Danish steel full-rigged sail training vessel for merchant service cadets, 790 tons gross, has diesel auxiliary power.
Ernest Godfrey Beaumont lived on Discovery Island.
Vice-Admiral Edmund Rollo Mainguy graduated from the Naval College of Canada in 1918 and served in the Royal Canadian Navy.
During WWII, he commanded two destroyers and, in 1944, he was the first commanding officer of the cruise HMCS Uganda. He was commanding officer pacific coast as a rear admiral from 1946- to 1948, flag officer Atlantic coast from 1948 to 1951, and chief of the Naval Staff from 1951 to 1956 as a Vice Admiral. By 1942, he was appointed chief of Naval Personnel, Ottawa. In 1946, he was flag officer Pacific Coast. He was appointed chief of Naval Staff, with rank of Vice-Admiral in 1951.
Captain Edward Peter De Cunha served in the Merchant Marine with foreign-going ships out of Montreal and the United Kingdom. Towards the end of his career, De Cunha worked as master mariner for Deepsea and B.C. Ferries in the Gulf of Georgia.
1st rate wooden ship. Construction of HMS Victory was completed in 1765, and, famously, she was Nelson’s flagship at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. She has been in harbour service since 1824, permanently dry-docked in Portsmouth. She now functions as both a museum ship and an official flagship. Naval personnel in the Portsmouth area can also be carried on Victory’s book for administrative purposes.
German, 9,472 gross ton cargo passenger ship. Originally built in Germany for Norwegian owners, M/V Weser was acquired by the North German Lloyd Company in 1931, lengthened and re-engined in 1934, and then operated on their Europe-Northwest coast service. When war came in 1939, Weser took refuge in Manzanillo, Mexico but was captured by HMCS Prince Robert on 25 September 1940 and taken to Esquimalt where she was refitted by Yarrows and renamed Vancouver Island. Under the Canadian flag, M/V Vancouver Island was operated by Canadian National Steamships in the Atlantic. Because of her speed, she was routed independently across the Atlantic instead of in convoy and made several passages carrying war supplies from Montreal. On 15 October she was torpedoed from the unusually long range of 2,000 meters by U-558 west of Ireland. Vancouver Island sank; all on board, 64 crew, 8 gunners and 32 passengers including RAF officers trained in Canada, were lost.
Iron screw gunboat 1876-1904, 363 tons.
Originally a small, 240-ton merchant ship that was bought by the Admiralty in 1787 and fitted out as an armed transport to carry breadfruit trees from Tahiti to the West Indies in 1788. The plan was to introduce breadfruit in the West Indies as a cheap food for slaves. Bounty’s crew mutinied during the voyage from Tahiti, putting the Captain, William Bligh, and 18 loyal men into a small boat. Bligh accomplished an epic voyage of 3,600 nm to the Dutch East Indies. Bligh had earlier served in the rank of Master under Captain James Cook and carried out surveys on the North-West coast of North America. In 1790, Bounty was burned by the mutineers who settled on Pitcairn Island.