SS Heliopolis (1907)

The SS Heliopolis is a Clyde-built British passenger ship that on her maiden voyage in 1907 became the first ship to deliver Spanish immigrants from mainland Spain to Hawaii. She was subsequently renamed in 1910 as the SS Royal George, and served as a troop ship for the Canadian Expeditionary Force during the First World War.

Pre-War history


The SS Heliopolis was built in 1907 by the Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Company of Govan, Glasgow, Scotland for the British-owned Egyptian Mail Company as an 11,146 gross ton ship with a length of 525.8 ft, a beam 60.2 ft, two smoke stacks (funnels), two masts, and a triple-screw propulsion that gave a cruising speed of 19 knots. Although launched on 28 May 1907 for intended service in the Mediterranean, her maiden voyage was to pick up 850 Spanish families in Malaga, Spain to be transported to Hawaii as contract laborers to work on the Hawaiian sugar cane plantations.

Departure of the ship from Malaga was plagued by bureaucratic delays, during which time 1,157 Spanish passengers left the ship and returned home in protest of poor conditions on board. The Heliopolis finally left port on 10 March 1907, and arrived in Honolulu, Hawaii on 26 April 1907 with 2,246 Spanish immigrants after 47 days at sea, which made the Heliopolis the first ship to participate in the Spanish immigration to Hawaii.

The Heliopolis, upon returning from Hawaii, operated in the Mediterranean on the Marseille-to-Alexandria route, with 1st-class accommodations for 344 passengers, 2nd-class accommodations for 210 passengers, and berths for 560 3rd-class passengers, giving a net capacity of 1,157 passengers. These voyages continued until 1909, when the Egyptian Mail Company decided that the ship was unprofitable, and put her up in dry dock in Marseille to be offered for sale.

The ship was subsequently purchased in 1910 by the Canadian Northern Steamship Company of Toronto, who renamed her the SS Royal George. She then did passenger service in the North Atlantic commencing on 26 May 1910 with the Avonmouth-Quebec-Montreal route, until she ran aground on 6 November 1912 attempting to put in at Quebec. However, she was salvaged, and after repairs returned to service on 17 June 1913 on the same route.

World War I service
The Royal George was taken over by the Canadian military when the First World War began, and sailed on 3 October 1914 from Gaspé Bay, Quebec for Plymouth, England with the Canadian Expeditionary Force. She subsequently participated in 1915 in the ill-fated Gallipoli campaign, and saw service through the remainder of the war as a British troop ship. The Royal George was returned at the end of the war to the Cunard Line, which in 1916 had purchased the entire fleet of Canadian Northern Steamship.

Post-War voyages
The Royal George resumed passenger service on 10 February 1919, traveling from Liverpool to Halifax to New York, and later from Southampton to Halifax to New York. But after nine voyages with the Cunard Line, she was retired in 1920 and used as a depot ship at Cherbourg Harbor in France to process emigrants, before finally being scrapped in 1922 at Wilhelmshaven, Germany.