earliest and most important war duties was figuring materially in this movement whilst still maintaining some semblance of a regular service, at least eastbound. 

Men of the 23rd Battalion (Vancouver, B.C.) boarding Missanabie at Halifax on 21 February 1915 (left) and Battalion officer staff aboard (right). Credit: http://canadianexpeditionaryforce1914-1919.blogspot.com/

Missanabie at Halifax before sailing with units of the Canada's Second Contingent. Her peacetime colours, or at least the funnel buff and white superstructure, have been cloaked in wartime grey. 

Missanabie at Halifax before sailing, showing to advantage her full stern and stern anchor.  Credit: Simplon postcards.com

With great secrecy, the first group of Canada's Second Contingent, 4,000 men in Megantic and Southland bound for Queenstown and 160 officers and 1,393 men in Missanabie left Halifax at 8:00 a.m. 23 February 1915.  Aboard Missanabie were the 23rd Bttn. and 35 officers and 1,104 other ranks of the 30th Bttn. Providing an escort were H.M.S. Essex and H.M.S. Glory. She arrived safely at Avonmouth on the 6th.

  

If it sailed in secrecy, the safe arrival of the Second Contingent was afforded major coverage in the Canadian press. Credit: Ottawa Evening Journal, 8 March 1915. 

Danger from submarines did not deter the Canadian Pacific Railway from carrying out the usual trials of the new 13,000 ton liner Metagama yesterday." "The trial was successful in ever way, the new liner attaining a speed of 17½ knots an hour.

Gazette, 4 March 1915

Credit: Ottawa Journal, 4 March 1915

Meanwhile, Metagama had completed her trials.  This were run 2-3 March 1915 on the Skelmorlie measured mile with a distinguished party of guests aboard including CPR Ocean Services Manager Major H. Maitland Kersey, Jas. Gray superintendent engineer, Sir John Biles, Barclay Curle's director J. Gilchrist and Capt. Christie and J. Martin of Allan Line. "The visitors were entertained to lunch and taken over the ship but there was no speech making, and the only toast was that of the King." (Gazette).  It was added that "Capt. George George Webster, takes command of the Metagama and is looking forward to some speedier voyage than were performed on the Lake Manitoba. He anticipates that the Metagama will become a great favorite with Canadians." A top speed of 17.5 knots was recorded and the vessel docked at Liverpool on the 3rd.   Thus, both of the Ms were in port together for the first time. 

Credit: Nottingham Daily Express, 25 February 1915.

So far as it can be ascertained to date, the Missanabie and the Metagama, the fine new sister steamships built last year for the Canadian Pacific Railway  will be the only vessels of the company to carry passengers between Montreal and Great Britain during the coming season. 

Gazette, 12 March 1915

The initial sailing dates from Montreal for the 1915 St. Lawrence season were announced: Metagama 7 May, Missanabie 21 May, Metagama 4 June and Missanabie 18 June.

Back in commercial service, Missanabie sailed from Liverpool on 14 March 1915 with 250 Second and 492 Third Class passengers, and docked at Halifax at 10:00 a.m. on the 21st with  "the largest number of passengers of any boat that has come west this season from Great Britain" (Gazette). Some of her passengers included some soldiers returning wounded from the front. In addition to her passengers, she landed 2,600 bags of mail, 26 bags of parcel post, 20 baskets of Japanese parcel post and two boxes of mail and local mail for the Maritimes. She arrived at St. John at 2:35 p.m. the next day.  Missanabie's eastbound crossing, with 198 Second and 504 Third Class aboard, commenced from St. John on the 26th. 

Credit: Victoria Daily Times, 19 March 1915.

Metagama (Capt. G.S. Webster, R.N.R.) sailed from Liverpool on 27 March 1915 on her maiden voyage with 239 Second and 446 Third Class, the later including 159 returning men from the First Contingent, "for the most part the men had been found physically unfit, while there is a small element of undesirables." (The Province, 29 Mar 1915). She arrived at St. John on 3 April in the morning where in addition to passengers, she landed 3,812 bags of mail and sailed later the same day for Halifax where 377 of her remaining passengers disembarked on the 4th. "The steamer, outside of two stormy days, had an uneventful  passage, seeing no sign of submarines." (Gazette, 5 April 1915).  Her return crossing began on 9 April, from St. John, and Halifax the next day, with a heavy list of 267 Second and 995 Third Class. She arrived at Liverpool on the 18th. 

Credit: Victoria Daily Times, 29 March 1915

Despite the war, immigrants still came to Canada, albeit in tiny numbers compared to the years leading up to  it.  On 7 April 1915 Sir  George Perley addressed 70 boys from the Fegan Homes who were sailing the next day in Missanabie, telling them that in Canada, the "farmers had never been more prosperous, and they would always be needed in Canada, which  hoped to  become even more  fully the granary of the Empire." The party of boys was smaller than previous years as  quite a few of them had enlisted in the Services.  Missanabie  docked at Halifax at 3:00 p.m. on the 17th and had brought over a total of lost of 213 Second and 522 Third Class, including 104 invalided or discharged soldiers, eight of whom had been wounded in combat, and arrived at St. John on the 19th. Her final crossing from St. John, ending the winter season, began on the 23rd, sailing with 248 Second and 727 Third Class passengers.

 

Credit: Star-Phoenix, 6 April 1915

In anticipation of the opening of the 1915 St. Lawrence season, the first  in full war conditions, CPR announced that Missanabie and Metagama would sail from Montreal every other Thursday not Fridays as previous stated. The new Metagama would be the first to depart, on 6 May. "The service will be kept up through the whole season with sailings every alternate Thursday by these boats." (Gazette, 13 April 1915). It was to mark a new era for CPR serving Montreal with two new ships specifically built for the route. 

The Canadian Pacific's palatial steamship Metagama will have a double interest attaching to her passage up the river at the end of this week, firstly, it will be her initial trip to Montreal, and, secondly, because on her maiden voyage she is more than likely to enjoy the prominence of being the first large trans-Atlantic ocean passenger liner to come to the port this year. 

Gazette, 29 April 1915

With 351 Second and 251 Third Class passengers aboard, Metagama sailed from Liverpool at 4:00 p.m. on 22 April 1915 on her first voyage to Quebec and Montreal and the first such of the season. She made 369 miles a day and "although not primarily designed for speed at the sacrifice of other qualities, this satisfied the most impatient passenger." She arrived at Quebec on 5:00 p.m. on 3 May and left the following morning at 4:00 a.m. to reach Montreal 3:00 p.m.  "The Metagama, which is in all its appointments and services in every way equal to its sister ship Missanabie, won the hearts of the 602 passengers which she brought to Canada from Great Britain on this trip. Every passenger spoken to, after the Metagama docked at 3 o'clock yesterday afternoon at the Canadian Pacific shed, was delighted with the fine weather which the vessel encountered, and delighted as well with their treatment on the boat, and with the facilities of the vessel for making them comfortable." (Gazette, 4 May).

The rest of May  1915 was extraordinary for both the new Canadian Pacific liners and steamship travel in general in wartime.

Credit: Times, 11 May 1915

For Metagama, it saw her return maiden crossing, the first one, too, of the 1915 St. Lawrence season, carry not commercial passengers but yet more Canadian soldiers. On 6 May the Victoria Daily Times reported that the local CPR  office had stated that the British Admiralty had commandered the Metagama and Missanabie.   On the 10th, it was clarified that only Missanabie, Scandinavian and Carpathia had been requisitioned. Missanabie's sailing from Montreal on the 20th , too, was cancelled for commercial travellers, and it, too, would instead carry troops. 

The Montreal docks were lined with people as the last gangway was lifted, and as the Metagama swung into the stream, hundreds of whistles from boats in the harbor, factories, mills and locomotives shreiked a farewell to the departing troops. The fluttering of handkerchiefs from along the docks and buildings on the waterfront, the tooting of whistles, intermingled with 'The Girl I Left Behind Me', as played in a lively manner by the 21st Battalion band, will leave a never-to-be-forgotten impression of those both on the ship and ashore. All the way down the harbor sirens shrilled their farewell, and a number of chartered tugs accompanied the Metagama some distance down the river.

Pvt. Frank O'Connor, 21st BN, .The Ottawa Citizen, 2 June 1915 

A maiden departure from Montreal like none other: R.M.S. Metagama sails on 6 May 1915 with Canadian reinforcements and hospital corps. 

Cleared of the pier and swung into the stream, Metagama is still so new her white boot topping line remains immaculate even if her once glistening white superstructure is swathed in grey as are her funnels. Credit: Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec.

Montrealers cheering off Metagama and the "boys" as she sails down the river. Credit: Queen's University Archives.

Amid stirring scenes, Metagama, her fresh peacetime paint partially obscured in wartime grey, sailed from Montreal on 6 May 1915 with 346 Second and 1476 Third Class passengers constituting the no. 3 and no. 4 General Hospitals, and 5th Stationary and 42 officers and 1,053 other ranks of the 21st Battalion (Kingston). In addition to the almost 1,700 troops, were 15 physicians and surgeons, 90 nurses and 120 medical students and orderlies. Six Lewis guns were mounted, three on the forward bridge and three on the aft docking bridge, to constitute her entire defensive armament. 

Aboard  Metagama's return portion of her maiden voyage: Canadian troops and nurses at Church Parade (left) with the ship's Union Jack displayed and a concert by the 21st Battalion's bagpipers. Credit: Hastings County Archives.

"The voyage of nine days was filled in with daily parades for troops, a drill for the nurses, and all precautions were taken to have everything in readiness in case of disaster. The health of those on was excellent; there were two cases of a serious character, two operations for appendicitis being performed." (Pvt. Frank O'Connor, 21st BN, .The Ottawa Citizen, 2 June 1915).

It had been expected that Metagama would disembark her troops at Avonmouth, but 48 hours before arriving in British water, she made, instead for Plymouth. Five torpedo boats met her the evening of the 14 May 1915 to escort her in the following morning, landing her passengers at Devonport. 

Credit: Gazette, 18 May 1915

Meanwhile, Missanabie and her passengers faced a horrific beginning to an otherwise routine crossing, one that reminded of the new reality of modern warfare at sea. With 269 Second and 453 Third Class passengers, she departed Liverpool at 4:00 p.m. 7 May 1915 and the following day at 2:30 p.m. steamed right through the area off the Old Head of Kinsale where the previous afternoon the Cunarder Lusitania, inbound from New York, had been torpedoed and sunk.  Unaware of the sinking, passengers aboard Missanabie were confronted by a scene of an undoubted maritime catastrophe: upturned or swamped lifeboats, pieces of timber and wreckage and bodies. 

A passenger aboard Missanabie, Mr. T. Scull, was quoted by the Gazette:  "We came over the spot where the Lusitania met  destruction, however. I myself saw one body-- a woman's. Although we  did not know what had happened to the Lusitania until next morning, there were not many who had a good night's sleep after the evidence of the disaster in the water. The ship came through at high  speed, and we were soon out of the danger zone." Another passenger recounted seeing eight empty lifeboats drifting about "amidst wreckage of every description. The name 'Lusitania' could be plainly seen on the sides of the boats, and when the steamer drew nearer many dead bodies were sighted, some in life-belts, and some without." 

With a report that a submarine was still in the vicinity, Missanabie swung out all her boats, put on full speed and begin a zig-zag course which was maintained until out of the danger zone. Ironically, it was her first crossing without any military personnel aboard. "Besides the peril  of hostile submarines a dense fog later add not a little to the fear of the passengers. The siren blew incessantly and at times the boat had to stop dead, the fog was so thick. The prevalence of icebergs on the sea was also a cause of trepidition. In all it was an adventurous voyage. " (Saskatoon Daily Star, 28 May 1915). Missanabie safely reached Quebec on 17 May 1915 and Montreal the following day.  

Missanabie's return crossing, beginning on 20 May 1915, with 183 Second and 1478 Third Class, including 37 officers and 1,104 other ranks of the 29th Battalion (Tobin's Tigers).  They arrived at Plymouth on the 29th, escorted in by H.M.S. Legion and H.M.S. Lucifer, as described by Lance Corporal V.E. Andrew, in The Province) 18 June  1915:   "what a magnificent sight it was to see them churning up the water, and making a short curve, take up positions immediately ahead of the troopships. Those were real cheers that rose louder and louder from Missanabie, cheers that were answered in true British style from the destroyers while a fluttering of flags…" 

With 243 Second and 149 Third Class aboard, Metagama left Liverpool on 22 May 1915, and upon arrival at Montreal on 1 June, the Gazette reported: "Except for two days' fog off the Banks of Newfoundland, the officers of the Canadian Pacific steamship Metagama report a pleasant voyage."

Men of the 49th Battalion aboard Metagama during boat drill. Credit: Edmonton Journal, 17 August 1915.

When she sailed from Montreal on 4 June 1915, Metagama had 221 Second Class and 1,429 Third Class aboard, all military personnel and medical corps including 1,070 officers and men of  the 49th Battalion, reinforcements for the 35th Battalion, the 242-strong Eaton (raised by the well-known department store) Machine Gun Battery and 50 nurses. Commenting on his voyage across, Bugler R.C. Brown of the 49th BN, wrote in the Edmonton Journal: "The Metagama is the new C.P.R. liner and this is the completion of her third round trip, so you can see she is new. She is only 13,000 tons displacement with speed of about 20 knots an hour. She is nicely fitted up through of course were are in the steerage with six bunks to a cabin but everything is clean and nice." 

Rather hopefully as it turned out, CPR announced on 10 June 1915 that they will resume regular trans-Atlantic service between Montreal and Liverpool on 1 July with sailing of Metagama followed by Missanabie on the 15th:

The C.P.R. has experienced considerable inconvenience through the activity of the British admiralty in commandeering the Metagama and Missanabie as transport. The ships formed part of the fleet which carried the first Canadian contingent across the seas, and they were then relinquished for passenger service. But at frequent intervals they have been taken over for admiralty duty. The Metagama was posted to make a sailing from Montreal several weeks ago, but the officials were forced to cancel it as she was required for more urgent service.

Needless to say the company is glad to resume its trans-Atlantic service. Further breaks may occur, but the officials do  not anticipate any. The sails have been advertised for two months ahead and a large amount of travel is looked for. The Metagama and Missanabie are one-class ships (second-class) and although they have only been in operation a brief period they have proven quite popular with the travelling public.

The Victoria Daily Times, 10 June 1915

Missanabie departed Liverpool on 11  June 1915 and her arrival at Montreal on 20 June was eagerly anticipated for among her 270 Second and 470 Third Class were returning wounded officers and men among her commercial  passengers: 

For an hour before the war-gray bulk of the Missanabie came into view many hundreds of eager Montrealers, armed with passes, occupied the space at the end of Shed No. 7 in their anxiety to get the first view of the vessel bringing back to Montreal some of those brave officers who from wen from Canada last year, and who are now returning wounded after having braved death in the trenches to uphold the traditions of the British Empire. When the Missanabie did eventually swing into the dock great excitement reigned both in the sheds and on the vessel, as everyone tried to find among the crowds those they knew would be there. As the 740 passengers passed along the gangway to the shelter of the shed great cheers rang out as each wounded man came out, and these were redoubled in the case of Montrealer.

Tears came to the eyes of many onlookers as they saw the almost tearful joy of family reunions where men greeted wives and children, who feared that such a meeting might never be.

The Gazette, 21 June 1915

Still carrying troops eastbound, Missanabie departed Montreal on 24 June 1915 with 187 Second and 1,474 Third Class including 40 officers and 1,003 other ranks of the 39th Battalion and one company each of the 38th BN and 47th BN as well as the Canadian Dental Corps. She reached Plymouth safely on 3 July.

Indicative of the conflicting demands on the new ships, on 22 June 1915 it was reported they had, again, been requisitioned, only to  have another announcement three days later stating: "Starting with the arrival on July 4th of the Canadian Pacific steamship Metagama, that company will keep up a passenger service between Canada and the  Old Country. The Missanabie will arrive three weeks later, and the service will be maintain by these two boats at intervals of two and three weeks throughout the season."

Credit: Victoria Daily Times, 17 June 1915

Very much still a commercial North Atlantic mailship, Metagama came into Quebec the evening of 3 July 1915 with 171 Second and 180 Third Class passengers, 2,762 bags of Canadian mails, 324 bags of Canadian parcel post, 205 baskets of Canadian  parcel post and 71 sacks for the Orient. Among her passengers were a dozen wounded officers. She docked at Montreal the following day. And in a brief respite from troop carrying, she left Montreal on the 8th  with 452 Second and 1,194 Third Class aboard. Of these, however, 900 were the wives and families (including some 400 children) of Canadian forces personnel who were going  over to live in England during their deployment. Metagama landed them safely at Liverpool on the 17th. 

Emulating her sister ship, Missanabie left Liverpool on 16 July 1915 with 272 Second and 312 Third Class aboard (including 12 CEF officers and other ranks) and 2,654 bags of mail, 98 bags of Japanese mail, 71 baskets of Japanese parcel post, 301 baskets of Canadian parcel post and 237 bags of Canadian parcel post.  But her most poignant passenger was the body of 15-year-old Miss Gwendolyn Allan, daughter of Sir Hugh Allan, who, with her older sister, had drowned in the sinking of Lusitania. The body of her sister was never located.  The ship's arrival at Montreal on the 26th was described by the Gazette: "When the Missanabie came to her dock yesterday afternoon at one o'clock her flags were at half-mast out of respect to the fact that there was on board the body of Miss Gwendolyn Allan, who was drowned when the Lusitania was torpedoed by the Germans. Other vessels in the harbor also paid their tribute in the same manner." And, for a change, too, her eastbound crossing beginning on the 31st was with commercial passengers, a healthy list of 363 Second and 1,128 Third Class which was landed at Liverpool on the 11th. 

