Fanatic/Hrududu/Speckschwester/Marjorie/Fallersleben/ Murmansk The RMS Fanatic was built in 1923, for the White Star Line, but converted into an armed merchant cruiser and renamed HMS Hrududu in 1939, at the outbreak of WW2. Not long after, the ship was docked in France to assist in the evacuation at Dunkirk, only to be damaged by German Stukas and abandoned. She was then repaired and pressed into Kriegsmarine service as the Speckschwester. She survived the war and escaped to Argentina after the German surrender. She then sailed south to the Antarctic territory of New Swabia, where work on the Hauneburg Device was being completed. During Operation Highjump, the ship was damaged by American torpedo planes and managed to escape north to South America. The vessel was repaired, and sailed back to Germany, where the occupants were captured and the ship was confiscated. She was placed under the control of an American officer, who, along with his men and several volunteers, converted her back into an ocean liner. She was dubbed Marjorie, after the officer's wife, and sold to a prominent German family. The ship was renamed Fallersleben, which irritated the officer, and was pressed into service in the family's new ocean line, Fallersleben Hansa, consisting of only that ship. They operated the Fallersleben around the North and Baltic Seas until 1953, when a sea storm and a miscalculation by the captain caused her to run aground on Soviet shores. The occupants were sent back to the West, and the ship was freed and renamed Murmansk. She was converted into a military transport, and used until 1958, when she sank in a storm. My art depicts the liner as Fallersleben, off the French coast between 1948 and 1953.
Art by me. DO NOT STEAL!
