HMS Engadine (1911)

HMS Engadine was a seaplane tender which served in the First World War. She was built as a Folkestone-Boulogne ferry by William Denny and Brothers, launched on 23 September 1911 and named after the Engadine valley in Switzerland. She was taken over by the Royal Navy in 1914 and modified, with the construction of cranes and a hangar aft of the funnels, so that she could carry four Short 184 floatplanes. There was no flight deck, the aircraft being lowered onto the sea for takeoff and recovered again from the sea after landing.

Her aircraft participated in the Cuxhaven Raid on Christmas Day 1914. At the Battle of Jutland in 1916, one of her seaplanes, piloted by Lieutenant Frederick S. Rutland carried out an aerial reconnaissance of the German fleet. This was the first time that a heavier-than-air aircraft had carried out a reconnaissance of an enemy fleet in action. Later in the battle she rescued the crew of the crippled HMS Warrior before taking her in tow. Later in the war she served in the Mediterranean.

She was sold back to her original owners, the South Eastern and Chatham Railway in December 1919.

By 1941, the ship had been renamed SS Corregidor and was working in the Philippines. On 17 December 1941, the ship — loaded with approximately 1,200 passengers fleeing Manila — was sunk by a mine off Corregidor most likely laid by Japanese submarine I-124. American PT boats PT-32, PT-34 and PT-35 rescued 282 survivors, 7 of whom later died from injuries.