The vessel was ordered after the New Zealand government, facing a requirement for more minesweepers to operate in home waters, chose the Castle-class design because it was simple enough to be built with the country’s limited ship construction facilities at the time.[1]
Manuka was laid down on 21 October 1940 and was of a composite design, using Kauri wood due to a shortage of steel at the time. [2]Manuka was launched on 23 September 1941, being built by Mason Bros Engineering Co, located at Auckland.[3] Being the third naval ship launched in New Zealand for the Royal New Zealand Navy.
Manuka was the third of four composite minesweepers constructed for the Royal New Zealand Navy and was commissioned on 30 March 1942. The others were Hinau, Rimu, and Tawhai. Manuka served in the LL Group (later renamed to the 194th Auxiliary Minesweeping Division)[4] which was located at Auckland.
In 1946, Manuka was leased to the Chatham Island Fishing Company, under the condition that she would only be used in New Zealand waters, and that she would be given back to the navy in case of an emergency.[5]Manuka would follow fishing fleets, working the coast that was sheltered.[6] At the end of the day the fishing trawlers would discharge their catches onto Manuka, where they would weigh, clean and process the fish. When she was full, she would sail to Wellington, often carrying radios for repair, and mail.[6] When the vessel returned it would carry supplies for the Chatham islanders.[6] As time went by while in service, there would be more and more problems no with the boiler on Manuka. to the point where she would need a replacement.[6] Over the course of her career she would also run aground multiple times while fishing.[7] In 1950, Manuka was moored in Port Hutt, acting as a floating freezer, with local trawlers storing their catches onboard. [6] On 4 October 1952, while anchored in Port Hutt, Manuka sunk at her moorings. There was nobody aboard when she sank.
The Nora Niven was a 90ft steam Trawler launched 17th November 1906. Built by Cochrane & Sons of Selby for the Napier Fish Supply Co of New Zealand this state of the art trawler with an Ice Making machine that could produce 3 tons of ice in 24 hour and cool storage compartments for 80tons of fish. In June 1917, a German surface raider, the SMS Wolf entered New Zealand waters. She laid two small minefields in New Zealand waters and sank two merchant ships. One (the Port Kembla) off Farewell Spit, and another (the Wairuna) off the Kermadec Islands. Two fishing trawlers, the Nora Niven and Simplon, were fitted as minesweepers and took up sweeping duties in these areas. Another brief flurry of activity occurred when Felix von Luckner, imprisoned on Motuihe Island after being captured in the Society Islands, escaped and commandeered a small vessel before being recaptured in the Kermadec Islands.
HMNZS James Cosgrove (6/T10) Castle class minesweeper HMS James Cosgrove Admiralty Trawler, Castle Class – Ad No 3716 HMNZS James Cosgrove Auxiliary Minesweeper – T.10 Boom Gate Vessel Launched by Ailsa Shipbuilding Company, Yard No: 332A, on 5/3/1918. Scuttled in 1952 360t light, 547t deep load. 125 ft 6in pp x 23ft 6in x 12ft 6in (depth of hold) 1 Shaft reciprocating VTE, 480 ihp, giving 10.5 knots 1 x 12 pdr Crew 18 approx, depending on role
1919 sold as a mercantile, same name. 1922 Sanford Ltd 10/10/1939 commissioned in the RNZN as a Minesweeper based at Auckland with the First Group 14/11/1940 joined Group III based at Lyttelton as a Port Minesweeper She then became part of the 96th Auxiliary Minesweeping Group, 25th Minesweeping Flotilla 1941 purchased by the RNZN April 1944 converted to a BGV 1946 returned to Sanford Ltd
Under construction in CanadaAs TR 1 in CanadaTowed target alongsideHMNZS Wakakura (T00) 1926–1941 was HMS Wakakura in the New Zealand Division of the Royal Navy. Thereafter RNZN Used as danlayer from July 1944.HMNZS Wakakura after she received a major overhaul in 1944
HMS/HMNZS Wakakura (T00) An aerial photograph, showing the minesweeper Wakakura leaving Auckland Harbour for the Hauraki Gulf with the naval floating target in tow. 1932-01-06
