General cargo ship Glengarry. This model shows what the ship would have looked like if the plans to convert her to an auxiliary cruiser had come to fruition. It was built by Harry Römmer on a scale of 1:100 and can be found on deck 5 of our exhibition.
MV „Glengarry“ was a general cargo freighter commissioned by the British Glen Line. Built in 1940 at the Burmeister & Wain shipyard in Copenhagen, the ship was completed when the Wehrmacht invaded Denmark. Germany seized the ship. Renamed „Meersburg“ and given to HAPAG for a short time, it was, however, taken over by the Navy and used as a target ship for training submarines in the Baltic Sea. In 1942 to 1943, the Kriegsmarine wanted to have the ship converted into an auxiliary cruiser.
To this end, it moved to the Wilton-Fijenoord shipyard in Rotterdam and was renamed „Hansa.“ In 1943, the „Hansa“ in turn went to the Blohm & Voss shipyard in Hamburg to receive the necessary weapons systems and camouflage equipment. The partial destruction of the shipyard by an air raid on July 25, 1943, forced the work to be abandoned. Since the ship was not fully equipped as an auxiliary cruiser, the Navy decided to use it as a training ship in the Baltic Sea. Documents mention that the „Hansa“ was possibly to be used again as a raider in the fall of 1944. But the development of the war made this impossible. The only other task the ship was to receive during the war was to transport military personnel and refugees to the West.
She survived the war despite being hit by a mine on May 4, 1945, and shortly thereafter was taken over by the British and renamed the “Empire Humber”. In 1946, the ship was returned to the shipping company that had originally ordered her, the Glen Line. She was then given the name she should have had from the beginning: „Glengarry“. She had a long life until she was scrapped in 1971.
This model shows what the ship would have looked like if the plans to convert her to an auxiliary cruiser had come to fruition. It was built by Harry Römmer on a scale of 1:100 and can be found on deck 5 of our exhibition.