SS Kalyan explained

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Ship Image:

American First World War Official Exchange Collection Q47857.jpg

Ship Country:	United Kingdom
Ship Name:	SS Kalyan
Ship Operator:	Royal Navy (1915—1919) P & O (1919–1932)
Ship Builder:	Cammell Laird, Birkenhead
Ship Laid Down:	1914
Ship Launched:	24 September 1914
Ship Out Of Service:	1932
Ship Fate:	Sold to Japanese ship breakers, 12 February 1932

Ship Type:	Troop ship (1915–1918) Hospital ship (1918–1919) Passenger-cargo ship (1919–1932)
Ship Length:	480.6feet
Ship Beam:	58.2feet
Ship Height:	37.7feet
Ship Propulsion:	2 screws producing 7040hp
Ship Notes:	^[1]

SS Kalyan was a ship operated by the P & O shipping line between 1915 and 1932.

Wartime Service

Kalyan was used as a troop ship between England, Egypt and Salonika. She was then refitted as a hospital ship and dispatched to North Russia in October 1918. After a 12-day voyage she arrived in Archangel. There she acted as a temporary base hospital for British, Canadian, French, Italian, Chinese and Russian sick and wounded.^[2] The ship remained there throughout the winter, with ice having to be broken each day to prevent damage through "pinching".

She returned to Leith in June 1919. Many of her crew were Muslim Lascars who had problems during Ramadan 1919, as they were above the Arctic Circle and the sun did not set. General Ironside gave them dispensation from observing the Ramadan fast.^[3]

Sister ships

SS Karmala
SS Kashgar
SS Kashmir
SS Khiva
SS Khyber

References

Web site: North Russia 1918-19 . Helena . Hartigan . Scarlet Finders: British Military Nurses.

Notes and References

Web site: KALYAN. passengersinhistory.sa.gov.au/. 21 March 2020.
Hospital Ship at Archangel, 1918–19 . BNA Topics . pdf . W. G. . Robinson . British North America Philatelic Society Ltd. . 47 . 3 . May–June 1990 . 12 . 2013-08-21 . 2013-08-23 . https://web.archive.org/web/20130823075603/http://bnatopics.org/journals/1990/BNA%20Topics,%20Vol.%2047,%20No.%203,%20May-June%201990,%20Whole%20No.%20437.pdf#page=13 . dead .
Book: Ironside, Edmund . Archangel 1918-1919 . Edmund Ironside, 1st Baron Ironside .