On her next arrival at Quebec and Montreal on 1 August 1915, Metagama came in with 175 Second and 148 Third Class passengers, including 23 wounded servicemen.  She docked at Montreal in company with Allan Line's Corinthian. The break from eastbound trooping was shortlived amid the grievous losses suffered by the First Canadian Division at the Second Battle of Ypres.  So Metagama sailed on the 10th with 150 Second and 1,489 Third Class, but from Halifax, and including men of 5th and 7th Field Artillery Brigades, 170 men of the Winnipeg 79th Cameron Highlanders and 700 belonging to the 5th Brigade.  They were landed at Devonport on the 18th. 

"Sailings of Practically Whole Fleet on Liverpool-Montreal Run Are Cancelled," said the headline in the Vancouver Daily World on 26 August 1915 as more liners were requisitioned for trooping. The eastbound sailings of Missanabie from Montreal 4 September and Metagama on the 11th cancelled or at least for commercial passengers. 

Even on the otherwise regular westbound commercial crossings, the grim reality  of the Western Front was inescapable as when Missanabie docked at Montreal the evening of 29 August 1915 with 304 Second and 253 Third Class including 14 officers and 22 other ranks, mostly wounded, one, Cpl. Stewart of the 5th BN having suffered 27 shrapnel wounds. 

This summer when circumstances permitted them to run at all, the Canadian Pacific vessels Missanabie and Metagama have run with an almost clock-like regularity, arriving in  Quebec Saturday night and in Montreal Sunday nights. Generally the time of arrival is the same, an indication of how completely large steamships have ocean travel independent  of weather conditions. The Metagama will be in port Sunday night. She will arrived at Quebec Saturday night with  314 passengers including 169 second class and 145 third class  passengers.

Gazette, 3 September 1915

 

Having sailed from Liverpool on 27 August 1915, Metagama, docked at Quebec at 5:00 a.m. on 5 September and at Montreal at 7:45 p.m. the same day, numbering among her passengers nine officers and 34 other ranks, most of them wounded. Her eastbound crossing, starting on the 11th had 95 Second Class and 1,603 Third Class comprised of 25 officers and 1,250 men from Alberta and five officers and 250 other ranks from Manitoba. 

Returning invalided troops numbered 16 officers and 134 other ranks among the 295 Second and 484 Third Class aboard Missanabie when she left Liverpool on 24 September 1915.  They disembarked on the evening of 3 October at Quebec and the following morning at Montreal. When she left Canada on the  9th,  the liner had 1,174 officers and men of the  8th and 12th Mounted  Rifles, the 79th Cameron Highlanders and the 40th Infantry BN aboard who were landed "at a British destination" on the morning of the 19th. 

On 11 October 1915 Metagama arrived at Quebec with 172 Second and 305 Third Class, including 183 returning wounded officers and men.  Her eastbound compliment of 151 Second and 1,558 Third Class, 1,709 officers and other ranks included the 35th BN and drafts from from the 32nd, 33rd, 34th Batteries, 4th Rgt. who were landed at Devonport on the 25th. 

Missanabie, which left Liverpool on 29 October 1915, made her final arrival in the St. Lawrence on 7 November, coming into Quebec with 169 Second and 345 Third Class, numbering among them, 183 returning military personnel and wounded. She docked at Montreal the following morning. Departing again on the 13th, Missanabie had 40 officers and 1,115 men of the 47th BN among a total of 141 Second and 1,575 Third Class aboard. She arrived at Plymouth on the 22nd. 

Missanabie in Cawsend Bay, Plymouth on 22 November 1915.  Note the 4.7"-gun mounted on her stern. Credit: Vancouver City Archives.

In an singular honour for the ship, Metagama conveyed home the body of the "Father of the Federation", the great Sir Charles Tupper (b.1821) who died in Britain on 30 October 1915.  The liner, which sailed from Liverpool on 2 November, had in  addition 234 Second and 974 Third Class, including a record 873 wounded.  Metagama came into Quebec at 6:00 a.m. on the 14th with her Blue Ensign at half-mast, and was met in mid river by the Government cutter C.G.S. Lady Evelyn which conveyed the coffin across to Levis where a special funeral train waited to take Sir Charles home to his native Halifax for burial. At the pier was an honour guard of 100 men of the 8th Royal Rifles with reversed rifles and the Royal Canadian Garrison Artillery Band played the funeral march as the coffin was carried off the steamer.  After disembarking most of her military personnel, Metagama proceeded to Montreal with 240 remaining passengers where she docked on the following morning.  With 30 officers and 1,046 men of the First Canadian Pioneer BN, among another capacity eastbound list, Metagama sailed from Montreal on the 20th and reached England on the 3rd. This was the final sailing of a busy 1915 St. Lawrence season for the sisters.

Metagama sails from Montreal on 20 November  1915 with troops, on her last St. Lawrence crossing of her maiden year. Credit: Queen's University Archives.

The last two arrivals for the year were into St. John and Halifax with Missanabie coming in on 12 December 1915 with 106 Second Class and 175 Third Class aboard and sailing from Halifax with troops (140 officers and 1,576 other ranks) on the 18th.  Metagama docked at St. John on Boxing Day, having left Liverpool on 18 December, landing 137 Second and 250 Third Class, including 125 medical discharged personnel. 

Typical of the sisters' increasingly mixed military passenger lists eastbound is this accounting of Missanabie 18 December 1915 voyage.  Credit: Gazette, 3 January 1916

In 1915, Missanabie had completed 22 crossings (including four commercial eastbound ones) and carried 9,840 passengers and 11,712 military personnel and Metagama, 17 crossings (including two eastbound commercial ones) and carried 7,654 passengers and 9,647 military personnel.

War notwithstanding, the new sisters were afforded the classic Odin Rosenvinge poster depiction.

1916

Metagama literally began the New Year 1916 by sailing from Halifax on New Years Day with 194 Second and 1,485 Third Class composed of a varied roster of personnel from many branches and services, including 15 officers and 287 men of the No. 1 Tunneling Company, 121 men and 27 nurses of the Dalhousie No. 7 stationary hospital, 31 officer cadets from Toronto University, 34 officers of the Royal Flying Corps.  and  17 officers and 77 men of a Naval Detachment. She was reported on 13 January as having "safely arrived in England." 

Combined sailing advertisement for C.P./Allan Line under Canadian Pacific Ocean Services. Credit: Victoria Daily Times, 20 January 1916.

When she left Canada on 1 January 1916 Metagama did so as a Canadian Pacific Railway Co. ship but by the time she reached "The Old Country" she was now officially belonging to the new Canadian Pacific Ocean Services Ltd. This had been formed on 1 October  1915 to provide an unified management for both the Canadian Pacific and Allan Line fleets, the long known but "secret" acquisition of Allans  having been accomplished back in 1909.  Managing the new "C.P.O.S." was G.M. Bosworth (Chairman) and Major H. Maitland Kersey (Managing Director) and the unified fleet comprised 39 vessels totalling nearly 400,000 grt  (239,000 grt C.P.R. and 155,000 grt Allan).

The first advertisement for the new "C.P.O.S." (Canadian Pacific Ocean Services) still lists C.P. and Allan Line ships and sailings separately. Credit: Gazette, 4 January 1916).

On her first arrival for 1916, Missananbie berthed at St. John on 17 January with 94 Second and 174 Third Class of whom 69 were returning officers and other ranks.  She was steaming eastward by the 22nd with 125 Second and 1,570 Third, all military personnel including a Mechanical Transport Corps, 8 officers and 193 men of the Third Divisional Cyclists and 14 officers and 302 men of the No. 2 Tunnelling Corps.  Missanabie arrived at Plymouth on the 30th. 

Dear Papa and Mama:

Well, we had a safe journey to old England and I sure did enjoy it. We landed at Plymouth on Sunday morning, Jan.  30th. We were just seven days and one night making the trip on the boat. The Missanabie is no small  tub still it not as large as some of the Cunard boats… We have had a very easy time of it so far and cannot complain of the grub either. I  did not get one bit sea-sick although the sea was pretty  rough for a couple of days… There were over 2,000 soldiers on the boat, about 400 of us Motor Transports. We mechanics had the best cabins on the boat. The trip did not see long to me. Neither did it seem to very new on the boat etc., for I had seen the thing so often in moving pictures, it all seemed natural.  However, it has been a great trip and I would not have missed it for a great deal.

Pvt. Cecil H. Myers, Imperial Army Mechanical Transport Service, 2nd Winnipeg dft. Letter to his parents, 1 Feb 1916 (an American from South Dakota who enlisted in the Canadian Forces), published in the Colby Tribune, 6 March 1916.

From 1914-16, officers (Second Class) and men (Third Class) were listed as commercial passengers and certainly fed like ones as these Second Class menus from Missanabie's eastbound crossing from Halifax in January 1916 show. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection

The new management could still not guarantee anything like a regular service, especially eastbound. On 29 January 1916 the Victoria Daily Times reported: "Uncertainties are not so closely associated with the sailings of liners from Canadian ports to Liverpool that it is impossible for the steamship  companies to guarantee a passage to any passengers. A few days ago it was announced that the C.P.R. trans-Atlantic ships Metagama and Missanabie had been released by the Admiralty and would return to the passenger trade. Now comes word that the sailing of the Metagama from St. John, N.B., on February 5 has been cancelled...  "The steamship agents now are unable to give applicants for tickets any positive information. One day they have a ship and the next day they have not. The agent's life is full of vicisitudes, and his trials at present are very numerous. He is blocked a every turn, yet he smiles on every customer and asks them to call in a day or two, when he may have some definite to say."

A premature announcement to be sure but highlighting the already substantial role the M's played in the transport of Canadian troops so far in the war. Credit: Victoria Daily Times, 26 January 1916.

Metagama came into St. John on 30 January 1916 with 133 Second and 179 Third Class including 75 military officers and men. She sailed for England on 6 February with 185 Second and 1,508 Third Class, including 31 officers and 718  men of the 8th Artillery Brigade and 24 officers and 785 men of the 9th Artillery Brigade.  On the 17th her safe arrival was announced. 

After what was described as a "rough and stormy passage", the Royal Mail Steamer Missanabie, which left Liverpool on 11 February 1916, docked at St. John at 9:30 p.m. on the 21st with 7,494 bag of mail and 248 Second and 507 Third Class passengers, 200 were returning troops.  She sailed eastbound on the 28th with 182 Second and 1,542 Third Class. Canadian gunners continued to populate the eastbound passenger lists and Missanabie numbered 25 officers and 729 men of the 10th Field Artillery Brigade and 22 officers and 868 men of the 11th Field Artillery Brigade (Howitzer) as well as 33 officers and 100 men of Halifax infantry. 

Talk about doing your  bit, the captain of the Metagama, and his waiters, sailors and stokers are doing theirs, plugging along with their war load through the submarine area and not giving a curse for any German who ever lived. He would be clear though if they hit his ship and I don't  think all the powers of hell would make him give her up, and if he had to let her sink under under him. Take off your hat to the British navy.

We saw some of them at work hour after hour, day after day in heavy seas that bury them, rolling and tossing, wet to the skin, cold to the marrow and they do it and keep on doing it and will do it till we are through with the whole  thing, keeping England fed, keeping the seas open for the world, getting the troops into action, and generally squelching Germany's sea efforts and indeed destroying its strength on land and not distanced by the navy are fellows like Captain Webster of the Metagama, sailing as through the war didn't exist.

Capt. G.R. Geary, 35th BN (former Mayor of Toronto), Calgary Herald, 9 February 1916

Another rough  passage was experienced, this time by Metagama which docked at St. John the evening of 5 March 1916 with 21 officers and 137 other ranks, mostly wounded, among the total of 214 Second and 371 Third Class aboard. Britain-bound on the 11th, Metagama had 105 officers and 1,625 other ranks from Engineering Field Companies, Signalling and Ammunition columns aboard.

Metagama returned wounded Canadian soldiers home to the Dominion. Credit: Vancouver Sun, 6 March 1916.

And brought English toffee to New York.  Credit: Buffalo Times, 26 March 1916

Men swarming aboard her decks like bees, the big C.P.R. liner Missanabie today crept into her berth at West St. John..

The Ottawa Citizen, 3 April 1916

With the largest list of any Canadian-arriving liner so far that year, Missanabie came into St. John on 2 April 1916 with 261 Second and 537 Third Class and 4,250 bags of mail and 1,280 parcels after "a good  passage" of nine days. Among those aboard were 180 returning officers and other ranks and 55 seamen. As usual, her eastbound crossing, with troops, commenced from Halifax on the 19th.  Among her 191 Second and 1,525 Third Class were  37 officers, 1,055  other ranks of the 51st (Edmonton)  BN and 16 officers and 378 men of the 224th Lumbermen's BN. 

After an especially long crossing encompassing 11 days, Metagama finally reached St. John the evening of 18 April 1916, and too late to disembark, her 204 Second and 334 Third Class including 114 invalided soldiers, had to spend another night aboard.

Credit: Buffalo Inquirer, 29 April 1916.

Metagama sailed from Halifax on 25 April 1916, in convoy with Calgarian, Empress of Britain and Lapland, escorted by H.M.S. Suffolk, taking over the largest deployment of Canadian troops since the departure of the First Contingent; some 18,000 in all.  Metagama had 191 Second and 1,525 Third Class aboard including 36 officers and 1,013 other tanks of the 63rd BN. The convoy arrived safely on 5 May. 

With 237 invalided officers and men among her 255 Second and 548 Third Class passengers, and a small Salvation Army-sponsored immigrant party of 34, Missanabie arrived at Quebec on 15 May 1916.  She also brought in 2,965 bags of mail and 1,122 parcels, some of its destined for Japan and Russia via the All Red Route.

In another, brief lull in trooping, CPOS announced on 2 May 1916 that for the first time in almost a year, Missanabie would operate as a commercial liner from Montreal to Liverpool, changing her sailing from 17 to 19 May to accommodate bookings.  The eastbound departure of Metagama from Montreal on the 27th would also be available for passengers.  With 193 Second and 227 Third Class passengers, Missanabie sailed from Montreal, as scheduled, on the 19th.

The vageries of trying to maintain some semblance of a commercial service, at least eastbound, was aptly demonstrated in conflicting press announcements and sailing notices in May-June 1916. 

Upon sailing from Liverpool on 12 May 1916, Metagama was the first to fly the new houseflag of the Canadian Pacific Ocean Services from her mainmast, the familiar red and white chequerboard now bearing the initials "CPOS" in navy blue letters.

When the Canadian Pacific Steamship Metagama arrived at Montreal yesterday at 11:05 o'clock yesterday morning many people were taken by surprise. When she was first reported from a signal station 470 miles east of Quebec men used to the ways of ships calculated that at the rate of 13 or 14 miles an hour she would arrive at Quebec late Saturday night, and leave for Montreal early Sunday morning, arriving here last night. But Commander H. Parry knows the river like a book, all conditions were favorable, and the vessel came up the river to the delight of passengers at 16 miles an  hour. As a result she arrived at Quebec at 6 o'clock Saturday morning, and was on her way to Montreal shortly after ten o'clock… All the passengers reported an enjoyable voyage. She left Liverpool on May 12th. 

The Gazette, 22 May 1916

Passenger List cover and frontispiece from Metagama's 12 May 1916 crossing, the first of the season, from Liverpool to Montreal which officially inaugurated the "Canadian Pacific Ocean Services" and the new revised houseflag. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection.

Metagama came into Quebec on 18 May 1916 with 292 Second and 345 Third Class passengers, including 137 returning wounded soldiers. And for the first time since June 1915, when she sailed from Montreal on the 27th it was as a commercial liner, with 188 Second and 232 Third Class passengers.

The Canadian Pacific liner Metagama arrived in Liverpool Sunday evening [4 June 1916] just eight days out from Montreal, thus finishing the trip in a time which would be considered excellent under the most favorable conditions of peace time. She left Montreal on May 27th, calling at Quebec en route. Her commander is Captain Henry Parry, whose quick passage up to Montreal on the inward trip here deceived calculation of experienced shipping men  as to the time of her  arrival  by some hours.

Gazette, 6 June 1916.

Having departed Liverpool on at 7:00 p.m. 3 June 1916, Missanabie  had a smart passage, docking at Quebec at 3:30 p.m. on the 11th where she landed most of her 283 Second and 378 Third Class there, including another Salvation Army party of immigrants, 31 in all.  There were 181 returning servicemen aboard. And with her scheduled 17 June sailing from Montreal to Liverpool cancelled, she proceeded around to Halifax after unloading Montreal to embark 274 Second and 1,390 Third Class passengers, including 38 officers and 1,007 men of the 77th BN. They were landed in England on the 28th.

Quebec, June 25--- The Canadian Pacific Ocean Service steamship Metagama, with four hundred and fifty passengers, arrived in port shortly after eight o'clock Saturday night after being delayed considerably by exceedingly foggy weather. Fog settled when the vessel was only a day out from Liverpool and conditions did not improve to any great extent as the journey progressed. It was an uneventual trip, however, and the time was well spent by all on board.

Gazette, 26 June 1916

Metagama arrived at Quebec on 25 June 1916 with 249 Second and 201 Third Class, with 18 returning servicemen, and reached Montreal at 8:00 a.m. the following morning.  On her second eastbound crossing that season carrying commercial passengers, she departed Montreal on 1 July with 334 Second and 427 Third Class and arrived at Liverpool on the 9th in the afternoon.

The respite from trooping came to an end on 14  July 1916 when it was announced that Metagama's 5 August sailing from Montreal for Liverpool would not be available for passengers. It was confirmed, however, that Missanabie would still take her sailing on the 22nd. 

The trip across the Atlantic was uneventful, and excellent weather was experienced. With exception of one day, when it was a bit disagreeable, the passengers were able to appear on the upper decks daily. 

