Friday 11 January 2013

HMS Laburnum/Singapore

HMS Laburnum was an Acacia class sloop launched in 1915. It  was the ship that fired on suspected Irish Volunteers near Galway during the Easter Rising (a number of books and articles erroneously state that HMS Gloucester fired on the Volunteers).

It appears to have transferred to New Zealand after the Great War and then to Singapore. When the Japanese conquered Singapore in 1942 it appears to have been scuttled

In 1915, Singapore had itself been the scene of a rebellion, with a number of Indian troops starting a mutiny and killing a number of British soldiers and civilians. German Prisoners of War from the Emden were released by the mutineers and invited to take part in the rebellion but most appear to have declined.

With order restored by the British (aided by French, Russian and Japanese ships), a number of the Indian rebels were shot en masse by firing squad.



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