SS Empress Queen
steel paddle steamer
SS Empress Queen was a steel-hulled paddle steamer, the last of her type ordered by the Isle of Man Steam Packet Company. The Admiralty chartered her in 1915 as a troop ship a role in which she saw service until she ran aground off Bembridge, Isle of Wight, England in 1916 and was subsequently abandoned.
Building and launch
The Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Company in Govan, Glasgow built Empress Queen in 1897 at a cost of £130,000. Before her launch the directors of the Isle of Man Steam Packet Company issued a circular in which they invited the shareholders of the Company to decide on the name of the vessel. The choices offered were Empress Queen or Douglas. Empress Queen was chosen, in honour of Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee.
The decision did not meet with universal approval; the Isle of Man Times of Tuesday January 19, 1897, disregarding sentiment and citing practicality, stated in an editorial that it thought it better to use the name Douglas, as it would be more easily recognised by passengers. In addition it was leveled that the decision had been taken by English shareholders, who formed the majority of the Company's shareholding. With the decision on the vessel's name decided, the launch date was initially fixed for February 18, 1897 – the christening ceremony to be performed by Mrs Margaret Mylrea, wife of Chairman of the Isle of Man Steam Packet Company, John Allen Mylrea.
The launch had to be delayed when a fire broke out in Fairfield's yards in February 1897.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Dec 25, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q7120838. Authority coordinates are 50.667, -1.083. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1915, 1916 and 1897.
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This entry incorporates text from “SS Empress Queen” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.