Gazette, 17 July 1916

Missanabie came into Quebec on 15 July 1916 and landed 263 passengers (of the total of 234 Second and 181 Third Class aboard)  and a  full consignment of mail which comprised: 2,072 mail bags and 1,559 parcels destined for Maritime Provinces (180 mail bags and 66 parcels), Province of Quebec (34 mail bags and 11 parcels), Western Canada (1,858 mail bags and 590 parcels), Japan (82 parcels), Russia (807 parcels) and Fiji Islands, 3 parcels.  She cast off at 5:30 p.m. for Montreal, but fog in the river delayed her arrival until 3:00 p.m. on the 16th.    Missanabie sailed for Liverpool on the 22nd with 256 Second and 268 Third Class passengers.

Metagama had 234 Second and 181 Third Class including 63 returning officers when she came into Quebec at 1:00 p.m. on 29 July 1916 and sailed at 6:00 p.m. for Montreal where she docked at 1:30 p.m. the following day. "The Metagama left Liverpool on July 21st. Disagreeable weather was experienced the first two days out, but otherwise the trip was pleasant, and uneventful. The officers state they were in hope of seeing the Deutschland or the Bremen, but added, with a smile, they had not seen either."  (Gazette).  Back to eastbound trooping, Metagama, instead of sailing from Montreal for Liverpool on 5 August 1916 as planned, sailed to Halifax to embark 148 Second and 1,434 passengers, including 32 officers and 940 men of the 119th BN and departed, in company with Cameronia, for England where they arrived on the 18th. 

Another sailing of Metagama, that from Montreal to Liverpool on 9 September 1916 was cancelled for commercial passengers on 18 August.  But that of Missanabie on the 26th would go ahead, leaving Liverpool on 11 August and reaching Quebec at 8:00 a.m. on the 19th. There most of her 296 Second and 300 Third Class passengers and 1,929 bags of mail were landed and she continued on to Montreal where she docked the evening of the 20th. 

Credit: The Gazette, 4 September  1916

The Metagama on this trip established a record for the present season for the Canadian Pacific Ocean Services ships. She left Liverpool on Friday, August 25th, and arrived in Quebec after an uneventful trip within the week. She again left Quebec at 11.15 on Saturday morning and docked at Montreal at 11 the same evening, which is exceptionally good time.

Gazette, 4 September 1916

Small emigrant parties sponsored by the Salvation Army continue to trickle in, and numbered 27 among the 386 Third Class arriving aboard Metagama at Quebec on 2 September 1916. Most of the 326 Second Class and 215 returning servicemen aboard continued on to Montreal.

More wartime alterations to  the schedules were announced on 23 September  1916 with Metagama's 14 October  sailing from Montreal  cancelled and Lake Manitoba briefly back on her old run effective 29 October.

With a good list of 340 Second and 504 Third Class, Missanabie docked at Quebec on 23 September 1916, with 229 wounded or returning officers and men among those aboard and another heavy mail consignment. Like her sister, she reverted to eastbound trooping, taking 1,707 aboard at Halifax, including 29 officers and 743 men of the 152nd BN and also those belonging to the 183rd BN.  She sailed, in company with Saxonia, on 4 October and reached England on the 13th. 

After another very smart passage of slightly over seven days,  Metagama reached Quebec early morning of 7 October 1916 with 231 Second and 253 Third Class passengers aboard.  During the ship's Montreal turnaround, the crew's newly formed rifle club held their first competition at the Point aux Trembles, "with a view to encouraging better marksmanship among the men and officers." More Canadian soldiers, totalling 1,721 officers belonging to the 160th BN and 169th BN, departed Halifax in the ship on the 18th and were safely landed in England on the 28th. 

Under Capt. Evans, Missanabie arrived at Montreal on 4 November 1916 with 214  Second and 205 Third Class.  She sailed eastbound, with 461 Second and 476 Third Class commercial passengers, for Liverpool where she docked on the 18th.

It became increasingly difficult to maintain any semblance of regular eastbound service. On 4 November  1916 CPOS set back Metagama's eastbound crossing from the 18th to the 23rd and then cancelled it altogether on the 18th.  More changes followed on the 25th when Metagama's next scheduled crossing, from St. John on 23 December for Liverpool, was changed to depart on the 27th. Missanabie would depart St. John on 9 December. 

As it turned out, Metagama would not resume eastbound commercial sailings for the rest of the year and her December crossing was cancelled altogether. Instead, she left Halifax on 27 November 1916 with 38 officers and 822 other ranks of 163rd BN and men of the 167th BN. She arrived in England on 6 December. 

War or no war, Canada still had her Christmas Boat in 1916 for The Old Country for families wishing to spend the holidays with their men  folk in the services stationed or on leave in England.

Missanabie which sailed from Liverpool on 25 November 1916, docked at St. John on 4 December with 155 Second and 297 Third Class aboard, including 186 military personnel and nurses. Her eastbound crossing, beginning on 9 December, would be that year's Christmas Sailing and attracted 339 Second and 308 Third Class passengers. Of the Second Class passengers, only 43 were men, the rest were the wives and children of Canadian troops training in England or on leave. They came from almost every province in the Dominion.  The ship also carried a capacity consignment of mail and parcels for CEF personnel.  In plenty of time  for the holidays, Missanabie reached Liverpool the evening of the 19th. 

Ending another busy year, Metagama came into Montreal on Christmas Eve with 126 Second Class and 296 Third Class. She sailed for England on New Years Eve with 127 Second Class and 44 Third Class.

In 1916, Missanabie had completed 20 crossings (including five commercial eastbound ones) and carried 9,226 passengers and 8,506 military personnel and Metagama, 20 crossings (including three eastbound commercial ones) and carried 5,909 passengers and 13,180 military personnel.

The classic "Hands Across the Sea" postcard was never truer in meaning than those posted during 1914-1918 from Missanabie and Metagama by civilian and military passengers alike. Credit: author's collection. 

 

1917

The New Year brought with it, on 1 February 1917, the declaration of the resumption of Unrestricted Submarine Warfare by Imperial Germany. This subjected any vessel, of any description or purpose, to attack without warning by submarine.  As a result, it both considerably tempered the idea that anything like a normal commercial service could be maintained across the North Atlantic, but when it was indeed "The Only Way to Cross," it was, in fact, still continued by Canadian Pacific Ocean Services and many other lines and wrote a new chapter in the story of service and sacrifice of the Merchant Navy to accomplish it.  And, as from the onset of the war, it was held down by Missanabie and Metagama.  The frequency of westbound crossings varied from monthly to twice monthly. And when Unrestricted Submarine Warfare resumed, there was a gap in sailings from Montreal to Liverpool from 3 February to 10 May.

It was "real war", too, in that the advance publication of sailing lists and "shipping news" disappeared amid a general news blackout. Like the U-Boats that precipitated it, Missanabie and Metagama's regular trans-Atlantic crossings were now a "Silent Service." in so far as press mention.

Missanabie opened the year's service with her arrival at St. John on 7 January 1917 with 71 Second and 56 Third Class aboard and sailed eastbound with 74 Second and 72 Third.  Metagama provided what would prove a final commercial roundtrip for sometime, coming into St. John on the 29th with 106 Second Class and 80 Third and departing on 3 February with 63 Second and 51 Third on a crossing that was the first from Canada after the declaration of Unrestricted Submarine Warfare.  It was to be the final eastbound crossing with passengers until May. 

Both ships resumed eastbound troop carrying crossings whilst still maintaining westbound commercial sailings. So Missanabie landed 86 Second and 83 Third Class passengers at St. John on 11 February 1917, then sailed around to Halifax to embark 31 officers and 756 other ranks of the 228th BN and 29 officers and 902 men of the 257th BN and departed for England on the 17th where she arrived on the 27th. Metagama, which docked at St. John on 16 March with 88 Second and 68 Third Class passengers, was Britain-bound from Halifax on the 28th with 24 officers and 526 men of the 165th BN, 31 officers and 841 other ranks of the 198th Battalion and 18 officers and 521 soldiers of the 256th Battalion. They were landed on 7 April. By then, there little demand for westbound space and when Missanabie came into St. John on 18 March, she had but 34 Second and 31 Third Class berths occupied.  Her next eastbound troop carrying crossing was from Halifax on 18 April with the first draft of the 224th Battalion which arrived in England on the 28th.

In May 1917 CPOS resumed  a fairly regular pattern of roundtrip commercial crossings with the two ships to open the St. Lawrence season. Missanabie, which left Liverpool on 20 April but kept anchored off the Mersey awaiting a convoy escort, finally reached Quebec on 4 May. Her 94 passengers included a number of returning French reservists. She docked at Montreal the following day. On he first eastbound crossing since February, she departed on the 10th with all of eight passengers aboard. Metagama followed, arriving Montreal on the 27th and departing on the 2 June, carrying but 86 passengers on the roundtrip. 

It was not surprising, therefore, when the frequency was cut to monthly.  For some unknown reason, Metagama's westbound crossing, concluding at Montreal on 9 July 1917, was "packed" with 312 Second and 248 Third Class as was that ending 27 September when she landed 282 Second and 205 Third. 

The cut-back in commercial sailings allowed trooping voyages to be slotted in. For example, Missanabie sailed from Montreal 20 September 1917 for Liverpool with 38 Officers and 1,116 men of the U.S. 102nd Infantry Regiment (New  Haven), 900 tons of cargo, one automobile and 23 wagons knocked down.  Metagama left Halifax on 6 October with officers and men of the 251st and 258th Battalions, arriving in England on the 17th.   

Metagama took the final St. Lawrence sailing on 21 November 1917 and Missanabie ended the year coming into St. John on 10 December and, rather too late to be that year's Christmas Boat, sailed for Liverpool on the 19th. 

In 1917, Missanabie had completed 18 crossings and carried 1,137 passengers and 11,712 military personnel and Metagama, 16 crossings  and carried 1,874 passengers.

R.M.S. Missanabie 1914-1918.

1918

Metagama made the first arrival in Canada for the New Year when she came into St. John on 5 January 1918 with a good list of 229 Second and 126 Third Class passengers, but departing on the 11th with but 38 Second and 3 Third Class aboard.  Missanabie followed, docking at St. John on the 24th and sailing on 2 February, the round voyage attracting but 43 fares. 

Although there seemed little commercial need for additional berths on the CPOS service, the company made it three wartime maiden voyages when Melita made her first St. John arrival on 14 February 1918.   For a brief period, there were  three Cabin Class "Ms" on the Liverpool-St. John run.  

However, at what would been the onset of the St. Lawrence season, CPOS switched their main passenger-mail service to New York to facilitate sailing in convoys. Military personnel, American, British and Canadian, were carried both east and westbound. This was inaugurated by Missanabie which docked there on 24 April 1918 with 46 Second and 40 Third Class commercial passengers, sailing eastbound with 4 Second Class on 3 May. Metagama's maiden New York call was on 8 May, departing for Liverpool on the 18th. With Melita, the three ships maintained a fortnightly service. On 7 August Metagama left New York with 104 officers and 2,011 men.

Missananbie docked at New York on 5 August 1918, landing 114 Second and 114 Third Class passengers and left for Liverpool on the 15th with 272 passengers aboard in addition to 83 officers and 1,892 men. 

That proved to  be her  final  completed voyage.  On 8 September 1918, Missanabie (Capt. William Hains) left the Mersey for New York with 200 crew, 59 military passengers and "a number of passengers." She joined Convoy OL34 escorted by H.M.S. Devonshire, Camellia, Bluebell, PL-36 and U.S.S. Jenkins, Paulding and McCall. The following day,  the convoy, making 11.5 knots was 52 miles south by east of Daunt's Rock off the Irish coast in quite heavy seas, when Missanabie was struck by two torpedoes fired by UB-87 (Capt. Petri) at 12:30 p.m. on the starboard side, one hitting the engine room and the other just aft. 

The effect was devastating, and Missanabie immediately settled by the stern.  Seven boats, all on the portside, were filled and lowered, but at least two capsized in the heavy seas, and caused most of the casualties outside of the engine room crew killed in the initial explosion. Some of the military personnel aboard, including a party of U.S. Marines, who were in Third Class could not get to the boat deck in time and had to jump overboard and swim for the boats.  

The dazzle-painted Missanabie sinking. Credit: How America Went to War, Benedict Crowell, 1921

At time of torpedoing, U.S.S. McCall went full speed ahead, laying a barrage of 12 depth charges at ten-second intervals to prevent further attack on convoy. UB-87 escaped undamaged and survived the war. 

Sketch of Missanabie standing upright just before she sank by New Zealand Lt. A. Martin who was aboard another ship in the convoy. Credit: Otawgo Witness, 15 January 1919. 

For Missanabie, she was gone in seven minutes, the ship suddenly upending and plunging by the stern with her bow straight up and  holding  in position for  some minutes before disappearing beneath the surface.  The escort ships immediately rescued survivors and McCall lowered a whaleboat in the heavy seas and with great difficulty, plucked nine survivors from the water.  These were landed at Milford Haven, Wales.  

Some of the rescued survivors including a part of U.S. Marines who were passengers aboard with two hospital nurses at Milford Haven where they were landed. And yes, they misspelled the ship's name... Credit: The Montclair Times, 19 October 1918.

TRANSPORT MISSANABIE SANK IN SEVEN MINUTES

AN ATLANTIC PORT, Sept. 19. - The first details of the sinking of the British transport Missanabie, sixty miles off the Irish coast, on Sunday afternoon, Sept. 9. was brought here today by passengers arriving in the convoy of which the former Canadian Pacific liner had been a member. While the failure of the convoy to await a final checking up prevented the passengers from knowing how many were lost, the general opinion was that all assigned to the bow lifeboats had been lost.

We sailed from an Irish port on Sept.8 at 11:30 o'clock in the morning' said a passenger. 'We were in convoy, and the Missanabie was the only ship in the fleet carrying passengers and mails. We proceeded, in fairly choppy weather at about eight knots with the Missanabie the last ship in line. She had had engine trouble and had been foced to drop behind the main body of the convoy.

On Monday morning however she caught up. At 11:15 o'clock that morning she was hit by a torpedo. The missile struck aft and a few seconds later another torpedo hit the vessel. For some reason it was impossible to stop the Missanabie's engines. A few moments passed and then the ship's magazine exploded and the vessel immediately began to sink by the stern. The crew began to lower the boats and within four minutes the stern was well under water. This made it impossible to launch the forward boats owing to the slant of the steamship. Some of the aft boats got away but I saw at least one boat overturned. Because of the choppiness of the sea I am sure that it would take wonderful seamanship to keep any of the small boats afloat very long.

From a ship next to the Missanabie I could see some of the passengers jumping into the water from the stern. Destroyers and patrol boats immediately the ship was observed in distress rushed to the scene and commenced to drop depth charges in the area from when the torpedo had apparently been discharged. No one saw a submarine nor was a periscope visible at any time. I am unable to say from my knowledge whether the depth charges proved effective.

The Missanabie by this time had sunk well down by the stern and the water going through her funnels caused her to stand almost perpendicular. The bow disappeared from view within a short time and the life of the steamship from the time she was struck to the time that she sank was about seven minutes.

As we came away I saw seven lifeboats in the water and apparently having a hard time of it. There were also many people in lifebelts afloat. The rescue vessels were near at hand however. Shortly after the Missanabie was hit a torpedo was fired at another ship in the convoy but this missed going astern. When the stricken steamship was almost perpendicular with her bow pointing skywards, her engines, anchors and other heavy material crashed towards the stern and this and the blowing up of the magazine undoubtedly caused her to sink so rapidly.

New York Times,  20 September 1918

Headlines and epitaphs for Missanabie's sinking in the Canadian press. 

McCall continued to serve on convoy duty throughout August and into September of 1918. On 7 September, as she was escorting convoy OL-34, a torpedo from UB-87 (Kapitänleutnant Karl Patri) slammed into the British passenger steamer Missanabie at 12:30 p.m. Lookouts on board McCall saw the torpedo wake and followed it to its origin, after which the ship steered toward the scene and dropped 11 depth charges. At 12:39 p.m., Missanabie’s bow rose nearly vertical and the vessel plunged into the depths. McCall put lines over into the water, and retrieved three of Missanabie’s crewmen, then lowered a whaleboat to recover more. The destroyer then circled the waters surrounding the sinking as other escorts continued to pull survivors from the sea. After circling the scene for two hours, McCall hoisted her whaleboat on board along with seven survivors.  At 8:57 p.m., McCall departed the convoy and set course for Milford Haven, Wales, to disembark Missanabie’s survivors, arriving the following day and returning to Queenstown.  Vice Adm. William S. Sims, Commander of U.S. Naval Forces in European Waters, commended McCall for her actions during the rescue.

from the official U.S. Navy war record of U.S.S. McCall D-28

Of Missanabie's officers and crew, 38 perished in the initial attack or by drowning or exposure. The dead included 14-year-old William Stuttle, Steward's Boy, 15-year-old Cadet Douglas Marler, 16-year-old George Dutton, Engineer's Boy, and Chief Engineer Frederick Wallinger. In all, 13 stewards/stewardesses, eight seamen, six cooks/pantrymen, five trimmers/greasers/firemen, two engineers and one cadet lost their lives.  Of the passengers, seven were killed including three U.S. Marines and Canadian Major G.G. Weir of Montreal, Lt. R.J. Burke, Lt. J.C. Fraser and Capt. J.C. Forsuth. Of the whaleboat crew from U.S.S. McCall, Ensign R.M. Ihrig and Chief Boatswain Mate Stanley F. Roman were awarded the Navy Cross for their rescuing survivors "under extremely difficult and dangerous conditions, succeeded in rescuing from the sea a number of survivors of the Missanabie, who but for such assistance so unselfishly and promptly given, must have drowned."

Metagama now joined a not select group  of suddenly solitary sisters of Canadian liners... Alsatian, Royal George and Empress of Britain.  She arrived at New York on 11  September  1918 and left there on the 17th with 117 officers and 1,938 men and had but one more turnaround at the port, 20-27 October before the Armistice was declared. Metagama sailed from New York for the last time on the 27th with 15 officers, 721 men and 14 nurses. Reverting to the Canadian run, she docked at St. John on 30 November with 429 Second and 459 Third Class and sailed for Liverpool on 13 December with 22 Second and 3 Third Class. 