Some history here – HMNZS Wakakura (T00) in the Lyttelton Harbour.; Douglas Jones; 1926-1947 The Canterbury Division of the RNVR 02 April 2023 The British Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve (RNVR) was instituted in 1903 and manned largely by members of the Royal Naval Artillery Volunteers as part of a modernisation of the British Commonwealth’s defence forces that included His Majesty Edward VII’s Colony of New Zealand. While the colony had always relied upon the Royal Navy’s Australasia Station and its largely British-born sailors for its primary naval defence, the Lyttelton Naval Artillery Volunteers had been formed in 1880 as part of a nationwide coast guard militia manning the gun emplacements that protected the Port of Lyttelton from the British Empire’s adversaries. With Edward VII’s modernisation efforts, the Lyttelton Naval Artillery Volunteers became the No. 1 Company Canterbury Division of the New Zealand Garrison Artillery Volunteers. On the disbanding of the British Royal Navy’s Australasia Station in 1913, the New Zealand Naval Forces were created as a Division of the Royal Navy under the command of its China Station. After WWI, the New Zealand Division of the British Royal Navy was formed in 1921, funded by the New Zealand government and increasingly crewed by New Zealand sailors. Five years later in 1926, the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserves were formed throughout New Zealand in support of their New Zealand Division. The Canterbury Division of the RNVR was composed of civilians from diverse backgrounds who shared a love of the sea and a willingness to serve the British Empire’s naval forces in times of war. Members included bank clerks, office workers, manual labourers and tradespeople, representing a broad cross section of New Zealand society. The RNVR’s commitment to the Crown and readiness to undertake naval operations at short notice made them an essential component of New Zealand’s Royal Navy defence force. In 1926, with the founding of local RNVR divisions, the New Zealand government purchased Her Majesty’s Naval Trawler TR1 from the British Admiralty. Built in 1917 in Canada, this naval trawler had been on loan to the Royal Canadian Navy for use in WW1 minesweeping and anti-submarine operations. A 540 ton, 41 m long steam ship with a crew of 26, she was armed with one 4 inch (102 mm) gun and two Lewis machine guns along with depth charges. Renamed HMNZS Wakakura (literally ‘boat school’ in te reo Māori) she served as the nation’s main steamer training vessel for the RNVR and was a regular visitor to Whakaraupō Lyttelton Harbour. Throughout the 1930s, when in port, she provided the Canterbury Division RNVR sailors with naval experience in seamanship, gunnery and minesweeping. On the advent of WWII, after the sinking of RMS Niagara by German mines, the New Zealand government embarked on the construction of the Castle Class minesweepers based on the design of the Wakakura, which also joined the 28th Minesweeper Flotilla. The cutter Deveron was a permanent Lyttelton-based training complement to the HMNZS Wakakura. At 26 tons, 16 m in length, and of kauri construction, she was built around 1877 in Auckland where it traded from, before being sold to a Lyttelton fisherman in 1886. She took part in the cargo salvage of the iron barque May Queen, wrecked at Camp Bay in early 1888, and traded timber in Southland and Stewart Island through the 1890s. From the early 1900s she was popularly known as the ‘Peninsula cutter’ trading goods around the bays from Lyttelton to Akaroa for some 20 years under Captain Christian Andersen and his son. Bought at auction for the sum of £25 on 26 July 1929, she was outfitted with an auxiliary engine and commissioned on 16 December 1929 by Royal Navy Commodore of the New Zealand Division, Geoffrey Blake, as the sail training vessel of the Canterbury Division RNVR based at Rīpapa Island. The Deveron proved popular with the reservists who eagerly took her to sea almost every weekend through the early to mid 1930s. Canterbury Division RNVR crews also sailed her in yachting races such as the Banks Peninsula Cruising Club’s annual ocean race from the harbour heads out to Brighton pier and back. With longer