USS Princess Matoika (ID-2290) was a transport ship for the United States Navy during World WarI. Before the war, she was a that sailed as SSKiautschou for the Hamburg America Line and as SSPrincess Alice (sometimes spelled Prinzess Alice) for North German Lloyd. After the war she served as the United States Army transport ship USATPrincess Matoika. In post-war civilian service she was SSPrincess Matoika until 1922, SSPresident Arthur until 1927, and SSCity of Honolulu until she was scrapped in 1933.
Built in 1900 for the German Far East mail routes, SSKiautschou traveled between Hamburg and Far East ports for most of her Hamburg America Line career. In 1904, she was traded to competitor North German Lloyd for five freighters, and renamed SSPrincess Alice. She sailed both transatlantic and Far East mail routes until the outbreak of World WarI, when she was interned in the neutral port of Cebu in the Philippines. Seized by the U.S. in 1917, the newly renamed USSPrincess Matoika carried thousands of U.S. troops to and from France in U.S. Navy service from 1918 to 1919. As an Army transport after that, she continued to return troops and repatriated the remains of Americans killed overseas in the war. In July 1920 she was a last-minute substitute to carry a large portion of the United States team to the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp. From the perspective of the Olympic team, the trip was disastrous and a majority of the team members published a list of grievances and demands of the American Olympic Committee in an action known today as the Mutiny of the Matoika.
After her Army career ended, Princess Matoika was transferred to the United States Mail Steamship Line for European passenger service in early 1921. After that company's financial troubles resulted in her seizure, Princess Matoika was assigned to the newly formed United States Lines and resumed passenger service. In 1922 the ship was renamed SSPresident Arthur, in honor of the 21st U.S. President, Chester A. Arthur. When changes in U.S. laws severely curtailed the number of immigrants that could enter the country in the early 1920s, the ship was laid up in Baltimore in late 1923.
President Arthur was purchased in October 1924 by the Jewish-owned American Palestine Line to begin regular service between New York, Naples, and Palestine. On her maiden voyage to Palestine she reportedly became the first ocean liner to fly the Zionist flag at sea and the first ocean liner ever to have female officers. Financial difficulties for American Palestine ended the service after three roundtrips, and the liner was sold to the Los Angeles Steamship Company for Los Angeles–Honolulu service. Following three years of carrying tourists and freight, the liner burned in Honolulu Harbor in 1930. She was deemed too expensive to repair and was eventually scrapped in Japan in 1933.
Hamburg America Line In March 1900 the Hamburg America Line (German: Hamburg-Amerikanische Packetfahrt-Aktien-Gesellschaft or HAPAG) announced the plans for 22 new ships totaling at a cost of $11million. One of the two largest ships announced was SSKiautschou at an announced . The ship was laid down at AG Vulcan Stettin in Stettin, Germany (present-day Szczecin, Poland). During her construction, HAPAG renamed the ship twice before finally settling on Kiautschou, the German colony in China, as her namesake.Bonsor (Vol. 1, p. 408) identifies the two names as Borussia and Teutonia, while Drechsel (Vol. 1, p. 338) gives them as Bavaria and Teutonia. Built, along with sister ship , for HAPAG's entry into the Deutsche Reichspost's Far East routes, Kiautschou was launched on 14 September 1900, and sailed on her maiden voyage from Hamburg to the Far East on 22 December 1900.Bonsor, Vol. 1, p. 408.
The ship was long and featured twin screws powered by two quadruple expansion steam engines that generated . The liner also featured bilge keels that helped stabilize her ride. Kiautschous first-class staterooms were described as "light and large" and located in the center of the ship. She had two large promenade decks, a music room, and a library. Her smoking room was at the rear of the upper promenade deck, and her large dining room featured a balcony where the ship's orchestra could serenade diners.
Kiautschou sailed on the Hamburg–Far East route until May 1902. For one round trip that month, Kiautschou replaced fellow HAPAG steamer on Hamburg–New York service, calling at Southampton and Cherbourg on her eastbound trip, and at Cherbourg and Plymouth on her westbound return. After this one transatlantic excursion, Kiautschou was returned to Hamburg–Far East service. On 20 February 1904, in exchange for abandoning the mail routes shared with North German Lloyd, HAPAG traded Kiautschou for Lloyd freighters Bamberg, Königsberg, Nürnberg, Stolberg, and Strassburg.
North German Lloyd North German Lloyd renamed the newly acquired ship Princess Alice, though the German spelling Prinzess Alice was widely used in contemporary press coverage and, often, by the Lloyd themselves. There is some confusion as to who exactly was the namesake of the ship. Edwin Drechsel, in his two-volume work Norddeutscher Lloyd, Bremen, 1857–1970, reports that the ship was named equally for Princess Alice of Albany and Alice Roosevelt. Princess Alice of Albany was a granddaughter of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom, and the new bride of Prince Alexander of Teck in Württemberg.Eilers, p. 215. Alice Roosevelt, daughter of the then-current U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt, was nicknamed "Princess Alice" by the press, and had launched the racing yacht of Kaiser WilhelmII, Meteor, at Staten Island two years before.Drechsel, Vol. 1, p. 261. Alice Roosevelt had been further honored by the German Empire by the March 1902 renaming of former torpedo boat D2 to Alice Roosevelt. William Lowell Putnam gives the namesake as Princess Alice of the United Kingdom, the daughter of Queen Victoria.Putnam, p. 145. Putnam states further that Princess Alice was the wife of Kaiser FriedrichIII, apparently confusing Alice with her sister Princess Victoria.