First post-war advertisement for CPOS with Metagama scheduled to sail from St. John to Liverpool 7 December, in the event  she left on the 13th. Credit: Gazette, 4 December 1918.

In 1918, Missanabie had completed 10 crossings (six from/to New York)  and carried 1,732 passengers  and Metagama, 17 crossings (10 from/to New York) and carried 2,043 passengers.

An undated photo of Metagama in the Mersey in quasi-peacetime livery but still armed with her 4.7 gun aft. Credit: Clydeships.com

"THE BRIDE SHIP"

The Metagama was known as the 'Bride Ship of the Atlantic' by reason of the large number of prospective brides that she carried from Great Britain and the Continent to this country during the period of intense migration after the war. In this respect she had a novel patron in Sir  Malcolm Campbell, a good Clydesider with all a  good Clydesider's love of ships, who was managing director of  the well-known firm of florists and confectioners, Malcolm Campbell, Limited. He never forgot the Canadian Pacific's descent from the Clydeside Allan Line, and took particular interest in the Metagama, presenting each prospective bride with a bouquet as she sailed. Her officers and a number of very regular patrons formed themselves into what they call 'The Order of Noble Metagamians' and promptly  elected Sir Malcolm Campbell as their patron."

The Gazette, 30 March 1934

With peace, Metagama could finally get down to the trade for which she was designed and built: to convey the immigrants, settlers, seasonal harvesters, domestics, boys, brides, mostly from the British Isles, to new lives in the Dominion. So many prospective British brides sailed in her that she earned the moniker of "The Bride Ship". There was no Roaring Twenties "on the other side" and the decade following the Great War saw a new resurgence in immigration to Canada, fostered by new government schemes to encourage it and a renewed, expansive Canadian Pacific to cater to it. Metagama was but the first of a new generation of "M" class cabins boats that entered service specifically for this epic trans-ocean migration. 

To many in a miserable post-war Britain, Canada's Western prairies were the Promised Land and ships like Metagama were the ticket to a new life.  Canadian Pacific sold you the boat ticket, the train ticket and even the "ready made farm."

Not only had she survived the war, but by virtue of  her unusual crossing-cum-trooping employment during it, Metagama had not been really altered during the course of it.  Repainted in full C.P.O.S. livery for the first time since her westbound voyage and spruced up, she was among the first first Atlantic liners "back at it".  With the new Melita and Minnedosa, she made up a  popular trio of cabin boats that formed an important core of CP's immediate post-war revival along with the former Allan liners Corsican, Grampian, Tunisian and Scandinavian.

Metagama had pride of place in CPOS' first post-war brochure, c. 1918. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection. 

1919

Metagama begin the first year of peace reversing her wartime routine for now she repatriated troops and dependents westbound and carried commercial passengers eastbound.  Her first westbound was badly delayed by stormy weather, and initially expected on 13 January 1919, she did not come into St. John until the 16th. There, she landed 142 officers, 50 cadets and 502 other ranks, with 503 civilians, most relatives of returning soldiers or munition workers.  This was, from many accounts, not a happy voyage, the rough seas exacerbating complaints about the poor condition of the ship, dirty and unacceptable accommodation for dependents and bad food.  Conditions improved immeasurably on succeeding voyages.  Eastbound, Metagama left on the 21st with 248 Second and 550 Third Class passengers. 

On 8 February 1919 Metagama left Liverpool with 52 officers and 425 other ranks together with 119 Cabin and 594 Third Class commercial passengers, many of them military dependents, who disembarked at St. John on the 17th. She sailed for Liverpool with 423 Cabin and 396 Third Class.

"She had one of the best passages since season opened and her passengers were delighted with the trip across the Atlantic," reported the Gazette on 25 March 1919 the day after Metagama arrived at St. John with her best list of the year: 196 Cabin and 968 Third Class. There were 312 Cabin and 255 Third Class aboard when she departed on the 29th for England. 

Canadian Pacific announced their first post-war St. Lawrence season plans on 10 April 1919 with Metagama making the first sailing from Montreal to Liverpool on 7 March. In doing so, it also released figures for the just ended St. John season showing 32,727 passengers handled through the port, 7,789 Cabin (1,728 being military dependents) and 24,938 Third Class of whom 1,510 were soldiers and the remaining number dependents. 

R.M.S. Metagama at Liverpool Landing Stage. Note the revised livery with the white carried lower in the superstructure and she still carries Carley floats aft. Credit: Maritime Quest, Michael Andrew

The first trans-Atlantic liner of the season, Metagama  docked at Quebec at 5:00 p.m. on 2 May 1919 with a total of  1,629 aboard including 53 officers, 335 other ranks and 750 women and children dependents in addition to 350 Cabin and 3 Third Class commercial passengers.  

In spite  of a heavy downpour of rain through the day large crowds of citizens thronged the dock hours before the vessel arrived, and waited patiently. Representatives of the city, the Government and the militia were present in large numbers and the Fifth C.G.R. band was also in attendance.

As the vessel rounded Point Levis, at 4.30  a mighty cheer went out from the waiting crowds who had been anxiously watching for the first appearance of the vessel. While the ship was docking the band struck up 'Home Sweet Home,' and other  airs. Those on board  flocked to the rail and waived greetings to  waiting friends and relatives.

The Gazette, 3 May 1919

Whilst the  military passengers and dependents disembarked at Quebec, most of the Cabin passengers remained aboard and were landed at Montreal the next day. Not only was Metagama the first the liner of the season to dock there, but it marked her return to the port after an almost two year absence as she had been using Halifax or St. John or New  York on her later voyages. 

The port of Montreal look like its former self when the R.M.S. Metagama, of the Canadian Pacific Ocean Services, docked on Saturday morning...

Commander James Gillies was in a cheerful mood. The voyage, beginning on the evening of the 23rd April at Liverpool, had been uneventful. 'As good a voyage as I have ever made on the Atlantic,' he remarked, 'with smooth water all the way, and just a little fog the last part of the voyage. It was a lovely trip up the river; we left Quebec at nine last night, and we reached here by  nine this morning, which shows how easy voyage  it is up the river.

The Gazette, 5 May 1919

The first Montreal sailing for the 1919 season got underway at 10:00 a.m. 8 May as Metagama left Shed No. 8 with a heavy list of 524 Cabin and 1,164 Third Class passengers. Fifteen minutes later the former Allan, now C.P.O.S. Tunisian docked at Shed no. 7 and it was a harbinger of, finally, returning to the peacetime  routine along the wharves. 

With another capacity load of military dependents (451 wives and 151 children), 90  officers and nurses and 264 Cabin and 238 Third Class commercial passengers, Metagama left Liverpool on 24 May 1919. Both she and Megantic were delayed by two days owing to dense fog in the Atlantic and off Newfoundland. She did not reach Quebec until 3 June and Montreal the following evening.   Among those landing at Montreal were Mr. & Mrs. Hugh Allan. The ship sailed eastbound on the 7th with 492 Cabin and 850 Third Class passengers. 

When Metagama came into Quebec on the evening of 6 July 1919 she had 1,628 passengers aboard including 269 Cabin and 234 Third Class, 44 officers, 19 warrant officers and 300 other ranks and 600 military dependents.  Among the military personnel were three generals including Brig. General J.M. Ross, DSO, who been wounded at Amiens. Upon landing at Montreal "he paid a tribute to the way in which the C.P.O.S. had looked after them on the Metagama and said all the arrangements as to messing and other things were excellent." (Gazette, 8 July  1919). When she cleared Quebec for  Liverpool on the 11th she had 488 Cabin and 754 Third Class passengers.

Metagama's Promenade Deck and  "no charge for deck chairs" figured in CPOS's first post-war brochure. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection. 

With peace, came a succession of strikes in England.  Metagama, which was to have left Liverpool on 1 August with a very  distinguished passenger aboard; General Sir Arthur Curry, Commander of Canadian Forces, on his first return home since the end of the war, had her departure not been put back by dock strikes. On the 30th the strike was settled, but Metagama did not sail until  the 4th and Gen. Curry sailed instead in Caronia. The C.P.O.S. liner had 44 officers, 238 other ranks, 359 wives and 38 infants plus 284 Cabin and 279 Third Class commercial passengers  including the Marquis of Anglesey, Lord Ashley, Lady Rodney, General and Lady Twining and Sir Thomas Robinson as well as the son of the Governor-General, Lord Charles Cavendish who disembarked at Rimouski to join his parents cruising the Lower St. Lawrence.  Metagama came into Quebec on 12 August and into Montreal on the 14th. She was off back to Liverpool on the 17th. 

With 542 Cabin and 1,111 Third Class passengers including 40 officers and 123 other ranks and 295  dependents, Metagama docked at Quebec on 18 September 1919 and Montreal the following afternoon. "Capt. J. Gillies, commander of the Metagama, said they had had a fairly good passage, with two or three days of rough weather in mid-Atlantic. The Metagama took the Straits of Belle Isle route, and had an excellent run through the Straits and up the St. Lawrence, encountering very little fog and not enough ice to bother." (Gazette, 20 September 1919). Her eastbound list comprised 471 Cabin and 817 Third Class.

The repatriation of Canadian forces and their dependents finally begin to wind down that autumn, as the first anniversary of the Armistice approached.  When she docked at Quebec on 24 October 1919, Metagama she had 574 Cabin and 1,605 Third Class aboard. She was joined at Shed no. 7, Montreal, by Melita.  With Grampian also in port, a field day was organised for their crews with Metagama's football team defeating those of  her  fleetmates.  Ending her first post-war St. Lawrence season, Metagama left Montreal on the 30th and had 355 Cabin and 397 Third aboard by the time she cleared Quebec. 

Commencing her winter service, Metagama sailed from Liverpool on 19 November 1919 for St. John with 443 Cabin and 777 Third Class aboard.  Among these was the first party of 25 woman emigrants sponsored to come over as domestics.  There were only five military personnel aboard.  Owing to a waterfront strike at St. John, Metagama had to dock at Halifax on the 27th and sailed for Liverpool on the 5th with 481 Cabin and 743 Third Class.

In 1919, Metagama completed 20 crossings and carried 18,638 passengers (8,027 westbound and 10,611 eastbound.

c. 1919 brochure for the "Three M's".  Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection. 

1920

Metagama made the first Canada arrival in the New Year, coming into St. John on 6 January 1920 with 435 Cabin and 569 Third Class, including 100 women, aged 18-20 year old, and former members of the Women's Auxiliary Army Corps "who are coming to Canada for the first time to seek homes and employment. " (Calgary Herald, 8 January 1920). With 287 Second and 507 Third Class passengers, Metagama left for Liverpool on the 12th.

There were 565 Cabin and 1,004 Third Class passengers aboard Metagama when she cleared Liverpool's  Landing Stage on 30 January 1920 for St. John where she docked on 10 February.  Among those aboard was the first organised group of 82 young women going over as domestics and sponsored by the Canadian Council for the Immigration of Women.  Metagama's eastbound departure, scheduled for 14th, was put back to the 16th. Her 465 Cabin and 522 Third Class list including the Duchess of Devonshire, wife of the Governor-General. A snowstorm on the 16th caused the sailing to be put back to 9:00 p.m. the following day. She arrived at Liverpool at 2:00 p.m. on the 27th. 

Her duties done in repatriating Canadian soldiers to their "home and native land," Metagama began what would be her most long-lived work: bringing a new generation of immigrants to the Dominion. Sailing from Liverpool on 5 March 1920 with 567 Cabin and 971 Third Class and  arrived off St. John on the 15th, but owing to a heavy storm, she did not dock until noon the next day. Earlier in the day she passed Empress of France, 40 miles east of Cape Sable with Governor-General aboard.  Landed 567 Cabin and 971 Third Class.  Between them, Metagama, Minnedosa and Empress of France, landed 1,500 settlers from Britain from 8-16 March at St. John. For the first time in six years, three special trains were arranged by the CPR to convey them westward. They were the first of some 20,000 immigrants booked to come over by that June. 

Another group  of 150 demobilised members of the British Auxiliary Army Corps, nurses and prospective wives of Canadian farmers sailed in Metagama from Liverpool on 9 April 1920 among 607 Cabin and 1,165 Third Class passengers… "While the girls are finding home of happiness, they may be found profitable in employment arrangements between the Canadian government and the overseas settlement department." (Calgary Herald, 12 April 1920).  A snowstorm off the coast delayed arrival at St. John, scheduled for the 19th, to noon the following day. Her eastbound sailing was put back from the 24th to the 26th. This marked the 34th and final sailing of CPOS's winter schedule. 

Beginning her St. Lawrence season, Metagama (Capt. J. Turnbull, CBE, RNR) departed Liverpool on 22 May 1920 with 582 Cabin and 1,128 Third Class aboard.  She came into Quebec on the 30th and Montreal the following day.  The crossing was notable for the discovery, a few days after sailing, of no fewer than 12 stowaways aboard.  With a heavy list of 575 Cabin and  1,112 Third Class, she sailed for Liverpool on the 5th.  Among those aboard were the 12 stowaways five of whom were sentenced to prison terms upon return to Liverpool of 21 days to three days and the seven others fined £5 each. Metagama was credited with landing the most number of legitimate passengers in one vessel so far that year.

Fog bedeviled St. Lawrence liners that whole summer and Metagama finally came into Quebec at 9:00 p.m. on 5 July 1920, too late to land her passengers and her eastbound departure from Montreal was  postponed a day to make up the delay.  The ten-day voyage saw the death of one 73-year-old passenger, from a heart attack, and the birth of a girl. This netted out a  very heavy list of 556 Cabin and 1,207 Third Class  including a government-sponsored group of  205 women immigrants for farm work and another group  of  18 men, "hand picked settlers" for the  Calgary and Columbia Valley.  Since the beginning of the year, some 48,000 emigrants had arrived under CPR sponsorship for farm settlement.  Landing all her Third Class, as usual, at Quebec, Metagama proceeded to Montreal where she docked the evening of the 6th. With 559 Cabin and 794 Third Class fares, Metagama sailed eastbound on the 11th. 

Metagama left Liverpool on 28 July 1920 and en route to Belle Isle reported "numerous scattered bergs, growlers and pieces and bad fog…"  She and her 552 Cabin and 1,167 Third Class passengers reached Quebec on the 8th and Montreal the following day.  As usual, the provincial papers recorded the arrival, by train, of the settlers: "Many Colonists Arrive--- a special train carrying passengers from the S.S. Metagama arrived in the city over the C.P.R. at noon. Among them were many who have come out to this country with idea of settling on the land. Several were ex-army officers with their wives and families."  (Vancouver Daily World, 13 August 1920).

Having sailed from Liverpool on 3 September with 564 Cabin and 1,187 Third Class passengers, Metagama (Capt. J.S. Turnbull)  called at Quebec on the 11th and left there for Montreal at 5:00 p.m. the same day. Just twenty-five miles above Montreal she grounded on a claybank near Contrecoeur  at 2:30 a.m. on the 12th. Although no apparent damage was done, she was not immediately freed and the steamer Three Rivers of Canada Steamship Line, was dispatched to near Ile Bouchard to take off the 500 passengers still aboard.  At the time of the grounding, there was fog in river and intermittent rain.

After 40 hours stuck in place, the combined efforts of the salvage vessel Lord Strathcona and tugs of the Sincennes-MacNaughton Line, pulled her free at 6:00 p.m. on 13 September 1920. "The Lord Strathcona reached the spot yesterday morning, and with her were four tugs, as well as powerful rug, the Gopher, all  of which strained at the ship throughout the day. At one time the task looked so difficult that it was believed it would require three days to pull the ship  off." (Gazette, 14 September 1920).  Metagama was able to proceed under her own steam to the Vickers yard in Montreal where she was immediately drydocked for  inspection. 

It was revealed that Metagama had had to pass the anchored freighter Wisley of Canada Steamship Lines, in the channel which was only 200 ft. wide and passing astern of her, went aground on the claybank. With no damage found, Metagama was able to proceed with her scheduled eastbound voyage, departing Montreal on 18 September 1920.

A party of young women immigrants arriving aboard Metagama, "Since the first of the yer neary five thousand young women have been brought to Canada through the efforts of the department of immigration and colonization." Credit: The Province, 21 October 1920.

Metagama  cleared Liverpool on 9 November 1920 with 507 Cabin and 1,038 Third Class passengers. It proved a miserable and protracted crossing owing to a succession of heavy gales in the North Atlantic that delayed all liners.  Metagama, averaging only 9.5 knots at times owing to the seas, was  four full days late, not arriving at Montreal until 11:00 p.m. on the 22nd.  She came in with almost completely empty bunkers as well.  On the 19th, CPOS announced that her eastbound departure would be postponed to the 27th. She sailed with a good list for the time of year of 386 Cabin and 910 Third Class, swelled by a large contingent of Westerners which came direct by special CPR train from Calgary to Montreal. She reached Liverpool on 8 December. 

Credit: The Ottawa Citizen, 23 November 1920

On 2 December CPOS announced their 1921 St. Lawrence sailing plans and indicative of the new emphasis on the intermediate fleet (for which the three new Monts were being built), there would be 75 sailings in and out of Montreal and only 17 just from Quebec.  Metagama, Melita and Minnedosa would hold down the Montreal-Liverpool run.

In 1920, Metagama completed 20 crossings and carried a record 25,052 passengers (15,992 westbound and 9,060 eastbound).

R.M.S. Metagama at Liverpool by Oswald F. Pennington, 1921. Credit: artuk.org

1921

Metagama began the New Year with a change to her usual routine. She arrived at St. John on New Years Eve with 310 Cabin and 1,236 Third Class, almost all  the later embarked at Le Havre on her first call at the French port. Her most  famous passenger was the well-known British actor John Martin Harvey, en route to a tour of Canada.  He learned of his Knighthood by wireless in mid-Atlantic, but also had the misfortune of falling in rough weather and spraining his ankle, causing the cancellation of his  opening night performance in Montreal.  Metagama sailed for Liverpool on 6 January with 168 Cabin and 243 Third Class passengers and arrived on the 11th. Again, she sailed westbound via Le Havre.