training trips around the peninsula to Akaroa and south to Dunedin via Timaru – at times braving fierce gales – or north to the port of Kaiapoi, the young hands gained vital sailing experience that would serve them well when called up for WWII. By late 1936, however, the venerable Deveron was starting to show her near 60 years of age, with one wag suggesting “it is time that she was treated to about 10 gallons of petrol and a match”. Sold for £10 in December 1936 she was finally scrapped in early 1940. With the establishment of the Royal New Zealand Navy in 1941, the Dominion’s long association with the British Royal Navy was finally ended, and the RNVR became today’s Royal New Zealand Naval Volunteer Reserve (RNZNVR) with the Canterbury Headquarters based at HMNZS Pegasus. See also ‘Leading Signalman Pat Luxton – Oral History’ at https://rnzncomms.org/luxton-2-2/ Join the Rebuild!HMNZS Wakakura (T00) at No 4 wharf in Lyttelton during World War II.; Unknown; 1939-1945;
Wakakura remained in commission throughout the Second World War as a training vessel and minesweeper. For the first part of the war she was part of the 28th Minesweeper Flotilla, until the flotilla was transferred overseas. From then the Wakakura was based at Lyttleton.
“A little trawler paid a big part in the lives of New Zealand’s pre-war and wartime naval reservists. Her Majesty’s Trawler (later HMNZS) Wakakura, purchased from the Royal Navy scrap heap ‘as is, where is’ to be a training ship, also left an impression on various wharves and a couple of other ships as she roamed from port to port around New Zealand instructing young would-be sailors in naval procedures.”[1]
During 1944 the Wakakura reported that it had sighted and depth charged a Japanese submarine off the Canterbury Coast, possibly sinking it. Naval historians concluded that while it was possible for Japanese submarines to be in the area, it was unlikely at that stage of the war.[2]
The ship’s bell was installed in the Devonport Naval Base Chapel.[3]
After the war in 1947 she was sold to the Tasman Steamship Company owned by a syndicate of 17 former merchant seamen. The ship was renamed SS Wakakura and converted to a refrigerated cargo vessel for use on the trans-Tasman run from Auckland and Wellington to Sydney.[4] The ships maiden voyage as a merchant ship was in October 1947 under Captain F A Barrett from Auckland to Sydney. The newspaper stated that the voyage across the Tasman Sea was expected to take 6 days.[5]
By 1948 the company decided that the ship was to small for the Trans-Tasman run and decided to purchase a larger vessel. The ship had made seven return voyages by the time.[6] The Fiji Government owned motor ship Viti was acquired by the company as a replacement.[7] When the Viti entered service the Wakakura was used for coastal shipping.[8]
The company put the ship up for sale in November 1950, and was sold to Mason Bros. Engineering Co. Ltd, being broken up at the Viaduct Basin in Auckland.[
Built for the Royal Navy by John I Thornycroft of Southampton, the minesweeper was launched on 26 January 1955 and later commissioned as HMS Hickleton
She was commissioned into the RNZN in 1965 and decommissioned in 1966. After leaving New Zealand service, she was transferred to the Argentine Navy and renamed ARA Neuquen (M1).
Operational history
New Zealand
Early in 1965, Indonesia was employing a policy of confrontation against Malaysia. New Zealand agreed to assist Malaysia by deploying two Royal Navy minesweepers then in reserve at Singapore. These were commissioned into the RNZN on 10 April 1965 and joined the Royal Navy’s 11th Minesweeping squadron (also Ton class), taking part in anti-infiltration patrols in Malaysian waters.
In her first year Hickleton, together with her sister ship Santon, carried out 200 patrols, with 20 incidents involving intruding Indonesians, often taking as prisoners those aboard the intercepted craft. By the time the Indonesian confrontation policy ended in August 1966 Santon had steamed 62,000 miles (100,000 km). Following the withdrawal of Commonwealth ships from the anti-infiltration patrols, the RNZN crew took her back to England, where she paid off in reserve at Portsmouth.