Princess Alice departed her new homeport of Bremen on 22 March 1904 for her maiden voyage under her new owners. After arriving in New York draped in flags and bunting, her dining room was the site of a press luncheon thrown by Lloyd staff celebrating her first arrival in that city. Princess Alice made four more roundtrips through early August, then shifted to Bremen–Suez Canal–Far East service, making her first Lloyd voyage on that route 31 August. Princess Alice would continue this pattern—sailing the North Atlantic during the heaviest-trafficked season and shifting to the Far East runs for the balance of the year—through 1910.
Throughout the rest of her Lloyd North Atlantic career she carried some notable passengers to and from Europe. In May 1905, for example, noted Baltimore gynecologist Howard Atwood Kelly, one of the co-founders of Johns Hopkins Hospital, sailed from New York; author Hamilton Wright Mabie and his wife sailed from New York the following month. American botanist Charles Frederick Millspaugh returned to New York aboard the German liner in June 1906, and retired U.S. Navy Rear admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan did the same in June 1907. Senator Augustus O. Bacon (D-GA), sailed for Europe on 1 August 1908.
Prompted by the successful use of wireless in saving lives during the sinking of in January 1909, and by proposed U.S. legislation (later passed as the Wireless Ship Act of 1910) requiring wireless for ships calling at U.S. ports, Princess Alice received her first wireless set in February 1909.Pierce, p. 690. Operating with call letters "DKZ" on the 300m band, her radio had a range.
At 10:00 on 27 May 1909, loaded with more than a thousand passengers headed for Europe, Princess Alice departed the Lloyd pier in Hoboken, New Jersey. As she neared The Narrows in a heavy fog, she steamed to stay clear of outbound French Line steamer and ran hard aground on a submerged rocky ledge near the seawall of Fort Wadsworth a few minutes after 11:00. After the fog lifted, it was revealed that the bow of Princess Alice had stopped some from the outer walls of the Staten Island fort. Lighthouse tender Larkspur was the first ship to come to the aid of the Princess, followed by U.S. Army Quartermaster's ship General Meigs and revenue cutter Seneca. No passengers were hurt in the incident and it was determined there was no damage to the hull of the liner. But, despite the effort of attending ships, she remained stuck on the ledge. Eventually, after offloading of cargo from her front hold onto lighters called to the scene, ten steam tugs and power from Princess Alices own engines freed the ship at 01:47 on 28 May, almost fifteen hours after running aground. The force required to free the liner was great enough that she was then propelled into SSMarken, at anchor some distance away, damaging one of that ship's fenders. After then making her way to the nearby New York City Quarantine Station, Princess Alice anchored to reload her cargo, and by 09:05, she was underway again. However, she ran aground again in soft mud in Ambrose Channel at 10:15. This time she was able to free herself and proceeded on to Bremen, a little more than 24 hours late. This voyage was further marred by the apparent suicide of a despondent New York attorney on 30 May. The man, headed to the spa town of Bad Nauheim in Hesse, had previously suffered a nervous breakdown and was under the care of a doctor on board the ship at the time he jumped overboard.
In May 1910 Princess Alice sailed her last North Atlantic passage for her German owners. Put permanently on the Far East route, she plied Pacific waters for North German Lloyd until the outbreak of World WarI. In late July 1914, as war spread across Europe, Princess Alice neared her destination of Hong Kong with £850,000 of gold from India. Rather than face seizure of the ship and her cargo by British authorities there, Princess Alice instead sped to the Philippines and deposited the gold with the German Consul at Manila. Leaving the neutral port in under 24 hours, the ship then rendezvoused with German cruiser at Angaur before returning to the Philippines in early August and putting in at Cebu where she was interned.
USS Princess Matoika On 6 April 1917 the United States declared war and immediately seized interned German ships at U.S. and territorial ports, but unlike most other German ships interned by the United States, Princess Alice had not been sabotaged by her German crew before her seizure. Assigned the Identification Number of 2290, she was soon renamed Princess Matoika. Sources disagree about the identity of the ship's namesake, who is often reported as either a member of the Philippine Royal Family, or a Japanese princess.Cutchins and Stewart, p. 64. Cutchins and Stewart are quoting Ernest R. Kinkle and John J. Pullam, historians of the 113th Infantry Regiment. Putnam, however, provides another answer: one of the given names of Pocahontas was Matoaka, which was sometimes spelled Matoika.Putnam, p. 145, note 32. Given that two other ex-German liners were renamed and —after Pocahontas and Powhatan (her father)—this seems the most likely. The newly renamed ship was taken to Olongapo City, north of Manila and placed in the drydock Dewey at Subic Bay where temporary repairs were made. She then made her way to San Francisco, and eventually to the east coast. Princess Matoika was the last ex-German ship to be commissioned.Crowell and Wilson, p. 417.
Transporting troops to France