Tall Ship Glenlee: Italian shipping magnate Achille Lauro revealed as saviour of historic Glasgow sailing vessel

Historian lifts lid on mystery of cargo ship’s Italian years

He was one of Europe’s biggest shipping magnates, whose name was posthumously overshadowed by his ill-fated, eponymous cruise liner suffering a deadly hijack then being sunk after a fatal fire.

However, new research has revealed that Italian tycoon Achille Lauro is also likely to have played a crucial role in saving Glasgow’s historic Tall Ship Glenlee from the scrapyard after the First World War in a shrewd business move that may also have propelled his own rise to success.

The vessel is now a visitor attraction moored on the River Clyde beside the Riverside Museum west of the city centre.

Glenlee has been moored beside the Riverside Museum since 2011. Photo by John Devlin/The Scotsman)

Historian and vice-chair of the Glenlee’s trustees Elizabeth Allen revealed her findings at the Scottish Maritime History Conference, which shed new light on the missing chapter in the history of one of the last five remaining Clyde-built steel-hulled cargo sailing ships and the only one in the UK.

Mystery has surrounded a period in the 1920s when the Port Glasgow-built vessel was in Italian ownership between being a British cargo vessel and a Spanish naval training ship. Launched in 1896, Glenlee spent its entire career abroad until being rescued from dereliction and towed back to Glasgow for restoration 30 years ago.

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Ms Allen said: “The years between 1920 and 1922 are the least known era in the 127-year history of Tall Ship Glenlee, and it had not been known why she was sold again, just two years after undergoing substantial investment in her."

Glenlee, then named Clarastella, followed by Galatea after its sale to the Spanish Navy, around 1923. (Photo by Tall Ship Glenlee Trust)

She said the ship, which had been renamed Islamount early in its life, arrived in Sete, on the Mediterranean coast of France, in 1919 with a cargo of sugar from Java, where it was sold to Genoese shipping firm Lauro and Fantozi for £19,344 (some £1.1 million now), “probably as a speculative investment”.

The vessel arrived in Genoa in 1920 and by the following year had been renamed Clarastella, when it was moved to Venice. Diesel engines were installed to supplement sail power, along with other modifications.

Ms Allen said the firm which installed the engines, Società Ansaldo-San Giorgio & Cia, then offered to sell the ship to the Spanish Navy as a training vessel.

Early in 1922, it was moved again to Monfalcone, a rapidly-growing shipyard east of Venice with links to Ansaldo, where it was sold to the Spanish three months later for £45,000 (some £3.3m now) – around three times the purchase price – which Ms Allen described as “a very handy return on the investment”.

Achille Lauro, chairman of Flotta Lauro Lines, pictured around 1960. (Photo by Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

She said: "The name Lauro in the sales notice led me to think of Achille Lauro, the shipping magnate. Lauro, while a Neapolitan, had a base in Genoa. He was to become a powerful politician and devoted Napoli football supporter as well setting up a major shipping line, Flotta Lauro, making him very rich.

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“Born in 1887, he was expelled from school when 13 years old and sent to sea for a year as a cabin boy in one of his father’s sailing ships, which travelled to Mexico, New Orleans, Martinique and Tangier. Achille knew ships, from all angles – he knew about their operation, purchase and sale.

“Returning to Naples in 1905, aged just 18, he was trusted to go alone to Genoa to buy a large steamer for his father’s fleet."

Maritime historian Elizabeth Allen said Lauro's investment "was certainly the one thing which preserved Glenlee". (Photo by Tom Finnie)

He took over the company on his father’s death five years later, but all of its ships were lost during the First World Ware after being requisitioned, and by 1919 he had little money.

Ms Allen said: "He needed to find cash and investors. He certainly managed this for, by 1930, his life had turned around. He had 21 vessels, the largest fleet in the Mediterranean and vitally-important credibility in the London financial markets.

“It is highly likely the purchase and speculative investment in and sale of a ship such as Islamount may well have provided the cash for this rapid development.

“The investment in Islamount very likely helped fund the rise of Achille Lauro. It also made the ship viable too, at a time when sailing vessels were discarded and left to rot as ships were rapidly moving to steam.”

Ms Allen said it was also “highly likely” that Ansaldo was involved in peer-to-peer lending to an entrepreneur such as the young Achille Lauro. She said: “Glenlee may also be a small part of founding the Frotta Lauro fleet of tankers and cruise liners.

“This investment was certainly the one thing which preserved Glenlee. The future shipping magnate may very well be the man to have saved Glenlee to be the national historic ship she is today, 100 years later.

Glenlee, then named Clarastella (right), at the Monfalcone shipyard in Italy around 1922 (Photo by Tall Ship Glenlee Trust)

“Due to this investment, Glenlee is now the only Clyde-built cargo sailing vessel afloat in the UK and one of only five of her type remaining worldwide.”

Ironically, Achille Lauro is now more popularly known for the ship he bought in 1965, re-naming it after himself and converting it to become a cruise liner. It suffered a series of collisions, explosions and fires.

The last one in 1994, with nearly 1,000 passengers and crew on board, led to its sinking off Somalia in which two people died.

The ship also achieved notoriety when it was hijacked by the Palestine Liberation Front in 1985, with the terrorists killing a passenger and throwing his body overboard.

Glenlee is the only free-to-visit historic ship in the UK but may have to introduce admission charges to fund significant maintenance bills.

It needs extra income to cover its £400,000 annual running costs and prepare for an overdue ten-year overhaul in dry dock.