The Terukuni Maru

In our final Diary of the Second World War, 80 years after VJ Day on 15 August 1945, we take a brief look at what it took in terms of shipping losses to enemy causes in the immediate post-war world before we circle back to the early months of the war and a rare loss of a Japanese vessel in English waters, and an even rarer one under the circumstances of war.

Sweeping the Peace

The immediate post-war world was dedicated to achieving the peace and in this the world’s navies and merchant fleets played as large a part as they had done during the days of war – but in shipping lanes that were considerably safer than they had been for the past six years: no approaching aircraft with a payload of bombs, no warships on the prowl on the surface of the sea, no submarines waiting to loose a torpedo and hole a vessel below the waterline.

Even as the new world order started to take shape and ships brought home troops, POWs and refugees, home, carried occupation forces, and took dispossessed persons and GI brides to new lives on other continents, there remained one more issue that was harder to deal with than simply ceasing fire.

After both World Wars there were occasional losses to stray mines following the cessation of hostilities (see our post on losses after the First World War, which were recorded right up to 1925). Between VE Day on 8 May 1945 to VJ Day 15 August 1945, there was only one war-related loss in English waters: HMS Kurd, mined off the Lizard with the loss of 16 crew while on those self-same necessary clearance activities in July 1945.

As late as 1950 the Ramsgate trawler Volante exploded after striking a mine in the Thames Estuary, although fortunately, in that case, all hands escaped.

These were the very last direct maritime victims of the Second World War within English territorial waters. Mines continued to wash up on beaches on a regular basis until the 1950s and 1960s and less frequently since then, although they still occur and require dealing with.

A Japanese liner in 1939

From the immediate post-war period, we now circle back to think about VJ Day and events earlier in the Second World War. Of course, the events in question – the atomic bombs unleashed on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the surrender of Japan – took place on the other side of the world and so we cannot commemorate the end of the war directly with events in our waters in the year of 1945.

The war, however, came to Japan’s door in the waters of the Thames Estuary in November 1939 with the loss of the Terukuni Maru – described in the contemporary press as a ‘crack liner’ – i.e. a first-class liner (a slightly old-fashioned usage now, but which survives in expressions such as ‘crack shot’). Her prestige was demonstrated in several ways, such as the fact that she was a motor-driven vessel, rather than a steamer.

Terukuni Maru and Nagasaki

The Terukuni Maru was completed in 1930 for the Nippon Yusen Kaisha (NYK) Line as a link between Japan and Europe. She was built by Mitsubishi at Nagasaki, reflecting the increasing pre-war Japanese industrial confidence which saw ships built domestically, rather than via orders placed with foreign shipyards. [1] This shipyard would be devastated by the atom bomb dropped on Nagasaki on August 9, 1945. An annotated aerial view of Nagasaki in the US National Archives from 1945 identifies the shipyard (marked 2 on plan), while the shipyard is seen devastated in this aerial view of 1946 with sunken shipping also visible.

The final voyage of Terukuni Maru

The Terukuni Maru left Yokohama for London on 24 September 1939 – but not without war risk insurance: it was a journey that may have seemed safe in the Far East but would become increasingly risky as it neared a Europe in conflict.

As they neared the English coast in November 1939, that journey would become riskier still. There had been plentiful recent minelaying all along the east coast of England: by U-boats on the Suffolk coast and off the mouths of the Thames and Humber by destroyer groups, each claiming several ships. US naval intelligence warned that ‘thirty-nine mines had been sighted adrift off the English coast’. [2] British intelligence suggested that on the nights of 20 and 21 November German mine-laying aircraft had been active. [3] Among the ships attributed to the Thames destroyer group’s activities was the Dutch liner Simon Bolivar, bound from Amsterdam to South America, on 18 November.

There were already swept War Channels off the coast of the UK for Allied shipping and neutrals alike – mines being no respecter of neutrality – for at the outset of war Japan was neutral. Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941 was yet to come.

Both the British naval authorities and the captain of the Terukuni Maru were well aware of the dangers ahead.