On 23 January 1921 Metagama left Liverpool, again via Le Havre (26th),  for St. John where she arrived on 3 February with 350 Cabin and 936 Third Class and sailed on the 9th.

Making a very smart passage especially for the time of year, Metagama which sailed from Liverpool at 4:00 p.m.  on 1 March 1922 and reached St.  John on the 10th a day ahead of schedule with 404 Cabin and 891 Third Class plus 2,839 mail bags.

On her first voyage to the St. Lawrence that season, Metagama left Liverpool on 23 April 1921. Among her 550 Cabin and 1,169 Third Class passengers was another group of 150 young women "to enter domestic service in Canada" and all having positions engaged at a salary of £6 a month. Of her Third Class passengers landed at Quebec on 1 May, the Gazette noted that "only 350 were returning to Canada, all the remainder being newcomers to  this  country." They included a family of 17 named Matthews from Dublin, consisting of grandparents, parents and  grandchildren en route to the Canadian West. They were among 100 Irish immigrants aboard.  On her first eastbound crossing from Montreal and Quebec, Metagama had aboard 403 Cabin and 256 Third Class passengers. She  docked at Liverpool on the 19th.

The 18-strong extended Matthews family from Ireland aboard Metagama,bound for Manitoba. Credit: Canadian Gazette, 28 April 1921.

Leaving Liverpool on 1  June 1921, Metagama had a good passage, reaching Quebec at midnight on the 9th to land her 898  Third Class passengers and then proceeded to Montreal with most  of her 537 Cabin passengers. When reporting on her arrival (along with Scandinavian) at Montreal on the 10th, the Gazette wrote: "Officers of both ships spoke of the excellent type  of  immigrant carried. Those in the third-class  were British-born almost without exception, and quite equal to, if not better than those carried on previous trips. The majority have already had farming experience, and intend to take up the same work in the new land, mostly in the western provinces, and there was also a large number of domestics." When Metagama cleared Montreal and Quebec, Liverpool-bound, on 16 June 1921 she had a full Cabin list of 546 and 350 in Third Class, including the Canadian Team  en route to compete in the sharpshooting competition in Bisley, England. 

A major Canadian sport back in the day, the annual Bisley Sharpshooting Contest in England always attracted ken competition and publicity. Here the 1921 team arrives at Liverpool in Metagama. Credit: Canadian Gazette, 30 June 1921.

Metagama passenger Peggy Kathleen Featherstone (aged 3) with Capt. A Freer. Credit: Canadian Gazette, 8 July 1921 

Peggy Featherstone was the most feted passenger aboard Metagama when the liner sailed  from Liverpool on 1 July 1921. "On boarding the liner Peggy, wearing a green velveteen frock and black hat, was met by the captain, who carried her onto the upper deck. With her dolly, Sarah Ann, a little cloth thing in her  right hand and her baggage by her side, she cheerfully pose for the photographers. There was a happy look in her blue eyes, an the breezes ruffles golden curls about her face." (The Winnipeg Tribune, 2 July 1921). Miss Featherstone, aged 3, was travelling alone to live with her aunt, after her mother had died, in Montreal.   Metagama docked at Quebec the evening of the 10th where her 404 Third Class passengers disembarked and continued to Montreal, docking with Megantic, the next evening, where most of her 392 Cabin passengers landed. 

Despite bad weather almost all the way across, Metagama managed to dock at Montreal on the evening of 10 August 1921 a full day ahead of schedule, the  Gazette reporting that "the only time the ship was actually delayed was while passing through the Straits of Belle Isle, when so  much ice was encountered that commander  deemed it advisable to stop his ship for two hours."  She landed 313 Third Class passengers at Quebec the previous day and 464 Cabin passengers at Montreal. 

On 8 September 1921 it was announced that henceforth the operating company for both the North Atlantic and Pacific routes would be known as Canadian Pacific Steamships Ltd. or "CPS".  The livery for the North Atlantic ships was changed to plain buff funnels with a white sheer line added to the black hulls.  Metagama would be repainted in the new scheme during her next overhaul. 

Once again, beating her own schedule by a day, Metagama came into Quebec at 5:00 p.m. on 12 September with 515 Cabin and 245 Third Class and concluded her crossing at Montreal at 7:00 a.m. the following morning.  She made the run from Liverpool in a creditable 7 days 16 hours.

Metagama came into Quebec on 7 October 1921 with 417 Cabin and 367 Third Class after another fast crossing of 7 days 2 hours and 20 minutes from Liverpool. Her passenger list was swelled by two twin girls born at sea to one of her Cabin Class passengers. They were named Meta and Laura. Metagama sailed for England on the 14th.

When she sailed from Liverpool on 28 October 1921, Metagama's most valuable cargo were flowering plants which would make the voyage in a specially-built miniature conservatory tended by a team of gardeners whose flowers would be used to make up the official wreath by the people of Great Britain to be presented during the dedication of the Tomb of Unknown Warrior in Arlington Cemetery on 11 November. She docked at Quebec on 4 November with 238 Cabin and 309 Third Class.  Ending her St. Lawrence season, Metagama left Montreal on the 11th for Liverpool.where she docked on the 20th.

Bound for St. John on her first winter crossing of the season, Metagama left Liverpool on 25 November 1921 and docked there on 4 December with 129 Cabin and 309 Third Class. Making the first of two CPS Christmas crossings that year (the second one being by Empress of France), she sailed from St. John on 9 December 1921 for Liverpool where she arrived on the 17th.  

In 1921, Metagama completed 20 crossings and carried 16,013 passengers (9,837 westbound and 6,176 eastbound).

A remarkable assemblage of CPS tonnage in Canada Dock, Liverpool in December 1921: left  to right: Empress of France, Empress of India, Empress of Britain (the only time there were three Empress liners together in the port) and in the right background, Metagama.  The last two named ships have been freshly repainted in the new CPS colours and Empress of  France and Empress of India are in their final days in the old CPOS livery. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection

Metagama in the Mersey in her new CPS livery. Credit: author's collection.

1922

Metagama began 1922 in her new CPS livery, departing Liverpool on 30 December 1921 with 136 Cabin and 194 Third Class and docked at St. John on 7 January 1922.  The New Year was tinged, however, with the loss of one of her seamen, Lawrence Cousine, who, whilst working on the Boat Deck fell overboard on New Years Day. A boat was immediately lowered and searched for him, but to  no avail. On her return voyage, beginning on  the 13th, Metagama put into Halifax to take on a cargo of 10,000 barrels of apples and reached Liverpool on the 22nd.

Oswald F. Pennington 1921 painting of Metagama in her new CPS livery. Credit: author's collection.

Canadian Pacific announced their 1922 summer programme on 10 February.  In anticipation of the entrance into service of the new Montcalm, Montrose and Montclare, Metagama would be transferred to the Glasgow service effective with her 24 March departure from St. John to Liverpool and Glasgow.  This was followed on the 17th by the news that Belfast would become a regular westbound call on the Glasgow service starting with Tunisian on 25 March which would call at the Northern Irish city the day after sailing from Glasgow. Metagama would make her first stop there on 19 May en route to Montreal.  Before the war, Belfast has been a regular call for the Lake-class ships as was Moville (for Londonderry) from Liverpool. 

Credit: The Province, 9 March 1922

On her first crossing from Liverpool (11 March 1922) from Glasgow (12th), Metagama arrived at St. John on the 19th with 252 Cabin and 460 Third Class after a fast passage of  eight days despite having to take the southern route owing to ice. Weekly service by Metagama, Scotian, Tunisian and Corsican. Her maiden crossing to Liverpool and Glasgow got underway on the 24th. Arriving at Glasgow on 4 April.

Metagama alongside Princes Dock, Glasgow looking very smart indeed. Credit: dalmadan. com

Metagama would open the St. Lawrence season that year with her departure from Glasgow on 19 April 1922 along with Scandinavian from Antwerp the same day, both for Montreal. Metagama, with 407 Cabin and 1,053 Third Class, was delayed by dense fog in the lower Gulf, not docking at Quebec until 1 May at 10:00  a.m. where only 21 of her passengers landed, the rest disembarking at Montreal the next day.  On the 7th Metagama was one of six liners to sail from Montreal-- Canada, Montcalm, Cassandra, Montreal and Albania being the others and a record for the port. 

Both having made fast runs on their second trips to Montreal that season, Metagama, from Glasgow, and Montcalm from Liverpool, arrived at Montreal on 27 May 1922. Of the former's  215 Cabin and 436 Third Class, the Third class disembarked at Quebec and "are like all Scottish immigrants, a superior class from every point in Scotland. In the third class was a special party of a hundred and forty, mostly all female  domestics bound for the prairie provinces under the auspices of the Salvation Army and conducted by Commander Lawson." (Nanaimo Daily News, 29 May 1922).

The new Montcalm went around on a sandbar at Champlain when her steering gear jammed  on 2 June 1922 and when refloated on the 4th, proceeded to Quebec where she would be drydocked. In the meantime, 125 of her Cabin and 360 Third Class passengers  where transferred to the outbound Metagama which had sailed from Montreal on the 3rd and held upon arrival at Quebec to take aboard her extra passengers and baggage.  She arrived at Liverpool on the 13th. Owing to the delay, Metagama's planned maiden call at Belfast outbound on her voyage on the 17th was taken, instead by Scotian.

"Dense and persistent fog off the Newfoundland Banks" delayed inbound liners at the end of June 1922 and 24 hours  late, Metagama finally came into Quebec the evening of the 25th with 310 Cabin and 600 Third Class aboard and arrived the following day at Montreal. Her outbound list on 1 July was swelled by a number of large American tourist co. groups  and she left with 517 Cabin and 134 Third Class. 

With the introduction of the new Montcalm, Montrose and Montclare, CPS adopted the term "Monoclass" for their one-class cabin boats. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection

Under Capt. G.C. Evans, Metagama sailed from Glasgow on 11 August and made her maiden call at Belfast the next day where she embarked 119 passengers to give her a total list of 312 Cabin and 512 Third Class. She had bad weather almost the whole across, up to Belle Isle, and was able to make up time all the way to Quebec where she docked on the 19th. Most of the Scottish and Irish immigrants were  bound for West. 

"After a good run from Glasgow and Belfast," Metagama docked at Montreal at 8:30 p.m on 15 October 1922 with 276 Cabin Class, having landed her 627 Third Class at Quebec the previous day. They included a 100 female domestics coming over under the auspices of the Salvation Army.  She also had a record nine stowaways, eight whom came aboard at Glasgow and one at Belfast, all aged 17-25 and turned over to the authorities at Quebec. 

R.M.S. Metagama in Belfast Lough, 4 November 1922. Credit: Larne Times, 11 November 1922.

The first consignment of mail dispatched directly from Ulster to Canada being put aboard the tug Musgrave to take out to Metagama. Credit: Larne Times, 11 November 1922.

Metagama, which left Glasgow on 3 November 1922, called at Belfast Lough the following day. There, she took on the first consignment of direct post from Ulster Ireland to Canada as an experiment to speed up delivery over the usual transshipment via Liverpool and would lead to the establishment of a regular direct mail service by CPS steamers on the route. 

Emigrants coming out to Metagama anchored in Belfast Lough aboard the tug Musgrave. Credit: Larne Times, 11 November 1922.

Immigrants on deck during Metagama's call at Belfast Lough. Credit: Larne Times, 11 November 1922.

With a very good list for her final St. Lawrence arrival of the season, Metagama came into Quebec on 11 November and Montreal the next day, landing 728 Third Class and 174 Cabin Class.  Of the Third Class, there were two escorted parties of 80  and 30 domestics.  She reported three rough and stormy days with strong  headwinds coming over.  Her last eastbound sailing took out 113 Cabin and 187 Third Class. 

On her first winter season crossing to St. John, Metagama left Glasgow on 1 December 1922, experienced one of her roughest ever passages. Heading into a fierce Atlantic storm with winds of up to 100 mph, her wireless aerials were blown down and two lifeboats damaged.  Early in the voyage she picked on an S.O.S. from the French steamer Chalutlier Auguste C. Blond, only 20 miles away, but upon reaching her reported position, found no trace of her.  Metagama came in with 67 Cabin and 519 Third Class. Making that year's Christmas crossing, she left on the 15th with 91 Cabin and 187 Third Class aboard.

In 1922, Metagama completed 22 crossings and carried 13,375 passengers (9,053 westbound and 4,322 eastbound).

The first in an annual series of special brochures highlighting the Monoclass Cabin Service published in 1923. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection 

1923

Upon Metagama's departure  from Glasgow on 28 December 1922, CPS announced that with the 15 February 1923 sailing from Glasgow her regular call at Belfast would resume and be made east- and westbound. This would also permit direct dispatch of mails from Belfast to Canada, saving 24 hours in the delivery time.  The first eastbound call would be made by Metagama sailing from Montreal on 3 May which would also inaugurate the St. Lawrence season.  The liner, with 172 Cabin and 517 Third Class, including 378 settlers, docked at St. John on 8 January.

Metagama, which left St. John on 13 January 1923 with 64 Cabin and 85 Third Class,  came to the rescue of the five-man crew of the fishing schooner Ida M. Cunningham, in gale conditions. When Metagama came across her, she had lost her sails and her engine was dead. The crew was taken aboard and landed at Glasgow on the 21st.

On 20 February 1923 CPR's General Agricultural Agent announced a new immigration scheme to bring out thousands of farm laborers and domestic servants to the farms of Western Canada. The immigrants would come from Great Britain, Ireland, Switzerland, Denmark, Netherlands and Belgium. It was additionally announced that the first migration of  young farmers from the Hebrides to Ontario under a provincial settlement scheme would begin when Metagama would put into Stornoway Harbour to take  400 men and women between the ages of 18-23 to Canada. 

With 139 Cabin  and 599 Third Class passengers (including 161 settlers for the West), Metagama arrived at St. John from Glasgow and Belfast on 26 February 1923. The officers reported a stormy first few days and large fields of ice encountered near the end of the crossing. "Among the passengers were several attractive young Scotch girls arriving to meet their prospective  husbands. There was also a large number of Scotch settlers on board. Speaking of their new venture, a number of the men said they had looked carefully into the matter and were convinced that there were splendid opportunities in Canada and that they could do better here than in the Old Country." (Gazette, 27 February 1923).

Metagama off Gourock, Robertson photo. Credit: dalmadan.com

When he took Metagama out of St. John on 1 March 1923 for Glasgow with 66 Cabin and 64 Third Class aboard, Capt. G.B. Evans OBE, aged 64, was ending a 48-year-career at sea. It was reckoned that he had made  578 crossings to and from Canada, conveying 247,923 passengers, 71,000 of whom were Canadian and American troops.  He, of course, was in command of Missanabie from November 1914 until her sinking in September 1918.

Now commanded by Capt. G. Hamilton, Metagama came into St. John on 25 March 1923 with 239 Cabin and full compliment of 1,095 in Third Class.  "To the skirl of bagpipes, sturdy folk from the Land of the Heather made merry upon the upper decks of the liner as she eased up to her dock in the glorious sunshine of an early spring day in Canada." (Gazette, 26 March). Her final crossing that season from the New Brunswick port commenced on the 29th with only 43 in Cabin Class and 50 in Third. 

On 11 April 1923 details on the emigrant group from the Hebrides for the Ontario was announced, comprising 400 married and 100 single men who would sail from Stornoway on the 21st.  Great unemployment in the Hebrides caused by the depression in the agriculture and fishing trades resulted in younger people are leaving "almost to a man and a woman."  "Of 400 young men already selected by the Ontario Government, no one is less in stature than 5 ft. 9 ins., or less than 168 lbs. in weight. The women are rosy-cheeked crofter girls from tiny townships and fisher lassies, who are accustomed to pack salted herring on quays in even the chilliest winds. Canada will draw from Hebrides as superb physical specimens as the first Norsemen who went there." (Gazette, 12 April 1923). 

The crowd on Stornoway quay on 21 April 1923 upon the arrival of Metagama to take  300 of her young men and women to new lives in Ontario. 

Metagama left Glasgow on 20 April 1923 and sailing through The Minch, the channel between the Lewis and the Isle of Skye, to  anchor off Stornoway the next day.  There, she was greeted by almost the entire community to see off the 300 immigrants, all but 20 of them young men with an average of 22. Before they embarked, they underwent received medical inspections and were presented with Gaelic bibles presented by the Ladies' Highland Association.  The steamer Hebrides acted as the tender to  take the immigrants out to Metagama.  It was one of the most poignant sailings of any liner as a community was saying farewell to an almost entire generation.  For Canada, it was, too, a moment of  national pride in being the great hope of a new life for so many. 

The tender made her last journey between the Metagama and the shore soon after four o'clock. The final trip was marked by scenes of real enthusiasm. The Stornoway pipe band was permitted to come aboard the Metagama along with a party of girl guides and other, who throughout the afternoon, had made themselves useful in helping the departing Hebrideans on their way. This concession was doubtless adequate compensation, for many of the older inhabitants of Lewis had come to the quayside they would be permitted aboard the liner.

With the skirl of pipes, the drums, and welcoming cheers from those already aboard, the final batch, for the time being, of New Ontario settlers reached the Metagama. 

The Gazette, 23 April 1923

Credit: Daily Mirror, 25 April 1923.

After calling at Belfast, Metagama headed across the Atlantic with 427 Cabin and 1,015 Third Class. Destined for Montreal, heavy ice lingering in the Gulf of St. Lawrence  forced Metagama (and Montcalm and Canada) to instead make for St. John. Metagama docked at the New Brunswick port on 2 May 1923 at 11:00  a.m. together with Montcalm.  Their passengers were further delayed by flood conditions but were finally on their way via Canadian National the following day.

