West Mead (Id. No. 3550)
1918-1919
The Navy retained the name carried by this vessel at the time of her acquisition.
(Id. No. 3550: displacement 12,175; length 423'9"; beam 54'0"; depth of hold. 29'9"; draft 24'11" (mean); speed 10.5 knots; complement 113; armament none)
War Dido was a steel-hulled, single-screw, coal-burning cargo vessel built in 1918 for the British government at Seattle, Wash., under a United States Shipping Board contract with the Ames Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co. Renamed West Mead prior to completion, she was inspected by the U.S. Navy in the Thirteenth Naval District on 26 October 1918, assigned the identification number (Id. No.) 3550 and commissioned on 29 October 1918, Lt. Cmdr. Nels A. Nelson, USNRF, in command.
Assigned to the Naval Overseas Transportation Service (NOTS), West Mead loaded 6,865 tons of flour, departed the Pacific Northwest on 15 November 1918, and proceeded via the Panama Canal to New York where she arrived on 14 December after a stop at Balboa, Canal Zone, en route. She underwent a few minor repairs, bunkered, and sailed in convoy for the British Isles on Christmas Eve. West Mead made port at Falmouth, England, on 9 January 1919.
She shifted to Rotterdam, Holland, on the 24th, and there unloaded her cargo of flour. She sailed for home, in ballast, and arrived at New York on 3 March 1919. West Mead then proceeded to Savannah, Georgia, where she took on board a cargo of cotton and lumber and got underway for her second voyage to the British Isles on 2 April. She reached Liverpool on the 21st, discharged her cargo there, and returned to Savannah, arriving on 7 June 1919.
Decommissioned on 9 June 1919, West Mead was simultaneously stricken from the Navy Register and returned to the USSB. Apparently operating under the name Westmead, the erstwhile NOTS ship wore the flag of the USSB until she was laid up in the late 1920's. Eventually acquired by the Babcock Steamship Co., and renamed Willanglo, the ship operated with that firm until 1929, when she was acquired by the Pacific-Atlantic Steamship Co., of Portland, Oregon, and renamed San Angelo.
In response to the need caused by German U-boat activity in the North Atlantic convoy routes early in World War II, the British government acquired a number of former USSB ships in both American private and government ownership; San Angelo was among them. She was carried on the Lloyd's Register of Shipping as belonging to the Ministry of Transport in 1940-1941, being renamed Empire Springbuck .
On 9 September 1941, laden with a cargo of phosphates and steel, Empire Springbuck, Watson E. O'Connell, Master, was steaming unescorted, after having straggled from Convoy SC-42 when she came under attack by the German submarine U-81 (Kapitanleutnant Friedrich Guggenberger, commanding) some 150 miles northeast of Cape Farewell. U-81 fired two torpedoes which hit the ship on the port side, causing raging fires. Empire Springbuck exploded soon thereafter, shaking U-81 that was submerged 1,200 meters away. There were no survivors, as the master, 33 of his crew, and five gunners, all perished with the ship.
Updated, Robert J. Cressman
13 February 2024
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