Built: Seattle Construction Co., USA 1912
Type: Danlayer
Pennant No.: T22
Displacement: 148 tons gross, 67 tons net
Length: 96.1 ft./29.3 m Beam: 19.5 ft./ 5.9 m Draft: 2.8 ft./0.8 m
Propulsion: Steam recip., ihp 350, single screw coal fired
Speed: 9 knots.
Armament: 2 x light MG
Complement: 14
Phyllis was built as a whale chaser built for the Norwegians named Star III, and worked from Stewart Island. She was laid up there in 1929, sold to a NZ buyer, renamed Phyllis and used as a trawler.
The ship was purchased from the Canterbury Steam Trawling Co. Ltd.of Christchurch on 3 September 1942 and fitted out at Lyttelton as a danlayer, the intention being to employ her at Auckland. A danlayer is a small vessel employed in minesweeping operations to lay dan-buoys to mark the limits of the channels swept through a minefield.
She was commissioned on 11 January 1943 as HMNZS Phyllis and sailed for Auckland but was delayed by engine trouble in Wellington. Inspection at Auckland rvealed numerpous defects and she prove unsatisfactory as a danlayer. Repairs were not completed and little or no use was made of Phyllis: she paid off in 28 February 1944 and was sold.
http://www.worldnavalships.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4073&page=
Phyllis as a fishing trawler