Metagama sailed from St. John on 8 May 1923 on her first crossing Belfast and Glasgow. She encountered heavy ice the first day out and made only 93 miles that day on account of it. On the 16th she came into Belfast Lough in rather rough conditions, and delivered the first direct consignment of mail from Canada to Ulster.

Metagama landing passengers and the first direct consignment of mail from Canada during her call at Belfast Lough on 16 May 1923. Credit: Belfast Telegraph, 17 May 1923.

For the first time passengers from Canada arrived direct at Belfast yesterday… With between 300 and  400 passengers on board the magnificent s.s. Metagama, under the command of Captain. G. Hamilton, anchored at the mouth of the lough between five and six o'clock yesterday morning to transfer 100 Belfast-bound men, women and children and about fifty bags of mails. Needless to say, there was plenty of excitement on board, but when the tender Milewater… arrived alongside the liner after a somewhat rough passage they found everything ready. It was some little time before the gangway was put into position, but when the tender had been made fast passengers, baggage and mails were transferred with the greatest possible speed.

Northern Whig, 17 May 1923

Baron Vernon (left) half sunk and beached and Metagama after colliding in the Clyde on 26 May 1923. Credit: dalmadan.com

Shortly after sailing from Glasgow on 26 May 1923 with 1,100 passengers, Metagama collided head-on with the one-year old 2,603-grt British freighter Baron Vernon at 9:30 p.m., inbound with a cargo of ore from Bilbao, in the Clyde.  Badly damaged, the cargo vessel was beached off Dumbarton Rock and Metagama returned to Glasgow in the escort of tugs with a port bow plated damaged nine feet above the water line, believed caused by impacting with the freighter's anchor.  

It was almost sunset when the steamers met. At first it seemed as it they were going to  pass all right, but something untoward occurred , and they crashed together almost  head on. They remained locked together for some time, but eventually they swung clear, and the Metagama put back to Prince's dock, Glasgow, where she was berthed and examined by a diver."

When the collision occurred most of the passengers were below and many had even turned in for the night. Among the few who were on deck there was naturally for some time considerable excitement, but as no one was injured their fears were soon allayed.

Sunday Post, 27 May 1923

Baron Vernon, seriously damaged and her bows crushed, was beached on a sandbank off Dumbarton to prevent her from sinking. Credit: Leeds Mercury, 29 May 1923.

Montrose, which had sailed from Liverpool the day of the collision, was diverted to Belfast to embark Metagama's intending passengers there. In the event then also made for Greenock on 27 May 1924 to embark 160 more who sent down river to join the ship and avoid further delay waiting for the repairs to be completed.  Her remaining passengers remained lived aboard Metagama at Prince's Dock "enjoying a series of concerts and entertainments." To further relieve the monotony, on the 28th Canadian Pacific chartered the steamer Queen Empress to take 300 of the passengers on a day cruise to the Clyde lochs, only to have the vessel, upon leaving Loch Goil, strike a submerged object. Taking on water badly, she managed to make to Greenock where the unlucky lot were transferred to another steamer to take them back to Glasgow. 

Credit: Daily Mirror, 28 May 1923.

Credit: Daily Mirror, 28 May 1923

Without further incident, the repaired Metagama resumed her voyage at 11:00 a.m. 29 May 1924, four days late. With 211 Cabin and 630 Third Class passengers, she arrived at Quebec at dawn on 6 June and Montreal that evening.  On board were 781 settlers, "the immigrants were perhaps the finest looking party of settlers to arrive here this season, the majority being young than the average landing at this port [Quebec]. Included in the party were 129 Glasgow girls destined for the Salvation Army's  hostel in Toronto." (Victoria Daily Times, 7 June 1923)… "The general appearance of the girls as they came off the steamers was the cause of much favorable comment. Without exception they were all neatly attired and their cheerful, smiling and pretty faces at once won the admiration of the bystanders." (The Gazette, 7 June 1923).

When the United States relaxed its quota on immigrants from the British Isles and Ireland, all liners were flooded with bookings, and many took passage in Canadian-bound ships. Metagama landed 1,016 Third Class at Quebec on 1 July 1923, but was so delayed in their processing, did not reach Montreal until the 2nd where her 406 Cabin Class passengers disembarked.  On her next Quebec arrival from Glasgow and Belfast on 1 August she broke all passenger traffic records for the St. Lawrence season with 1,078 Third Class, landed there, and 382 Cabin Class for Montreal. Of her Third Class, 600 were destined for the United States. Since June, some 20,000 Scots had immigrated to North America, 60 per cent to Canada.

Wonderful pen and ink illustration of Metagama alongside from the 1923 Monoclass brochure. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection 

Between 19-21 October 1923 Minnedosa, Montrose and Metagama arrived in Canada with a total of 1,406 immigrants.  For Metagama's 191 Cabin and 428 Third Class included 218 women coming over as domestics, mostly in Ontario.

On her final crossing to St. Lawrence for the year, Metagama arrived at Quebec on 17 November 1923 and that evening at Montreal.  She brought in 122 Cabin and 480 Third Class.  "With a passenger list composed principally of Scots returning home for the Christmas holidays, the Canadian Pacific liner Metagama will Montreal this morning for Belfast and Glasgow on her last trip of the season from this port. An unusual feature of the cabin list is that 63 of the 135 travellers in this class have names beginning with the prefixes of 'Mc' or 'Mac.' The steamer will also carry 280 third-class passengers.' (Gazette, 22 November  1923). She arrived at Belfast on the 30th and Glasgow the next day.

In 1923, Metagama completed 22 crossings and carried 14,295 passengers (11,389 westbound and 2,906 eastbound).

The front and back cover of the 1924 Monoclass Cabin Service brochure. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection 

1924

Metagama underwent a extended annual overhaul and sailed from Glasgow on 16 January 1924 with cargo  only and from Liverpool on the 19th for St. John with 59 Cabin and 270 Third Class. It proved a stormy and tragic first crossing of the New Year for at 6:30 p.m. on the 20th, Able Seaman Thomas Shaw, aged 25, from Glasgow, was washed overboard when two large waves swept over the bows where he and four other men were securing the forward winches.  Metagama came into St. John on the 29th and "Prior to their departure the passengers all had complimentary words for the skill of the commander and the Metagama which they claim is a wonderful sea boat." (Gazette, 30 January 1924) On 1 February 1924 Metagama sailed from St. John for Liverpool via  Glasgow  with 46 Cabin and 104 Third Class aboard. 

Metagama's foredeck in one of the many charming drawings in the 1924 Monoclass brochure. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection 

On 17 February 1924 a walk-out of 120,000 dock workers in Britain resulted in Metagama being taken out of dock at Liverpool and anchored in the Mersey so as not to held up and miss her sailing on the 22nd. When the departure of Marloch was cancelled, her 250 passengers were transferred to Metagama. They joined the Gold Medal winning Canadian Winter Olympic Hockey Team, returning from the Winter Games at Charmonix, France. She would sail, without cargo, as scheduled.

London, Feb 22-- A large number of the Canadians in London gathered at Euston Station today to give a hearty send-off to the Canadian hockeyists, winners of the world's amateur hockey championship at the Olympic games, who, tired, but happy, entrained at Euston for Liverpool on the beginning of their journey homeward. The train pulled out amidst vociferous cheers for the Canadian champions.  

The homeward Canadians carried with them almost every conceivable kind of baggage, including bird cages, live rabbits, and white mice. They sailed on the Metagama. The ship will call at Belfast. 

The Windsor Star, 22 February 1924

Metagama arrived at St. John at 8:30 p.m. on 1 March 1924 with 188 Cabin and 427 Third Class and the special train for Cabin passengers reached Montreal first thing on the 3rd. The Canadian Olympians would spend the night there and then travel by special CPR car on the regular train to  Toronto where a civic reception awaited them. 

Back on her direct Glasgow-Belfast-St. John run, Metagama arrived at the New Brunswick port on 29 March 1924 with a very heavy  list of 1,178 Third Class in addition to 116 in Cabin.  Of those in Third Class, 363 were settlers bound for the prairie provinces and 19 for British Columbia. 

Another group of British domestics arrive in Montreal aboard Metagama. Credit: The Marion Star, 19 April 1924.

On 7 April 1924 it was announced that "Metagama will represent a university at sea when she sails from Montreal on June 26 with more than 200 student from various Canadian universities who are accepting the invitation of the Overseas Educational League." They would return, after touring the British Isles including the British Empire Exhibition and France and return in Empress of Scotland. 

The Robb Family of Auchtermucty on the quayside at Glasgow 18 April 1924 before embarking aboard Metagama for Canada and Braeside, Sask. Credit: Leader-Post, 21 April 1924

The 375 emigrants who sailed in Metagama's first St. Lawrence crossing of the year, leaving Belfast on 19 April 1924 (note the slipway gantries of Harland & Wolff to the right) by the tug Bison to embark the liner in Belfast Lough. Credit: Weekly Telegraph 3 May 1924.

Opening her 1924 St. Lawrence season, Metagama (Capt. W. Henderson), sailed from the Clyde on 18 April for, Quebec and Montreal and after calling at Belfast had 283 Cabin and 1,193 Third Class aboard. Of these, 818 embarked at Glasgow and 375 at Belfast. She arrived at Quebec on the 27th and late the same day at Montreal. On her first eastbound crossing of the season departing 1 May, she had 209 Cabin and 286 Third Class, including 150 for Belfast where she anchored on the  9th before proceeding to Glasgow.

'Seventeen brides sailed to Canada on the Canadian Pacific liner Metagama, consequently Cupid boarded the ship at Glasow, carrying with her a bouquet for each bride. The bouquets were presented by Sir Malcolm Campbell and Cupid was sent by Mr. John Campbell, of Messrs. Pettigrew and Stephen, Glasgow.' Credit: Aberdeen Press & Journal, 19 May 1924.

Among those sailing in Metagama from Glasgow on 16 May 1924 were 17 brides bound for Canada and in all, she landed 767 Third Class at Quebec on the 24th and 248 Cabin Class at Montreal the next day. 

Another group of 18 brides were aboard Metagama when she left Glasgow on Friday the 13th of June 1924.  In an all, she had taken out 46 brides to Canada so far this season. On the 19th it was reported she was due to dock at Quebec at 5:00 p.m. on the 21st.

Instead, on 19 June 1924 at 8:40 a.m., the Italian steamer Clara Camus, outbound to France with a cargo of grain, collided with  Metagama seven miles east southeast of Cape Race, off Cape Spear, in heavy fog. The Italian ship struck Metagama on the starboardside near the no. 1 stokehold. The fog being so thick at the time that the collision occurred with no warning. 

According to the crew of the Metagama, she was running slowly through the fog about nine o'clock in the morning, sounding her whistle every minute, when another craft crashed into her, then whistled thrice and backed away.

There was sudden  rush of passengers to the decks, but through the exertions of stewards and officers, order was restored and measures taken to insure their safety as the race to port was begun. Boats were made ready and arrangements for transfer made when, hours later, other vessels reached the crippled vessel.

Severely damaged and taking on water faster than her pumps could manage, Metagama was in a precarious situation. Capt. Henderson saved the ship by flooding the portside ballast tanks creating a 35 degree list to port to lift the holed starboardside sufficiently clear to let the pumps do their best whilst the ship made for St. John's, Newfoundland, 70 miles away. Fortunately the sea calmed out and she made good headway whilst passengers remained on deck, in lifejackets, barely able to stand owing to the list. She had some 14-ft. of water in her stokehold by the time she reached port.

Cool-headed action on the part of the Metagama's officers averted a panic aboard the craft when the passengers rushed for the decks after the force of the collision had sent the craft reeling. Further cool-headed action under the supervision of the officers, while the water poured into the forward stokehold, resulted in the filling of the port side ballast tanks and subsequent listing of the injured starboard side out of the water. The ensuing thirty degree list to port resulted in reducing the flow  of water into the hold and made it possible for the pumps to keep up the unequal struggle until the liner was safely beached.

Passengers highly praised captain, officers and seamen for the handling of the situation as they found their way ashore. During the long race one seaman, a skilled pipe had provided music with a set of bagpipes, the ship's string band played continuous impromptu concerts, and phonographs had been pressed into service on the vessel's tilted decks to help  maintain the courage of those aboard.

Gazette, 21 June 1924

Passengers on the open decks of Metagama during the dash to safety to St. John's following the collision showing the list. Credit: saltscapes.com

Clara Camus, her bows crushed by the impact, disappeared into the fog and Metagama wirelessed her situation to St. John. The Red Cross Line's Rosalind, Kenbane and Canada responded to her S.O.S. and Senef dispatched immediately from St. John's. 

By some miracle, the point of impact struck empty cabins, most of the passengers being at breakfast at the time and there were no casualties from the collision.  However, the two crew in  Metagama's no. 6 lifeboat, which was launched to ascertain the damage (which was reported to be a 15 ft. by 3 ft. gash), and disappeared without trace in the fog when the line securing the boat to the ship severed. They were given up for lost despite an extensive search by the U.S. Coast Guard's Tampa and Modoc (on ice patrol duties). On 29 June the half submerged boat was found  off the Grand Banks. But the very next day it was finally reported that T. Reynolds and J. Hall had been safely picked up by the schooner Bluenose and then transferred to the schooner Glacier which landed them at Cape Broyle, Newfoundland.

The remarkable sight of Metagama sailing into St. John's following her collision with Clara Camus. Credit: eBay auction photo.

Both ships were able to reach St. John's some eight hours after the collision, the Italian vessel first and then an hour later Metagama came in just before dusk, escorted by Rosalind  and a couple of seagoing tugs.

Metagama as she appeared coming into St. John's. Credit: Memorial University, Newfoundland

As the ship came to anchor in St. John's harbor, she appeared in a critical condition and passengers implored boats and tugs to take them off. But with time apparently too short for safe transfer, her captain rushed the Metagama toward a shoal, where she was beached on a mudbank. 

Entering the harbor the liner at first made for the Furness-Withy piers but to be headed for the upper end of the harbor, where she was beached in the shallow water. It was found that the leakage through the rent in her hull could not be kept under control with the liner's  pump. Total loss of the Metagama was averted only by the few yards by which she  got into port ahead of the rise of the water within her hull beyond the buoyancy. The liner rests in an easy position, where repairs can be conducted expeditiously. 

Gazette, 21 June 1924 

Metagama barely made it to safe haven in St. John's, Newfoundland. That she did so was a credit to  her officers and crew, her two completely separate boiler rooms, calm seas and not a little good luck.

Canadian Pacific had the inbound Montreal  detour to St. John's to embark  Metagama's 695 passengers and take them to Quebec and Montreal. Arriving on 21 June, her progress was impeded by more fog and she did not reach Quebec four days later where the Third Class were landed and the 191 Cabin passengers disembarked at Montreal the next day. 

Presenting an extraordinary sight, Metagama beached on a mudflat in St. John's harbour after a remarkable 70-mile voyage under her own steam with a 35-deg list. The damage to her amidships is clearly visible.

Meanwhile, the pumps finally gained the upper hand and Metagama was refloated on 21 June 1924 in shallow water over the mudflats. Her  26 June sailing from Montreal was cancelled on the 23rd and the university party transferred to Montreal.

Showing the rent in her underwater hull from the collision. Credit: eBay auction photo.

Clara Camus' bow defining the term "crumpled" following her collision with Metagama. 

On 7 July 1924 it was announced that Metagama, sufficiently patched up and seaworthy, would sail from St. John's to Davie Shipbuilding Co. at Lauzon and be drydocked there upon arrival on or about the 12th for permanent repairs.  Then it was reported on the 11th that she had run aground off the entrance to the port of St. John's whilst getting underway.  "Badly listed, it was difficult to control her, and tugs surrounded her in an effort to get her free. The liner was hard aground and it was expected tonight that she could not be be floated before high tide at 3 o'clock tomorrow morning. Four tugs tried in vain to get her off the shoal, but the lines broke repeatedly." (Gazette, 12 July 1924). Underway again, Metagama docked at Shed 27, Quebec on the 16th where her  600-ton cargo would be unloaded and then she shifted across to Lauzon to be drydocked for repairs, estimated to take 37 days and cost $100,000.

Metagama in the Davie dry dock, Lauzon, Quebec.Credit:archiveshistoriques ville levis 

Metagama entered dry dock on 15 July 1924 and in what was considered record time, her underwater repairs were completed by 7 August thanks to the efforts of 350 men working night and day shifts.  She stayed in dock to await the arrival, by Empress of France, of a Lloyd's  surveyor.  On the 13th it was announced Metagama would shift to Quebec to load a full cargo of grain and 400 tons of general cargo and sail direct to Glasgow on the 22nd where arrived on the 29th. 

After being given additional refitting, members of the press were showed around a fully repaired and refurbished Metagama at Prince's Dock in Glasgow on 4 September 1924. Sir. George M'Laren Brown, European General Manager, Sir. Thos. Fisher, General Manager of CPS and Wm. Baird, Asst. European Passenger, hosted the event and luncheon later in the Cabin dining saloon. 

This wonderful ship, the Metagama, is undoubtedly one of the most popular ships crossing the Atlantic. She had carried across the North Atlantic more passengers than any other ship crossing, and the C.P.R. had carried more passengers from Scotland to Canada than any other line, proving the popularity of their service.

