More historical help please...

[tritonofnor]

Thanks to the Naval Historical Branch of the MOD, I have now discovered that my boat, launched as Penguin in 1936, by Hugh McLean & Sons, for a chap called John Gordon, was renamed ORLANDO on the first of April 1940, and requisitioned by the Ministry of War Transport on the 21 Feb 1942. She served as a naval auxiliary boat at Greenock, until she was laid up at Fairlie on 11th December in the same year. On 7th January 1943 she was renamed ROLAND. Six months later she was sold to a Mr H McLaughlin of Wakefield Garage, Freckleton, nr. Preston.

Questions are these..
Why so many name changes? Was this common practice at the time, or were boats renamed after some particular tragedy?

Does anybody out there have copies of Lloyds Register from just after the war to try and trace her further?

Anybody related to Mr McLaughlin? Long shot I know but I'd love to see what she looked like then - I'm sure she's been altered plenty over the years!

Thanks in advance!

Ian

 

[Peterduck]

I wonder if there is anything in the fact that 'Roland' is almost an anagram of 'Orlando'? Curious. I think that name changes are as common now as then. The fact that my yacht 'Swallow' has kept the same name for all of her 89 years is remarkable.
Peter.

 

[Forbsie]

She is still registered as Penguin in the 1949 Register and is still "Aquired by His Majesty's Government".

 

[nordic_ranger]

It is quite common for commercial vessels no matter what size to have regular name changes when aquired by new owners even the RN on the odd occasion when they don't buy new do this.
Hugh McLean & Sons yard was in Gourock and they built a good number of Naval Pinnaces and ships lifeboats over the years but sadly closed over 25 years ago.
Your boat may have been laid up in the world-renowned Fife yacht yard Fairlie they also built Minesweepers for the navy and repaired a lot of boats. During the Second World War the yard was taken over by the Admiralty. William Fife died in 1944 and when the Admiralty returned the yard to the Fife family, it was sold and became the Fairlie Yacht Slip Ltd. under Mr Archibald McMillan, building fishing boats and repairing racing yachts. however their main claim to fame was the building of J Class yachts for the Americias Cup challenge and the famous and beautiful 'Fifers' a lot of which are still afloat today.
Sorry I can't help you further.

 

[tritonofnor]

Thanks for the replies chaps.. I too was struck by the anagrammatical (is that a word?) similarities of her naming.
Was there a sort of ssr register after the war? It would seem that if she's still shown as being in the Navy's hands after they disposed of her then the registration could simply have lapsed and the last details known left on the register?
Nice to think that there's a connection with Fife's - no matter how tenuous!

 

[Kristal]

It could be as simple as the fact that "Orlando" is Italian for Roland (I think - stretching my mind back to studying Virginia Woolf). Maybe there was some anti-Italian feeling back then, for some reason...

 

[ponapay]

She is not in my 1967 version under any of the names given. Sorry.

 

[tritonofnor]

Thanks for looking. She's also been called Green Dolphin, and Triton of Nor(e), and she also migrated to Ramsgate long before I brought her to the West Country...