Queen Elizebeth
During March 1940 four of the world’s greatest liners, the Mauretania, Normandie, Queen Elizabeth and Queen Mary, were berthed alongside each other. The Queen Elizabeth remained berthed at New York until 13 November and then set sail for Singapore, via Cape Town. The refit was completed in graving dock at Singapore and defensive armament was fitted. Internally it was fitted out to carry troops as it had now been requisitioned by the Ministry of War Transport. On 11 February it sailed from Singapore to Sydney, arriving on 21 February. After the fitting out was completed here it made a trooping voyage to the Middle East and spent the next five months carrying troops from Sydney to Suez, and returning with German POW’s. After the US entered the war the Queen Elizabeth sailed to Esquimalt, in Canada, and carried troops to Sydney.
In 1942 the Admiralty drew up plans to convert the two Queens into aircraft carriers but these were later abandoned as it was considered that their troop carrying role was too important. In April 1942 the Queen Elizabeth relocated from Sydney to New York. Here the troop accommodation was altered to make its capacity 10,000. In June 1942 it began to make voyages from New York to Gourock and then to Suez, via Cape Town. In August it began a shuttle service between New York and Gourock. Despite the ever present threat of U-boats the ship continued its service unscathed, although the German press stated that a U-boat had hit the vessel with a torpedo on 11 November.
By the end of the war in Europe the Queens had brought over a million troops to the war zone. The ship’s next duty was to repatriate these troops and redeploy troops for the war against Japan. The repatriation of American troops continued until October 1945 when the Queen Elizabeth was released from US service and allocated to the repatriation of Canadian troops. On 6 March 1946 it arrived back in Southampton and was released from Government service as the need for troop movements had diminished. During the war it had carried over 750,000 troops and travelled 500,000 miles.
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The Queen Elizabeth made its final Atlantic crossing on 5 November 1968. It had now already been sold to a group of Philadelphia businessmen for £3.25 million. After this it sailed to Port Evergaldes and opened to the public in February 1969. By the end of the year it had been closed down by the local authorities as a fire hazard and was losing money. By late 1970 the ship had been auctioned and bought by C.Y.Tung shipping group in Hong Kong and was intended to become a floating university. It was soon renamed Seawise University and sailed for for Hong Kong on 10 February 1971. Due to machinery problems it did not arrive until July and anchored off Tsing Yi Island near Kowloon.
Work soon began on a £5 million refit to convert the ship into a university and by January 1972 work was almost complete. Security on board, however, was lax and on 9 January several fires were discovered in various parts of the ship. The fires spread and the ship burned throughout the night. Soon the ship rolled on to its side and then the hulk continued to burn and smoulder for over a week. Fortunately there was only one casualty but it was clear that the ship was now only fit for scrap. An enquiry in July 1972 confirmed that it had been the work of an arsonist but the culprit was never found. In December 1973 it was decided to scrap the hulk. The ship’s final protest came on 5 November 1975 when it rolled over and disgorged several tons of oil which polluted the surrounding waters and beaches.
The wreck of the Queen Elizabeth figures in the movie The Man with the Golden Gun as a secret MI6 HQ in Hong Kong.
One article described Stevens as a "bombshell" and she was a real looker in the pictures I saw. Her first husband, a B-17 gunner who spent time in a POW camp, divorced her for infidelity. One article reported a rumor that she was having an affair with the husband who owned the house where the shooting occured, Charles Milton.
Stevens, born in Texas, married an Army major in the airborne and ended up in Connecticut. The shooting happened around midnight and it appears everyone was intoxicated. The victim and his brother went to the Milton home to hang out with a girl who was some kind of helper to Mrs. Milton. Stevens said she thought they were burglars and went to investigate with a gun her husband had left her. She claimed the victim, who was a sailor in the submarine service, rushed her and she shot him in self defense. The witness stories varied, probably because everyone was drunk.
The prosecutor later gave up and dismissed the charges, concluding he could not overcome the self-defense claim.
The trail then disappeared and I couldn't find anything about what happened later to her or others involved in the case.