Sir George MacLaren Brown, CPS

Metagama in Prince's Dock, Glasgow. Credit: dalmadan.com

THE METAGAMA RETURNS TO THE SERVICE. Party Journalists Entertained. After being extensively overhauled, the Metagama, which ranks as one of the best equipped and most attractive liners in tho Canadian-Pacific fleet, resumed her usual sailings yesterday, when she departed from Prince’s Dock, Glasgow, with a large complement of passengers, mostly emigrants, for the Dominion. In view of the splendid record of the Metagama in connection with emigration traffic, and the prospect of increased bookings, and also mark the return of the liner to the active service list, the Company entertained on board Thursday a large party of journalists representative of the daily and provincial Press of Scotland. The party were conducted throughout the entire ship, and shown in detail the additions made to already well-known amenities and attractions of the liner. The luxurious appointments of the state rooms, the artistic scheme of decoration, the introduction of modern conveniences, and the provision of cabin comforts all impressed the visitors, did the efficiency of the service and the high standard maintained in catering for all classes of passengers.

 Falkirk Herald, 6 September  1924

Living up to her press moniker as being "The Bride Ship of the Atlantic," Metagama conveyed another group of Scottish brides to be to Canada. Credit: Dundee Telegraph, 8 September 1924. 

When Metagama sailed from Glasgow on 6 September  1924, she had 320 Cabin Class and 120 Third Class aboard, with five Scottish brides among them, and she embarked another 70 Cabin and 120 Third Class at Belfast the next day. She docked at Quebec at 5:00 a.m. on the 13th.

Ending her abbreviated St. Lawrence season, Metagama left Montreal on 13 November 1924 with 29 Cabin and 139 Third Class passengers. Her first winter crossing to St. John from Glasgow and Belfast landed 61 Cabin and 161 Third Class passengers, 100 bags of mail and 600 tons of cargo there on 6 December. And, of course, four more Scottish brides.  Her eastbound crossing was a Christmas one with extra direct train services from all parts of the Dominion to the ship's side included in the through fare.  She departed St. John on the 11th with 57 Cabin and 242 Third Class.

Thus ended, perhaps none too soon, a most eventful year for Metagama.

In 1924, Metagama completed 17 crossings and carried 8,702 passengers (6,252 westbound and 2,450 eastbound).

Cover art for a circa 1924-25 Monoclass Cabin Class brochure. Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection 

1925

Metagama did not make her first crossing of the New Year until March when she docked at St. John on the 14th with 59 Cabin and 228 Third Class passengers. Bound for Belfast and Glasgow, she left on the 20th.

Another immigration scheme was the "3000 British Families for Canada" sponsored settlement programme with Metagama taking out the first family, destined for British Columbia, on her first crossing in 1925. Credit: Dundee Telegraph, 9 March 1925

Plans for the 1925 summer season were announced on 6 April with 92 arrivals and departures from the St. Lawrence by CPS including seven round voyages by Metagama on the Glasgow-Montreal run. The first commenced on 8 March and Metagama was one of three CPS steamers to arrive at Quebec and Montreal the weekend of 16 May, following Melita and Montroyal.  

Six Passengers Whose Ages Total  442 Years.

Six brides, also six septuagenarians, 10 Cossar boys, 15 domestics, and a large number of farmers and farm labourers, sailed from Glasgow to Canada to-day on the Canadian Pacific liner Metagama.

Dundee Evening Telegraph, 8 May 1925

Sailing from Glasgow on 8 May 1925, Metagama came into Quebec on the 17th with 154 Cabin and 346 Third Class. Her first eastbound crossing  got underway from Montreal on the 21st.

Among those sailing in Metagama from Glasgow on 5 June 1925 were over 30 Scottish boys enrolled as farm apprentices in Canada who received free passage out provided by the Colonisation Association. They were obliged to remain in their positions until they reached 18 years of age. Also aboard were 24 families, the largest group so far that season, and a part of scheme to place 3,000 British families on as many Canadian farms that year. The fog-delayed liner reached Quebec on the 14th with 144 Cabin and 497 Third Class aboard. 

Credit: Northern Whig, 23 July 1925

In addition to 160 Cabin and 245 Third Class passengers, Metagama reached the St. Lawrence on 7 August 1925 from Glasgow and Belfast with 25 Irish race horses and six prize Clydesdales. Proving that trouble really does come in threes, Metagama suffered her third casualty in as many years when it was reported on the 10th that she had touched bottom in the river below Quebec on the 8th en route to Montreal, a few hours before the outbound Montrose had also touched bottom and had to return to Montreal for repairs. The grounding occurred in fog when Metagama had to swing out in the channel through the Ste. Croix Bar to avoid the approaching tug Sir Lomer. Metagama damaged her port tanks, and after unloading on the 10th, entered the floating dry dock at the Vickers yard for repairs. 

Metagama in the floating dry dock (built at Barrow-in-Furness in 1918) at the Vickers Canada yard in Montreal on 18 August 1925 for repairs after touching bottom in the St. Lawrence between Quebec and Montreal. 

On 12 August 1925 Canadian Pacific announced that both Montrose and Metagama would be laid up  for 25-30 days for repairs. Marloch would replace Metagama on her 28 August sailing from Glasgow. With a number of plates needing replacement, the cost to repair her was estimated at  $70,000. After after a full inquiry into the accident, the Dominion Wreck Commissioner on 1 September issued a severe reprimand to Fortunat Ramelin, the pilot in charge of Metagama, and also censured Second Officer David Pert for not interceding.  The next day it was announced that Metagama's repairs had been completed and she shifted to Shed 9 to load in preparation for her scheduled sailing on the 10th for Belfast and Glasgow. 

Five of the eight brides from Glasgow and Belfast sailing in Metagama. Credit: Belfast Telegraph, 25 September 1925. 

On 31 October 1925, Metagama arrived at Montreal for the last time that season with 81 Cabin and 199 Third Class passengers. 

Beginning her winter season, Metagama had only 36 Cabin and 82 Third Class, 1,000 tons of cargo and 4,000 bags of mail and parcels to land upon arrival at St. John from Liverpool on 6 December 1925. Once again, Metagama had one of the Christmas sailings that year, departing St. John on the 11th for Glasgow and Liverpool with 95 Cabin and 449 Third Class aboard. 

In 1925, Metagama completed 16 crossings and carried 5,321 passengers (3,074 westbound and 2,277 eastbound).

1926

Metagama (Capt. E. Griffiths, RNR) and her 40 Cabin and 148 Third Class passengers rang in the New Year a day before landing at St. John from Liverpool on 2 January 1926.  Mersey-bound on the 8th, she left with 59 Cabin and 92 Third Class and arrived on the 16th.

The programme for  the 1926 summer season was announced on 27 January 1926 with Metagama to make seven voyages on the Glasgow-Belfast-Montreal run. 

After battling a fearsome winter Atlantic storm, Metagama reached St. John, doubtless to the relief of her 56 Cabin and 133 Third Class passengers, on 2 February 1926.  A passenger aboard was quoted in the Calgary Herald: "...huge waves, more than 100 feet high, battered the Metagama at  times. One of these broke a window an inch thick on the bridge, and broke the nose of one of the sailors. The ship behaved splendidly, however, although according to the chief engineer it was the worst weather he had experienced in the Atlantic since 1884."

Metagama (Capt. A. Freer) closed out the winter season with her St. John departure on 23 April 1926.  In all, CPS had 25 winter calls there and the New Brunswick port handled a record 413 ocean going steamers compared to 299 the previous season. 

Despite the General Strike in Britain, Metagama was able to sail on schedule from Glasgow at midnight on 7 May 1926. She landed 496 Third Class at Quebec on the 16th and 82 Cabin passengers at Montreal the following morning.  Among the Third Class were 200 new Scottish settlers, led by Father R.A. MacDonnell, managing director of the Scottish Immigrant Aid Society. On her first sailing that season from Montreal on the 20th she had 93 Cabin and 185 Third Class aboard. 

On her next Quebec arrival on 14 June 1926, Metagama landed 547 Third Class including the largest group of farm workers so  far that season: 380 in all, all destined for Winnipeg and all "with the fixed intention of becoming Canadian citizens and making their homes on the farm."  

Metagama continuing to bring "the very best class of settlers that this country can get...". Credit: Calgary Herald, 30 June 1926.

Metagama continued to bring  "good stock" to the Dominion, not  just sturdy Scottish and Irish settlers, but thoroughbreds as on 11 July 1926  when she landed 25 of the best racing horses in Ireland at Montreal comprising one stallion, 16 mares and eight geldings and mostly three-year-olds and both steeplechasers and flat runners. Metagama also brought in 94 Cabin and 220  Third Class passengers of possibly lesser pedigree, including a group of Scottish teachers. 

In July 1926 Metagama landed a valuable consignment of prize racing horses and a group of Scottish teachers bound for a tour of Canada and the U.S., here posing with Capt. Freer. Credit: St. Andrews Citizen, 10 July 1926. 

On 25 July 1926 CPS announced some changes for the late summer and autumn sailings. Metagama's 29 October sailing from Liverpool would also call at Greenock and her 4 November departure from Glasgow to Montreal would be substituted by one from Liverpool on 12 November, replacing Montrose. 

Arriving from Liverpool rather than Glasgow and Belfast, Metagama came into Quebec on 6 August 1926 with 196 Cabin and 888 Third Class, including 546 for Winnipeg of whom 202 were Mennonites. Their numbers were swollen by Nicholas Patrick Metagama Dyck who was born at sea on 4 August to Mennonite parents immigrating from Russia. He was the first Mennonite baby to be baptized by a Bishop of London, the Right Hon. A.F. Winnington-Ingram, who was aboard as a passenger. The baptismal service was held on the aft deck and the child's name honoured Patrick (after the ship's surgeon who delivered him) and Metagama after the vessel, of course. 

Canadian Pacific announced their St. Lawrence season plans for 1927 on 5 September 1926. Principal among these was Melita joining Metagama on the Glasgow-Belfast-Montreal run. 

With a cargo more valued than even race horses, Metagama docked at Montreal on 8 November 1926 with a consignment of gold sovereigns worth almost one million dollars (£200,000)  in forty boxes locked in her strong room and under the personal supervision of Capt. A. Freer.  Her passenger list comprised 118 Cabin and 551 Third Class including a party of 39 Scottish miners going to the Cape Breton coal mines and two boys, one aged eight and the other five, travelling alone and under the care of the Purser J. Smellie, who were met on the pier by their grandfather.  Thirty passengers were bound for the Orient and would catch Empress of Asia at Vancouver which was held a day to await their arrival. Bidding farewell to the St. Lawrence for the year,  Metagama sailed on  the 12th.

As usual, CPR arranged special through sleeping cards from the Western Provinces right to the ship's side at St. John for the Christmas crossings to the "Old Country." Credit: Calgary Herald, 6 October 1926.

An epic winter storm which ravaged the New England and Canadian coast and spread into the Atlantic, pummelled Metagama and many other ships. The CPS liner, two  days late, came into St. John on 8 December 1926, having sailed from Liverpool back on 26 November. Of her 728 Third Class passengers, there were 412 adult and 76 child settlers for the prairies and 32 adults and two children destined for British Columbia, 200 being Mennonites.  Once again, Metagama was one of CPS's Christmas Boats, sailing from St. John on the 11th, 200 of her 76 Cabin and 357 Third Class passengers arriving in two special trains from the West which ran right to the ship's side. 

In 1926, Metagama completed 22 crossings and carried 9,752 passengers (7,046 westbound and 2,656 eastbound).

Credit: University of British Columbia, Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection 

1927

As she did in 1926, Metagama rang in the New Year just before arriving at St. John on 2 January 1927. Among her 87 Cabin and 475 Third Class passengers was the D' Oyly Carte Opera Company, including Henry Lytton and Bertha Lewis, who would open the next week at His Majesty's Theatre  in Montreal with Gilbert & Sullivan's "The Mikado."  Enjoying a "delightful trip with very mild weather," Metagama also landed 2,110 tons of cargo, 1,043 bags of mail and four more  thoroughbred horses. Her first first eastbound for the year got  underway on the 7th with 70 Cabin and 147 Third Class aboard.

Canadian Pacific tinkered with their winter/spring sailings, announcing on 1 January 1927 that Metagama's 11 February westbound crossing would be cancelled and instead she would sail from Antwerp on 4 March and Southampton the next day, returning direct to Antwerp rather than to Liverpool and Greenock. 

Beginning the settler season in earnest, Metagama docked at St. John  on her first crossing from Antwerp and Southampton (sailed 2 March 1927)  on the 11th with 188 Tourist Third Cabin (the first time she had  carried passengers under this designation in lieu of Cabin Class) and 862 Third Class, almost destined for farms in around Winnipeg.  Metagama sailed for the first time to Antwerp on the 15th.

Photo postcard for Metagama. Credit: author's collection.

One of three CPS liners to dock at the port in one weekend (bringing in a record total of 3,753 passengers), Metagama landed 84 Tourist Third and 1,308 Third Class at St. John on 8 April 1927 from Antwerp and Southampton.  Back on her familiar route for her final winter crossing, she left St. John for Glasgow on the 12th.

St. Lawrence-bound for the first time that year, Metagama sailed from Glasgow on 30 April and Belfast the next day, and landed 556 Third Class (including five brides and 32 domestics) at Quebec on 7 May and 51 Cabin passengers at Montreal the following day. Eastbound, she took out 82 Cabin and 84 Third Class on the 12th. 

Setting a record for big families landing at Quebec, Metagama docked on 7 June 1927 numbering 12 families all of which comprised at least ten members each as well as 55 smaller families. In all, she landed 830 settlers, "every one of them British, and they presented a fine appearance as they came down the gangway into the sheds en route into immigration building for examination." (Times Colonist, 7 June 1927). 

R.M.S. Metagama coming into Quebec on 7 June 1927 with 830 new Canadians. Credit: Archives Canada. 

With the first group of children from Bernardo Homes in London to come over to Canada in some two years, numbering 46 boys and 11 girls and all bound for homes in Toronto, Metagama came into Quebec on 2 July 1927.  In all, she had 51 Cabin and 384 Third Class aboard.  Fog delayed her arrival at Montreal until the 6th so she had to put in a short turnaround to take her scheduled departure the next day at 11:00 a.m. for Belfast and Glasgow. 

On 4 October 1927 CPS announced that in anticipation of the  maiden voyage of the new Duchess of  Atholl in June 1928, a general fleet reshuffle with Metagama going on the Antwerp, Cherbourg and Southampton service.

Among those arriving aboard Metagama's final St. Lawrence trip of the season at Quebec on  23 October 1927 were 228 new settlers and 17 English students bound for Claresholm College in Alberta. This marked the  first  crossing of the ship to accommodate three classes: Cabin, Tourist Third and Third, disembarking 114, 168 and 238 passengers respectively in each class.  On her eastbound departure on the 28th for Liverpool, she reverted to Cabin and Third Class only. 

In reporting the Metagama's fire, the Belfast Telegraph used this nice shot of her anchored in Belfast Lough on an earlier call. 

Metagama, after calling at Greenock, docked at Liverpool on 7 November 1927 and then proceeded to Glasgow to unload the rest of her cargo after which she was to be drydocked for her annual overhaul. Whilst in the Firth of Clyde on the 9th at 9:00 a.m., smoke was seen issuing from no. 6 hold containing a quantity of rubber tyres and 200 bales of hay.  The crew injected steam into the hold which seemed to have quenched the blaze. When the ship made it to Prince's Dock, Glasgow, the fire brigade was called. When the hatch to the hold was lifted, dense volumes of black smoke issued forth and the fire had well retaken hold. The firemen had great difficulty in getting at the seat of the fire in the 30-ft. deep hold.  It was, at one point, feared the fire would spread to the Third Class dining saloon which was immediately above the 'tween deck.    

During the night, the Metagama took a serious list to starboard owing to volumes of water used to fight the blaze, but this was countered by emptying some of the ballast tanks on that side of the ship.  The ship's list at one point was sufficient to snap one of the forward moorings and slowly righting herself, she eventually settled on the muddy bottom of the dock. After 20 hours' work, firemen finally got the fire under control by the morning of 10 November 1927, but even so one engine and two fire men, suspended in a bosuns chair over the portside, were playing water through portholes into the still smouldering cargo for much of the day. The fire was declared extinguished on the 11th and work resumed to unload the remainder of cargo still aboard. 

At least the fire was well-timed and the damage could be repaired in the course of what was already planned to be an extensive refit for Metagama. This included re-arranging her accommodation for three classes: 290 Cabin, 229 Tourist Third and 1,011 Third Class and she also emerged in the revised Canadian Pacific  North Atlantic livery of plain  black hull, the white sheer being deleted. 

In 1927, Metagama completed 20 crossings and carried 8,723 passengers (6,641 westbound and 2,082 eastbound).

Looking pretty "plain jane" in CPS's revised 1928 livery.  There are few "real" photos of Metagama in this scheme and most, like the above, are actually retouched to remove the white sheer line of the previous livery. 

1928

Resuming service, Metagama sailed from Liverpool on 27 January 1928 and after calling at Greenock and Belfast, had 37 Cabin, 59 Tourist Third and 187 Third Class aboard to disembark at St. John on 6 February.  Her eastbound crossing, beginning the 10th, took away 35 Cabin, 34 Tourist Third and 116 Third Class passengers.

Not all of Metagama's settler passengers were from the British Isles and among the 416 Third Class she land at St. John on 4 March 1928 were 60 Scandinavians bound for farms in the West in addition to 12 British farm labourers, 10 British domestics for Montreal and eight more British families.  She also disembarked 54 Cabin and 79 Tourist Third.  With the ship now off her familiar Scottish and Irish ports route, her passenger profile would, like her new route, become increasingly varied and distinctly continental.

Contributing 681 to her share of the more than 1,700 settlers who arrived at St. John in the last few days aboard CPS, Metagama docked on 2 April 1928 from Antwerp and Southampton.  She carried no Cabin passengers on this trip, but numbered 151 Tourist Third in her compliment.   Her eastbound crossing of 7 April had a meagre compliment of 5 Cabin, 9 Tourist and 21 Third bound for Southampton and Hamburg. It was an inauspicious inauguration of CPS's  new cabin class service to Hamburg which would, in effect, replace that of the Empress liners from Quebec but would, at the start of season, start from Montreal.  It would be Metagama's only eastbound crossing on the line which would thereafter be held down by Montroyal and Montairn. 

