Hello, I'm seeking information on the greek involvement in the D-Day, normandy landings. Not sure if I am even posting in the right place, please feel free to direct me in messages. I m trying to find the names of the three greek commercial vessels that helped during the normandy landings. Greece helped with 2 naval ships, the RHN Tombazis and RHN Kriezis and also provided 3 commercial ships. as of yet, i have not been able to find the names of the 3 commercial ships that took part in the operation. Anyone out there that might have information on this?
MichelleKAL, Welcome aboard. There are experts here whose focus is the D-Day landings and hopefully they will be along.
Might this help if they have biographies: From: https://greekreporter.com/2023/06/06/the-greeks-who-fought-on-the-side-of-the-allies-on-d-day/
US-flagged merchant ships that took part in the Normandy landings in June 1944 are listed on page: http://www.usmm.org/normandyships.html I am also looking for the 6 Greek Ships. I have the names of the 2 that were used for the two floating harbours (codename ‘Mulberry’ ) which are Γεώργιος Π (Georgios P with captain Mr G. Samothrakis) and Άγιος Σπυρίδων (Saint Spyridon with captain Mr D. Parisis). Do not know the names of the other 4 merchant marine ships.
Well nowt found for your targets, but the two ships used for the floating harbours were blockships so were sunk.
The blockships were Aghios Spyridon, can't find a second one. There were several Panamanian flagged vessels and one 'London Greek' the last one was a Commodity vessel.
Thanks Roy Martin. As far as I know all the liberties belonged to USN. Greek shipowners bought Liberty ships after the end of the war and started to become big... From Wikipedia: More than 2,400 Liberty ships survived the war. Of these, 835 made up the postwar cargo fleet. Greek entrepreneurs bought 526 ships and Italians bought 98. Shipping magnates including John Fredriksen,[36] John Theodoracopoulos,[37] Aristotle Onassis,[38] Stavros Niarchos,[38] Stavros George Livanos, the Goulandris brothers,[38] and the Andreadis, Tsavliris, Achille Lauro, Grimaldi and Bottiglieri families were known to have started their fleets by buying Liberty ships. Andrea Corrado, the dominant Italian shipping magnate at the time, and leader of the Italian shipping delegation, rebuilt his fleet under the programme. Weyerhaeuser operated a fleet of six Liberty Ships (which were later extensively refurbished and modernized) carrying lumber, newsprint, and general cargo for years after the end of the war.
True, but that is post-war. During the war a number of Liberties were transferred to the British, who designed the hull and engines of these ships, under Lend Lease, they called them Sam boats. Some were even transferred to Russia. I would imaginwe that the two Greek Liberty ships at Normandy were also Lend Lease. The Greeks also had the British ship Empire Liberty, the 'mother' of the Liberty ships, by this time. If you want to read the story you can download Workhorse of the Fleet by Gus Bourneuf, published by ABS, Free.
