Qualla: SS St Petersburg https://qualla.com/ss-st-petersburg en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:25 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/g/f/q/9/ss-st-petersburg-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: SS St Petersburg https://qualla.com/ss-st-petersburg SS St Petersburg: Introduction https://qualla.com/ss-st-petersburg/ Photo credit Royal Navy official photographer, Public domain. Just before midnight on 16 May 1941, three Heinkel He 111 bombers came out of the dark over the North Sea and found two ships. One was the troopship Archangel, which had begun her life thirty-one years earlier as a passenger ferry running between Harwich and the Hook of Holland. The other was the destroyer HMS Blankney, her escort. The bombers dropped fast - one came in at fifty feet, almost wave-height, and put two bombs into Archangel's engine room. The boiler exploded. Aboard, two anti-aircraft batteries of the Manchester Regiment were trying to get to Aberdeen after garrison duty in Orkney. Forty-one of them would not arrive.

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Image: Royal Navy official photographer | Public domain

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/f/q/9/ss-st-petersburg-wp/gfq9-ss-st-petersburg-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full SS St Petersburg: Built for the Hook https://qualla.com/ss-st-petersburg/ Photo credit Scotland_location_map.svg: Eric Gaba, NordNordWest derivative work: Uwe Dedering, CC BY-SA 3.0. She was named for the imperial Russian capital - St Petersburg - and she was built by John Brown & Company at Clydebank and launched on 25 April 1910, the third of three sister ships ordered by the Great Eastern Railway. A Miss Green - daughter of a GER director - performed the l...

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Image: Scotland_location_map.svg: Eric Gaba, NordNordWest derivative work: Uwe Dedering | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/f/q/9/ss-st-petersburg-wp/gfq9-ss-st-petersburg-built-for-the-hook.mp3 0:06 2 full SS St Petersburg: Two Wars, One Name Change https://qualla.com/ss-st-petersburg/ Photo credit Royal Navy official photographer, Public domain. The Admiralty requisitioned her in 1915, less than five years into her ferry career, and turned her into a cross-Channel troopship for the First World War. They also renamed her. St Petersburg was no longer a name a British troopship could carry - by then the Russian capital had ...

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Image: Royal Navy official photographer | Public domain

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/f/q/9/ss-st-petersburg-wp/gfq9-ss-st-petersburg-two-wars-one-name-change.mp3 0:06 3 full SS St Petersburg: The Attack Off Aberdeenshire https://qualla.com/ss-st-petersburg/ Photo credit Royal Navy official photographer, Public domain. On 16 May 1941 Archangel embarked the 182 and 196 batteries of the 65th (The Manchester Regiment) Anti-Aircraft Brigade at Kirkwall in Orkney, bound for Aberdeen. HMS Blankney - a brand-new Hunt-class destroyer - escorted her. The three Heinkels caught them just before midnight, ...

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Image: Royal Navy official photographer | Public domain

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/f/q/9/ss-st-petersburg-wp/gfq9-ss-st-petersburg-the-attack-off-aberdeenshire.mp3 0:06 4 full SS St Petersburg: The Cost https://qualla.com/ss-st-petersburg/ Photo credit Royal Navy official photographer, Public domain. Blankney launched her boats. Her surgeon went aboard Archangel to help the troopship's medical officer treat the burned. She went alongside to complete the evacuation, then brought the survivors to Aberdeen around 0800 the next morning. The toll in 182 battery was thirty-eight ki...

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Image: Royal Navy official photographer | Public domain

]]> Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/g/f/q/9/ss-st-petersburg-wp/gfq9-ss-st-petersburg-the-cost.mp3 0:06 5 full