Captain B Matsukura gave an interview to The Times. in which he said that, having arrived in the Channel on the morning of 19 November, his vessel was boarded by naval officers for clearance and guidance towards the swept War Channels. [4] They finally weighed anchor for London with their 28 remaining passengers on the morning of 21 November with the assistance of a British pilot, while five crew were posted to scan for mines. However, as lunch was being served, ‘there was a terrific explosion . . . the ship shot up, several plates were broken, and three of the passengers were injured.’ [5] To Reuters he said that ‘When we struck the mine the ship shivered and jumped into the air.’ [6] The master gave his opinion that: ‘I would say it was a deep mine. If it had been an ordinary floating mine at least one of my look-outs would have seen it. My own belief is that it was a magnetic mine.’ [7]

All on board saved – including an unusual passenger

The ship’s engines were disabled and the pilot suggested beaching the ship, but it proved impossible to do so, and she began to list. However, the time it took for her to finally sink, 40 minutes later, and the relatively few passengers (most having disembarked earlier in the voyage) meant that it was possible to save all on board in eight lifeboats: 28 passengers, a passenger’s dog, 177 crew, and the pilot. The ship then finally heeled over to starboard and sank. [8]

There was another passenger – a stowaway of sorts. A falcon had flown on board, exhausted and hungry in the eastern Mediterranean, and was ‘taken care of by the bath-steward, but otherwise regarded as a bird of ill-omen.’ It was placed on board the Beaverford, one of the ships which had come to the rescue, and taken to London Zoo. The Beaverford was in Convoy HXF (Halifax-UK Fast), having made the journey ‘northabout’ via Scotland and bound for Dover, which suggests the convoy was on scene and others may well have been able to assist, including their escorts HMS Acasta and HMS Ardent. [9] The falcon’s survival made a good story and a feelgood picture for the press, even if its feathers had been somewhat ruffled by its extraordinary journey.

Images flashed around the world

But someone else also took good pictures of the wreck as it was taking place – the ship’s photographer, K Asami. The Daily Mirror told its readers: ‘You owe the amazing pictures in today’s Daily Mirror to a boy of eighteen . . . His photographs will be well paid for. It won’t be only camera work that will have earned him the money, but initiative and enterprise.’ [10]

That picture of the wreck itself is now in the Mirrorpix archives – search on Terukuni Maru – and and tells the full story at a glance – the ship heeling over to starboard, her bows already below water, the passengers escaping, and the swarms of other vessels giving assistance at the scene. The viewpoint is high, and taken from some distance, so he was able to take his photograph safe on board another vessel, giving him a stable platform to create a coherent image that told a powerful story.

Clearly he was able to take his most precious – and portable – possession with him, and became an accidental war journalist. Photography – and the democratisation of photography – made it possible to record shipwrecks as they actually happened, a trend which started to significantly come into its own during the First World War, can be said to have come of age during the Second World War, and is a precursor to today’s crowdsourced mobile phone footage that contributes so much to modern television news bulletins.

Orderly evacuations such as those on board the Terukuni Maru, or aboard the WWI loss Ballarat (subject of an earlier post) made it easier to do so, or those on board rescuing vessels could also take pictures (covered in our post on HMHS Anglia, also WWI). The teenage Asami’s astonishing photograph was syndicated around the world by radiophoto – a means of remote transmission of photography which emerged in the 1920s and 30s (also called Wirephoto by the Associated Press). For example, it was reproduced in the New York Times, where it was described as ‘passed by British censor’. [11]

Those who were there could thus bring a perspective that professional journalists just could not cover, but the conventional press could, of course, avidly film and interview survivors: check out this Gaumont newsreel of 23 November 1939.

Censorship and the War Channels

The reason Asami’s picture passed by the censor was that there was no identifiable detail as to the vessel’s location and no press report gave details other than ‘North Sea’ or ‘England’s east coast’, in conformity with British wartime censorship, even internationally. For example, in the Daily Mirror, we are told: ‘Crowds saw the crack Japanese liner Terukuni Maru sink off the East Coast yesterday after striking a Nazi mine.’ [12]

Hidden in plain sight

Yet there is an interesting story that is hidden in plain sight and wartime censorship has nothing to do with it. The position of the wreck has received no commentary as far as I am aware, until now.

