Court Line - the company and its ships

Dorington Court (3)

 

Court Line used the name Dorington Court for five ships:

 

· Dorington Court (1) - a cargo ship completed in 1908

· Dorington Court (2) - a cargo ship completed in 1915

· Dorington Court (3) - a cargo ship completed in 1939

· Dorington Court (4) - a cargo ship completed in 1940 and originally named Empire Meteor

· Dorington Court (V) - a cargo ship completed in 1957

 

Dorington Court (3) had a short working life of just over three years. During this time she served on many WW2 convoys but was torpedoed and then finished off by gunfire from a German submarine in 1942 with the loss of the lives of four crew members. Dorington Court (3) had her revenge as her design became the basis of the Empire, then Ocean and Liberty ships.

Basic Data

Type: Cargo ship

Registered owners,managers and operators:

Court Line. Ltd.

Managers Haldin & Phillipps

Builders: J.L.Thompson & Sons Ltd.

Yard: Sunderland

Country: UK

Yard number: 592

Registry: N/K

Official number: 167241

Signal letters: N/K

Call sign: N/K

Classification society: N/K

Gross tonnage: 5,281

Net tonnage: 3,113

Deadweight: N/K

Length: 426 ft

Breadth: 59.9 ft

Depth: 25.5 ft

Draught: N/K

Engines: 3 cylinder triple expansion steam engine

Engine builders: North Eastern Marine Engineering (1938) Ltd.

Works: Newcastle-on-Tyne

Country: UK

Power: 420 hp

Propulsion: Single screw

Speed: 11 knots

Cargo capacity: Five holds with the superstructure split by No. 3 hold and two masts with a complement of 10 small derricks

Crew: There was a complement of 43 at the time she was sunk

Service during WW2

 

Dorington Court (3) took part in 34 convoys according to information shown in the table below which is provided courtesy of Convoyweb   - see  Ext. Ref. #5.

Sinking

 

According to External resource #4,  Dorington Court (3) was sunk by German submarine U-181 (Captain Wolfgang Lüth) on 24 Nov 1942 at position 27.00S, 34.45E while she was sailing a route between Calcutta - Madras (4 Nov) - Lourenco Marques - Durban - UK with 9,261 tons of general cargo.

 

Of her complement of 43 there were 39 survivors and 4 dead.      

 

Notes on loss:  At 20.34 hours on 24 Nov, 1942, the unescorted Dorington Court (Master Ernest Douglas Aynge Gibbs) was torpedoed and sunk by gunfire by U-181 105 miles east-southeast of Inhaca Island. Four crew members were lost. The master, 33 crew members and five gunners landed at Inhaca Island near Lourenco Marques                                                  

 

 

Roll of Honour

 

The table below lists the crew members that died. All are listed on panel 36 of the Tower Hill memorial.

Postscripts

 

1. Dorington Court (3) can be considered to have had a kind of revenge in that her design was selected by the Admiralty for the large Empire building programme and the subsequent Ocean and Liberty type ships.

2. U-181 sunk 27 ships totalling 138,779 GRT. Details are recorded in Ext. Ref. #3. She survived the war having been taken over by Japan at Singapore in May 1945 and became the Japanese submarine I-501 on 15 July 1945. The Japanese surrendered I-501 in Singapore in August 1945 and she was scuttled there by the US Navy on 12 Feb 1946.

3. According to Ext. Ref. #15:

The first Skipper of U-181 was Wolfgang Lüth, the second most successful submarine Skipper of WW II.  Lüth earned the KNIGHTS CROSS with OAK LEAF, CROSSED SWORDS and DIAMONDS.  He had commanded several U-boats previously, including U-13, U-9, U-138 and U-43 before taking command of U-181 on 9 May 1942.  He became the right-hand man to GrossAdmiral Dönitz after the alleged suicide of Adolf Hitler when Dönitz was Chancellor of Germany.  Because of his position, Dönitz was allowed to maintain armed security around himself well after Germany had surrendered.  Lüth was in overall command of the security forces and it was his own order that a sentry should ask for the password only once – and if the correct password was not replied, the sentry should shoot to kill.  Lüth was walking through the grounds of the Germany Naval Academy at Flensburg/Mürwick one night, his mind on other things, and he did not hear the sentry challenge him for the password.  As Lüth himself had ordered, the sentry fired one shot, killing Lüth instantly.  There was a quick Court of Inquiry and the young sentry, who was under command of our good friend GERD THÄTER (194-1987), was found totally innocent of any wrongdoing.

 

Images

 

1. Image #1 by courtesy of Clive Ketley.

Image 1 shows Dorrington Court (3). The date and location are not known.

Image 1