Two in particular received the name HMS Maori - there were of course no macrons in those days - under the auspices of the Royal Navy's Tribal-class warships in the then-comparatively new destroyer class of vessels, or as they were originally known, torpedo-boat destroyers. However, neither of the ships named HMS Maori enjoyed a wholly fortunate career in the Royal Navy.
The huge number of warships in the Royal Navy over the years has required enormous numbers of vessel names. The process of naming these vessels was often dictated by historical precedent, with the Admiralty naming ships after famous battles and war leaders. But also as the Navy expanded it took on a more systematised approach, which was particularly important in the naval arms race in the leadup to World War 1 and the mass building programme during World War 2 to strengthen the Navy for the existential crisis of the Battle of the Atlantic. Many new names were required and the need for some sense of order and coherence was identified early on. For example, destroyers built around the same time would often be named with the same initial letter, such as the 1913-14 L-class destroyers including HMS Laertes, Llewellyn and Lochinvar, or for regional rivers around the British Isles, as in the 1903-05 River-class destroyers that included the riverine HMS Chelmer, Exe and Teviot.
The first Tribal-class of warships arose in the Edwardian decade and was named after often warlike tribes around the world, some with connections to the British Empire, and some not. The 12 destroyers in the class ranged from 850 to 1090 tons; early boats sported three 12-pounder guns, later augmented to five, while later boats were equipped with two four-inch guns. All vessels were equipped with two 18-inch torpedo tubes, and their turbines of between 14,000 to 15,500 horsepower could propel them at up to 33 knots to track down their elusive prey.
(In a hallmark of the practical approach the Royal Navy took to vessel names, in 1917 it took two damaged halves of two vessels of this class, HMS Nubian and Zulu, and merged them into a single working vessel that was renamed HMS Zubian).
The first Royal Navy HMS Maori was launched at William Denny & Brothers in Dumbarton in May 1909 after nine and a half months of construction, although it was not fully completed until November of that year. Crewed by 71 officers and ratings, the Maori was originally based at Harwich, but by the eve of World War 1 it was serving in the 4th Destroyer Flotilla, operating in the English Channel and the North Sea, where the Navy was engaged in bottling up the German surface fleet in its highly-defended ports. By 1915 Maori was serving with the 6th Destroyer Flotilla, and on 7 May 1915 it struck a mine and sank off Zeebrugge. The impact on naval history was negligible, particularly because on the same day the ocean liner RMS Lusitania, steaming off the Old Head of Kinsale in County Cork, was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine U-20, with the loss of 1195 lives, which was over half of those onboard. The outraged caused by the deaths of 128 American citizens in the attack was a direct contributor to the United States' eventual entry into the war on the Allied side in 1917.
The sinking of the destroyer attracted almost no attention in the New Zealand press at the time, which was consumed with the Gallipoli landings of a few weeks earlier. The only mention I could find was in the New Zealand Herald of 12 May 1915, which printed a grainy photo of the Maori, with the caption:
SUNK BY A GERMAN MINE AND HER CREW TAKEN PRISONERS BY THE ENEMY: THE BRITISH TORPEDO BOAT DESTROYER MAORI (980 TONS), WHICH FOUNDERED OFF THE BELGIAN COAST
The destroyer Crusader went to the rescue of the crew. The enemy opened fire from the batteries ashore, and the Crusader was forced to withdraw after being an hour and a-half under fire, abandoning boats containing seven officers and 88 men of both crews. The Germans report that all were saved and taken prisoners to Zeebrugge.
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| HMS Maori (1909) |
The second Tribal-class destroyers were a set of 16 vessels from 1937. Almost double in size to their Edwardian counterparts, these vessels displaced 1870 tons and were equipped with eight 4.7-inch guns plus four 21-inch torpedo tubes. Their 44,000 horsepower geared turbines achieved a top speed of 36 and a half knots. One of the second batch of Tribals being built at the Fairfield yards in Govan was given the name HMS Maori. The vessel was laid down in July 1936, launched in September 1937 (with the honours being performed by Mrs WJ Jordan, wife of the New Zealand High Commissioner Bill Jordan, who held the role from 1936 until 1951) and commissioned into the Royal Navy in January 1939 just before the outbreak of war.
Assigned to convoy escort service with the Mediterranean Fleet, HMS Maori played a role in the seesawing balance of military power in the region as the Allies were forced out of Greece and Crete, and as battles raged in North Africa. It also joined the ill-fated Norway campaign, in which the Royal Navy's destroyers served bravely but were exposed due to a lack of air cover. In its most distinguished battle honour, in May 1941 the ship also participated in an night-long torpedo harassment of the rampaging German battleship Bismarck. The destroyers Maori, Cossack, Sikh and Zulu peppered the enormous Bismarck with torpedo fire and illuminating it with star-shells into the next morning, causing no direct harm but preventing the battleship's crew from gaining any rest that night. The Bismarck would go on to be sunk later that day; Maori assisted by rescuing some of the few German crew to survive the sinking, picking up 25. Along with the Cossack's 85, the two ships saved nearly all of the mere 114 German survivors of the sinking; almost 2100 men perished with the ship.
Maori also played an important role in the Battle of Cape Bon in December 1941, off the coast of Tunisia (not to be confused with the other Battle of Cape Bon nearly 1500 years earlier in the 5th century AD). With three other Allied destroyers, HMS Sikh, HMS Legion and the Dutch HNLMS Isaac Sweers, HMS Maori participated in a daring sneak attack, catching the Italian light cruisers Da Barbiano and Di Giussano unawares at close range. Carrying 72 tonnes of supplies and aviation fuel on their decks, the Italians were unable to fight freely. HMS Maori's guns struck Da Barbiano, the Italian admiral Toscano's flagship, in the bridge. Both Italian cruisers and the admiral were lost, as were 817 Italian naval personnel; only around 640 were rescued.
However, the Mediterranean was a high-risk posting, and HMS Maori's luck eventually ran out. On 12 February 1942 under the picturesquely-named Commander Courage, she was at port in Valletta, Malta, when an attack by German aircraft sunk her at her moorings. Fortunately only one serviceman lost their life in the attack, but for Maori the war was over. She would later be raised and re-sunk in a safer location in July 1945, and the wreck has subsequently become a Maltese diving attraction.
Due to wartime censorship the New Zealand press appears to contain no word of the sinking, but the previous month the ship enjoyed a more convivial event: the Royal Navy crew's first visit from actual Maori soldiers. The destroyer welcomed aboard 32 soldiers from the Maori Battalion, with the Herald reporting on 12 January 1942, 'Distinguished Service Commander Jonas said he welcomed the Maoris because of the fact that since the launching of H.M.S. Maori in 1938 none of the ship's company had met a member of the Maori race, but they had heard much of the exploits and fighting qualities of the Maoris in Greece, Crete and Libya'. There was also a ritual exchange of gifts, with the Maori presenting the Battalion men with the naval ensign the ship had flown during the victory over the Italians at Cape Bon: 'Major T. Love, of Wellington, accepted the Ensign on behalf of the Maori Battalion. He then led the Maoris in a rousing haka. Major Rangi Royal, of Rotorua, on behalf of the battalion, presented Commander Jonas with a swastika flag which the Maoris had captured from Rommel's staff'.
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| HMS Maori (1937) [source] |
See also:
Blog: The international naval flotilla, 19 November 2016
Blog: In fear of the Tsar's navy, 5 November 2011
Blog: Royal NZ Navy 70th anniversary, 2 October 2011
Blog: Chatham Historic Dockyards, 5 August 2010
Blog: Nauticalia in Portsmouth, 12 April 2007
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