Making her first Quebec arrival for the season, Metagama arrived from Southampton and Hamburg on 3 May with 24 Cabin and an over capacity crowd of 1,265 Third Class. This reflected the new cosmopolitan makeup  of her new European based service as well as that of Canadian immigration as a whole comprising 235 Hungarians, 148 Czechs,150 Ukrainians, 95 Poles, 25 Lithuanians, 65 Yugoslavians, 50 Scandinavians and the balance British. All were bound for Winnipeg. By contrast, she landed but 14 Cabin passengers when she docked at Montreal on the 3rd.

Metagama's eastbound departure from Montreal for Southampton on 5 May 1928 resumed the Montreal-Channel ports service which had lapsed the previous year when Melita and Minnedosa went on the Liverpool run.  Metagama would go only as far as Southampton where she would be drydocked and fitted with new solid screws which were reckoned to give her half a knot more speed.  Resuming service on 6 June from Antwerp to Montreal via Southampton, Cherbourg and Cobh, she held down this route with Montrose. She arrived at Southampton on the 14th.

Delayed by dense  fog, Metagama arrived at Montreal from Antwerp, Southampton and Cherbourg  on 16 June 1928 with 53 Cabin passengers, having landed her 495 Third Class passengers at Quebec. She carried no Tourist Third on this crossing.  She certainly had a good compliment in that class when she departed on the 20th with a large student party of 210 travelling with the Overseas Education League in addition to 70 Cabin and 141 Third Class passengers.  The student group was likened by The  Province to "a deportation of the debutantes and the prettiest Canadian university co-eds."

Owing to a strike at Antwerp, Metagama's scheduled 4 July 1928 sailing from the port was cancelled and, of  course, her eastbound crossing of 18 July.  Her intending passengers were rebooked in Empress of Scotland from Quebec. Sadly, it robbed the ship of the honour of conveying some of the Canadian Olympic team to the Games held that year in Amsterdam as had been planned for that sailing. 

Fog again delayed Metagama's docking at Quebec from the Channel ports on 10 August 1928 and she was forced to anchor for several hours at Lower Traverse before coming alongside at 7:00 p.m. with a traditional heavy list of 927 in Third Class for that time of year, being almost all season harvesters coming out from Britain for the grain harvest in the West and almost all winding up settling permanently.  Her 70 Cabin Class passengers disembarked at Montreal the following evening. She again carried only Cabin and Third westbound but also Tourist Third eastbound.  

Doubtless to cater to returning summer travellers, Metagama's next westbound crossing accommodated three classes with 186 Cabin, 173 Tourist Third and 514 Third, of  the later 492 were settlers destined for Winnipeg.  They were landed at Quebec on 7 September and her cabin passengers at Montreal on the 8th, including a theatrical  company.  On this voyage, she was commanded by Capt. D. Sinclair McQueen. 

In announcing their winter season schedule on 29 September 1928, Metagama would  make the first call at St. John on 1 December and sailing six days later. A few days later the 1929 St. Lawrence schedule came out showing 75 sailings from Montreal with  Metagama and Montclare maintaining a three-weekly frequency to Antwerp.

Credit: Gazette, 22 November 1928

Winnipeg, December 4-- Little children wearing sailor overcoats and with bare knees, other wrapped to their eyes with woollies, but all bearing on their cheeks the mark of western Canada's healthy climate, were among the passengers on the Christmas boatside special on the Canadian Pacific this morning. The special of 13 cars, carried about five hundred passengers, nearly one hundred of them between two and ten years of age, and will run straight through to West St. John to connect with the Metagama and Montclare. The regular passenger trains for Montreal carried about 300 other Christmas travellers, including 48 returning British harvesters.

The Gazette, 5 December 1928

Her first sailing from St. John to Cherbourg, Southampton and Antwerp, on 7 December 1928, opened CPS's winter season and was also the first Christmas crossing, attracting 16 Cabin, 115 Tourist Third and 205 Third Class fares.

In 1928, Metagama completed 22 crossings and carried 7,086 passengers (5,610 westbound and 1,476 eastbound).

1929

Metagama began 1929 with two voyages back on the Liverpool-Belfast-Greenock-St. John run.  The first of these landed 22 Cabin, 23 Tourist Third and 112 Third Class passengers on 7 January and on the eastbound crossing beginning on the 11th, she had 47 Cabin, 55 Tourist Third and 107 Third aboard.  Among those aboard were Commodore W. Hose and Engineer Commander T.E. Phillips, Royal Canadian Navy, who  carried with them the contracts for the very first two warships to be built for the service, the destroyers H.M.C.S. Saguenay and H.M.C.S. Skeena, to be built by Thornycroft at Southampton. 

Canada, too, had her Ten Pound Poms, and among those first availing themselves of the Canadian sponsored £10 fare for qualified settlers, were among 245 Third Class passengers disembarking Metagama at Quebec on 3 February 1929 with 38 Cabin and 62 Tourist Third landing at Montreal the next day. Her eastbound crossing on the 8th was notable in being the first to take air mail direct from central Canada, 13 bags in all, which were flown into Midgeville just in time to be raced by motorcar to West St. John to be put aboard Metagama just before she sailed at 12:30 p.m.

Metagama resumed her Channel Ports-St. John services that March, coming in on the 11th with 18 Cabin, 97 Tourist Third and  422 Third Class, the later all settlers bound the West. 

On her final arrival there for the season, Metagama came into St. John on 14 April 1929 fairly bursting at the seams with 28 Cabin, 95 Tourist Third and 898 Third Class from Hamburg, Southampton, Cherbourg and Cobh not to mention 1,000 tons of cargo and two carloads of mail and express parcels. Bidding farewell to New Brunswick for the time being, Metagama pulled out on the 17th and reached Southampton on the 26th and Antwerp the following day. 

Promoting the 1929 summer season, the "speedier ships" referred to the new solid screws fitted to the M's which increased their speed by half a knot. Credit: Gazette, 8 April 1929. 

Montreal-bound for the first time that year, Metagama sailed from Antwerp on 5 May 1929. She was commanded by a new skipper, Capt. G.F. McCombie, formerly of  Beaverburn.   Metagama made a special call at the Tail  of the Bank on the 11th to embark a large and varied list of emigrants: families, farm workers, domestic workers, Y.M.C.A. boys, Cossar boys and boy immigrants under the auspices of the Catholic  Emigration Association. Included was family party of 18 representing three generations, sailing under the New Brunswick Settlement scheme and the fare paid by the whole family only averaged £1 13 s. per member. After picking up another 150  passengers at Belfast, she had aboard 93 Cabin, 143 Tourist Third and 1,108 Third Class.  She came into Quebec on the 20th.  Dressed overall for Empire Day (increasingly known as Victoria Day in the Dominion), Metagama left Montreal on the 24th with 95 Cabin, 188 Tourist Cabin and 118 Third Class passengers.  She joined Antonia, Ausonia and Lady Rodney in sailing that morning. 

Some of the boy immigrants, aged 14-18, under the auspices of the Catholic Emigration Association who sailed in Metagama on her first St. Lawrence crossing in May 1929. 

Back briefly on her old Glasgow run, Metagama (Capt. M.F. Murray) came into Quebec on 14 June 1929 with 32 Cabin, 68 Tourist Third and 381 Third Class, the later including no fewer than 65 families comprising 231 settlers in all.  She sailed on 22nd with 75 Cabin, 212 Tourist Third and 230 Third Class.

During a visit to Montreal, come of Canada's champion Olympic swimmers visited Metagama and apparently packed their swimsuits. Credit: Leader-Post, 10 July 1929.

A quiet  summer season was capped by the 3 October 1929 announcement of the winter schedule which included putting Metagama on yet another new  routing: St. John to London, Cherbourg and Antwerp January-April.

In November 1929 the Gazette reported that rumour that Cunard were proposing converting their A-class steamers  on the Canada run back to two classes, but this time Tourist Third Cabin and Third Class and to include Athenia and Letitia of the associated Donaldson Line.  It was speculated that if the Atlantic Conference permitted the change that CPS would follow suit with the "M" class ships, including Metagama. 

Plans for the summer 1930 season included Metagama and Montrose running on a Montreal-London-Le Havre-Antwerp route with 14 calls at the French port. 

Making her first Christmas crossing from Britain in six years,  Metagama (Capt. D.J.C. Jones)sailed on 13 December 1929 from Liverpool to  St. John, via Greenock and Belfast, arriving on the 23rd. Just in time for Christmas, she came in with the single largest consignment of mail  she had ever carried: 2,329 bags of parcel post, 508 bags of magazines, 295 bags of letters and cards-- 3,762 bags in all and taking six mail cars which were attached to the Montreal Boat Train.   

Credit: Gazette, 27 December 1929

With her departure from St. John on 27 December 1929, Metagama inaugurated Canadian Pacific's new service from Canada directly to London, a route hitherto served only by the "Beaver" class cargo liners. This would use the new port (1926) at Tilbury Docks. After calling there, Metagama would continue to Antwerp with cargo and sail westbound from Southampton, Cherbourg and Cobh. Eastbound, the only call would Cherbourg before docking at Tilbury the next day. 

In 1929, Metagama completed 16 crossings and carried 5,738 passengers (3,931 westbound and 1,807 eastbound).

1930

Metagama began a new year and new decade with her maiden arrival at Tilbury Docks on 5 January 1930. 

It was announced on 20 February that Metagama would additionally call at Halifax on her crossing from St. John which was put back to 28 February to allow for the call there on 1 March. 

With a record number passengers to St. John for the season, Metagama docked at St. John on 23 February 1930 with 59 Cabin, 140 Tourist Third and 391 Third Class. Most were  bound for the West with three special trains on hand to route them straight through to Winnipeg.  Her most famous passengers on this trip were the Canadian hockey team returning from a triumphant two-month tour of Europe, winning the European hockey championship and winning all but one of the 32 total games they played.  They boarded the CPR boat train for Toronto. 

Metagama's eastbound crossing from St. John on 28 February 1930 and Halifax (where she loaded a large cargo of apples) to Cherbourg, Southampton and London attracted 63 Cabin, 37 Tourist Third and 108 Third Class fares.  Her call at Halifax on 1 March was, in fact, the first by a CPS passenger ship since 1924.

Inbound from Antwerp and channel ports, Metagama landed a heavy list of 955 Third Class (and 12 Cabin and 88 Tourist) passengers at St. John on 8 April 1930. Among those arriving from Southampton was a party of Royal Navy personnel, one officers and 12 ratings, bound for the Canadian navy base at Esquilmalt, B.C.  Bound for Cherbourg, London and Antwerp, Metagama made her final sailing from St. John on the 11th.

The evolving Depression bit Canadian Pacific hard and fast and already overtonnaged following the introduction of the four new Duchesses in 1928,  they began to cutback. One early (and unannounced) casualty was the cancellation of Metagama's first sailing of the St. Lawrence season, from Antwerp on 24 April 1930, arriving Montreal 4 May, and returning 8 May to Le Havre, London and Antwerp.

Back in service, Metagama, now commanded by Capt. W.B. Coyle, R.N.R., sailed from Antwerp on 18 June 1930 and Southampton on the 19th docked at Montreal  at 1:30 p.m. on 29 June 1930. She brought over 32 Cabin, 18 Tourist Third and 140 Third.  Her eastbound sailing of 3 July to Le Havre, London and Antwerp took out a good crowd of vacationers and students numbering 124 Cabin, 239 Tourist Third and 108 Third Class.  She also had 45 Royal Canadian Navy ratings en route to Southampton to help man the now completed H.M.C.S. Skeena and H.M.C.S. Saguenay.  Metagama arrived at Antwerp on 13 July. 

Metagama sailed from Southampton 14 August 1930 and came into Quebec  on the 22nd and arrived at Montreal a day later. She had 179 Cabin, 198 Tourist Third and 208 Third Class aboard.  On the 28th she departed Montreal for Le Havre, London and Antwerp with 21 Cabin, 35 Tourist Third and 55 Third Class passengers. She arrived at London (Tilbury) at 7:00 a.m.  6 September and Antwerp at 1:00 p.m. on the 7th.

That proved to be Metagama's final  voyage and with nary an announcement, she decommissioned by Canadian Pacific facing a precipitous  fall-off in traffic as the Stock Market Crash of the previous October descended headlong into the Great Depression.  This effectively ended sponsored emigration to Canada and having placed the four Duchesses in service in 1928 and the new Empress of Britain coming out in 1931, the company had way overbuilt.    

In 1930, Metagama completed eight crossings and carried 3,297 passengers (2,420 westbound and 877 eastbound).

Metagama arrived at Southend on 23 January 1931 for lay-up and was anchored not far from the famous pier, becoming an increasingly forlorn sight for several seasons of holidaymakers. She was sold on 9 March 1934 for £18,250 to P.&W. McLellan for breaking up. On the afternoon of 14 April Metagama was driven ashore and beached at their Bridgeness yards. 

Credit: Glasgow Herald, 16 April 1934

On 21 April 1934 ship was opened to  public inspection for a fee, the proceeds  going to local charities:

Lured by the the hope of recapturing romance on the one-time favourite 'bride ship of the Atlantic,' and attracted by the prospect of visiting one of the principal ships' cemetaries of the River Forth, about two thousand persons availed themselves of this unique opportunity… 

And now, her voyaging over, her anchor cast for the last time, her final tie-up  made, the Metagama will be scrapped. No longer will she witness the joyous but tearful good-byes of bevies of blushing brides and brides-to-be en route to the rolling prairies of Canada.

As a matter of fact, the Metagama paid a last farewell to affectionate crowds on Saturday. They walked in stately fashion up a roughly constructed gangway, and entered the ship through a hole cut low down in the vessel's port side, and so, past a litter of broken woodwork, into the furnished lounge. The inelegent embarkation was effected with such composure and such an 'air,' as if everybody was accustomed to crossing the Atlantic every second week, and as if the derelict was the new Cunarder.

The Metagama rose to the occasion, displaying its soiled and faded  splendour  proudly, and the crowds passed admiring comments on the accommodation and the furnishings. The children's playroom, with its nursery equipment, and its walls dadoed with pictures from nursery stories, was the premier  source of  interest, and a queue lined up to inspect it.

But the visitors were not  content merely to  explore the decks and public  rooms. They penetrated, by way  of long, dark passageways, and precipitous iron ladders, to the bowels of the ship, where flickering lanterns revealed the engines which had carried the Metagama through seas in calm and storm. And they climbed up companionways from deck to deck until they reach the bridge, with its navigation and signalling apparatus. No one, however, was daring enough to clamber up the rigging to the crow's nest.

Several visitors discovered a place  on the ship were  loving  couples-- scores of them-- had carved their names on the woodwork. One lady  audibly wondered it 'any of the brides have come back to  shed sentimental tears over the initials their young men put  inside carved hearts.'

Linlithgowshire  Gazette, 27 April 1934

The dear old Metagama now lies at Bridgeness sadly disfigured.  The point of her  nose has been snipped off, but the bridge remains. The flighty 'bride ship' recently tried to  elope, and she actually burst her strong bonds and slipped away. But she was caught by Mr. Mudbank and held fast in his close embrace again

Linlithgowshire Gazette, 8 June 1924

On 28 September 1934 it was reported that Metagama's breaking up "is almost complete" and little remained of her that November when the Atlantic Transport Line's Minnetonka, barely ten years old, was beached at the same yard for scrapping. 

So ended what had been but a 15-year active career for Metagama. Few ships worked harder and figured more  in their trade and in the memories of her passengers who embarked in her to start new lives in a distant country.  R.M.S. Metagama remains among the most important and beloved of all the ships that served and built the Dominion.

                                                Crossings     Passengers             Troops   
R.M.S. Missanabie          74                      26,155                      30,000 (approx.) 
R.M.S. Metagama            283                  153,452                   36,000 (approx.)   

R.M.S. Metagama sails from Stornoway for Canada, April 1923. Credit: Hebridean Memories, Seton Paul Gordon, 1923.

R.M.S. MISSANABIE

R.M.S. METAGAMA

Built by Barclay, Curle & Co., Whiteinch, Glasgow. Yard nos. 510 (Missanabie) & 511 (Metagama)

Gross tonnage       12,469 (Missanabie)

                                 12,420 (Metagama)

Length: (o.a.)        520 ft.

              (b.p.)         500 ft. 

Beam:                     64 ft. 

Machinery: quadruple-expansion reciprocating, eight single-end coal burning boilers 215 psi. 9,000 i.h.p..

Speed:                    15.5 knots service

                                17.5 knots trials

Passengers             520 Second Class 1,138 Third Class (as built)

                               520 Cabin Class 1,138 Third Class (post-1919)

                               290 Cabin Class 229 Tourist Third Class 1,011 Third Class (post-1927) 

Officers & Crew   300                               

                       

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Canadian Gazette

Engineering

Engineer & Naval Architect

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Nautical Gazette

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Aberdeen Press & Journal

Belfast Telegraph

Calgary Herald

Daily Mirror

Daily Record & Mail

Dundee Courier

Edmonton Journal

Gazette (Montreal)

Glasgow Herald

The Globe

Larne Times

Nanaimo Daily News

New York Times

Northern Whig

Ottawa Citizen

Ottawa Journal

Red Deer Advocate

Saskatoon Daily Star

Star-Phoenix

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The Scotsman

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https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/

https://www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/Pages/home.aspx

https://www.dalmadan.com/?p=4836

https://www.gettyimages.com/

https://www.greatwarforum.org/

https://www.hathitrust.org/

https://historicengland.org.uk

https://www.iwm.org.uk/

https://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/merseyside-maritime-museum

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https://searcharchives.vancouver.ca/

A special note of appreciation for the University of British Columbia's outstanding Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection of Canadian Pacific material. 

Additions/Corrections/Contributions welcomed

contact the author at posted_at_sea@hotmail.com

© Peter C. Kohler