M/S Belray
Updated March 25-2011

To Belray on the "Ships starting with B" page.


Received from Sverre Johansen (postcard collection).

Source: Bjørn Milde's postcard collection.


Received from (and painted by) Jan Goedhart, Holland.

Post war picture received from (and taken by) David Todd.
He thinks this was in 1952, when she was in drydock in Grimsby Royal Dock off the River Humber (possibly for repairs to bow damage).

More pictures are available on this external page (click in them to enlarge).

Misc. Voyages:

For information on voyages made in between those mentioned here, please see the documents received from the National Archives of Norway and A. Hague's Voyage Record above.

Carrying machinery, Belray is listed among the ships in the Halifax-U.K. Convoy HX 62 on July 31-1940, having been cancelled from the previous convoy, HX 61. Her destination is given as Birkenhead, station 72 - follow the links for more convoy information, other Norwegian ships also took part. See also Page 1. Belray arrived Liverpool on Aug. 15, and unless some voyages are missing from the record, she subsequently spent quite a long time there, before joining Convoy OB 241, which left Liverpool on Nov. 9 and dispersed on the 14th, Belray arriving Freetown independently on the 30th. Beduin, Carmelfjell, Einar Jarl, Maridal and Sveve are also listed, as will be seen when following the link provided within the table above.

Page 1 also shows some of her 1941 voyages. Belray took part in the evacuation of the British forces from Crete in May-1941. Her 1942 voyages are listed on Page 2, while her 1943 and 1944 voyages are shown on Page 3 (convoy information for some of them can be found in the Voyage Record above). It'll be noticed, that she occasionally had long stays in port.

She was one of the unfortunate ships that were in Bombay on April 14-1944 when the British cargo ship Fort Stikine started burning in Victoria Dock. Other Norwegian ships present were Graciosa and Braganza, and Wallem & Co.'s Iran and Norse Trader (Panamanian flag); follow the links for info on what happened to them. My page about Sønnavind has a detailed description by someone who witnessed the carnage from a distance. 11 ships were completely destroyed, 9 damaged, and many people on shore killed or injured (a four digit number). The external websites that I've linked to at the end of this page have more information.

Belray was at Prince's Dock for final trials of her engine after 11 months' repair (according to Page 3, she had arrived Bombay from Aden on May 21-1943). One of her British gunners by the last name of Staines was killed when he was hit by a flying object from the first explosion on Fort Stikine (I believe he's identical to Stanley Ernest Valentine Staines, who's commemorated at Plymouth Naval Memorial - external link). A Chinese fitter and 5 other labourers from shore were also killed and several coolies injured. 4th Engineer Arne Grønneberg and Cook Alfred Ødegaard were also badly injured and had to be taken to the British Military Hospital. Some of her other crew members at the time were Jacob Bøkevold, 1st Mate E. H. Jahr, 2nd Mate Bror Jan Blom, Radio Operator Einar Nystrøm, Able Seaman Bjørn Edvardsen, 1st Engineer Carl Johan Johansen, 3rd Engineer N. Olsen, and a British gunner by the last name of Hayward. I'm assuming her captain was still Øivind Barth(?).

Red hot pieces of iron and metal caused small fires aft, but were subsequently extinguished by those on board. However, as several new fires started aft on the poop deck, most of her complement abandoned the ship, while some remained on board to help carry casualties to shore, but when the fires increased and the ammunition aft started to go off they all left the ship.

Belray had been badly damaged but was repairable. Going back to Page 3, we see that she remained in Bombay until Sept. 11-1944. Her 1945 voyages also start on this document and continue on Page 4. As can be seen, she finally got to go home to Norway in the spring of 1946.

More information on all the Norwegian ships mentioned here can be found via the alphabet index at the end of this page, or go to the Master Ship Index.

POST WAR:

Sold in 1960 to Compania Naviera Soraya (Pateras Bros. Ltd., Piræus), Beirut and renamed Artigas, Lebanese flag. Sold in the spring of 1970 to West German breakers, arriving Hamburg on March 25.

Related external links:
Operation Merkur - The Invasion of Crete - From the website Die Gebirgstruppen.

The Bombay Explosion - Details of the events and several pictures.

The First and Last Voyage of the Fort Crevier - (Sister ship of Fort Stikine). More on the Bombay explosion. See also the Epilogue.
List of Ships lost

Fort Ships of WW II - Alphabetical list of Fort ships (also has the Ocean and the Park ships).

Back to Belray on the "Ships starting with B" page.

The text on this page was compiled with the help of: "Nortraships flåte", J. R. Hegland, "Sjøforklaringer fra 2. verdenskrig", Volume I - Norwegian Maritime Museum, and misc. (ref. My sources).