NOVEMBER, 1955. Welders at the Barclay, Curle yard at Whiteinch on the Clyde work on HM troopship Nevasa, days before its launch. The vessel, with a gross tonnage of 21,000, and “designed to the latest modern troopship standards”, was the 68th ship built at the yard for the British India Steam Navigation Company, which itself was marking its centenary that year. The launch was intended to be carried out by John Boyd-Carpenter, Minister of Transport, but “pressure of work” meant that he couldn’t attend, and his wife performed the naming ceremony. Nevasa was commissioned six months later, in July 1956.
Its subsequent history is detailed on the website of the SS Uganda Trust: “Nevasa quickly became popular with her passengers but her career as a troopship was cut short as the result of the government’s termination of national service and the increasing transfer of troops by air. In October 1962 she was laid up in the River Fal.”
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British India decided to convert Nevasa into an educational cruise ship, and she began cruising alongside two other school ships. From 1968 Nevasa worked with the SS Uganda, “but in 1974 the huge rise in oil prices curtailed her use and she was scrapped in 1975.”
Nevasa was the second troopship of that name to be built at Barclay, Curle. A story about the earlier one reflected the loyalty and affection she inspired in her crew . Some years before she was broken up in 1948, a young man walked up the gangway in search of a job. The quartermaster, Frank Huntley, who had worked on the ship for 34 years, told him: “Son, you go and camp at the bottom of the gangway, and when you see a coffin coming off, nip up quick: you may be lucky.”
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