The wreck’s position and identity have always been known with a consistent charting history since the date of loss, wartime reports on her position and marking, and dispersal activity in 1950 – an unbroken chain of reporting. [13]

The official Lloyd’s casualty report was finally made on 19 February 1940, and stated ‘reported to have sunk in forty minutes after striking a mine off Harwich on the 21st November, 1940’ although further correspondence ensued with the owners, who were reluctant to give up the possibility of salvage. However, by May 1940, they had ‘no objection to the record ‘Sunk – War Loss 11.39′ being made against this ship’s name in the Society’s Register Book.’ [14]

The wreck is charted and located around 3.5 miles or so NNE of the Sunk Head Tower light, and 2 miles ENE of the Inner Sunk light, nearly 12 miles east of Frinton-on-Sea, Essex. [15] The pilot’s suggestion of beaching the ship confirms its proximity to local sandbanks. [16] The Daily Mirror had said ‘crowds’ witnessed the wreck, which appears to be corroborated by the reminiscences of an eyewitness standing as a boy with his friend on the cliffs at Frinton-on-Sea, Essex, on 21 November 1939: he saw a liner he believed to be the Terukuni Maru sailing near the Sunk lightvessel go up in ‘an enormous plume of water’ and ‘turn on her side’. [17] This position also seems consistent with two boats from the Terukuni Maru, still complete with their oars and a quantity of ships’ biscuits still inside, fetching up at Den Hoorn and De Koog on the Dutch coast a couple of weeks later. [18]

What exactly was the Terukuni Maru doing there? She was heading north from the Downs off the eastern coast of Kent for London, so how come she was as far north as off the Sunk light vessel? The location of the wreck is nearly 30 miles north of Margate, where she could ’round the corner’ west into the Thames.

The Terukuni Maru had a British pilot on board, familiar with the many sandbanks of the Thames, and who will have been up-to-date with the war channels, adding a new layer of requirements for careful navigation – and the vessel was proceeding in accordance with instructions given when boarded by naval officers. She might well have drifted a little after being mined, since her engines were disabled, but she cannot have drifted very far, if at all, in the 40 minutes it took her to sink. Yet she was seen off Frinton-on-Sea near the Sunk light vessel by witnesses, with many vessels coming to her rescue; she was recorded by Lloyd’s as mined off Harwich; and has a consistent history of charting and identification by the UK Hydrographic Office since the time of loss.

So why was she there? Examination of data for wrecks which were mined in English waters during the first four months of the war shows that there is a small cluster off this area corresponding to those few days of activity noted above. It seems natural that the Simon Bolivar, coming across from Amsterdam on 18 November, would have joined the war channel close to Harwich (after all, Harwich and the Hook of Holland have been connected by a regular service for centuries) but it is harder to work out exactly why the Terukuni Maru was so far north of her expected peacetime course, when the weather was not a factor and her crew had expert pilotage and Admiralty advice.

The clue, perhaps, is in the words ‘the expected course’. The vessel will have been directed towards the swept War Channels, and it could be that the wreck remains of the Terukuni Maru form a tangible record of something short-term and ephemeral – a set of instructions, a change of course, a temporary alteration to the war channels, and direction towards known channels believed swept and safe – as the area near the recent wreck Simon Bolivar would have seen significant sweeping activity to make the area safe. Or was she directed away from London to Harwich?

There is an intriguing comment in a secondary source, synthesised from contemporary Australian and Singaporean newspapers, [19] which describes the position of loss as 8 miles north of Margate, 20 miles east of Shoeburyness. That position is some 24 miles south of the known and charted position of the wreck, but it would certainly be a location more compatible with a vessel turning east into the Thames from the Downs. Yet she cannot have drifted 24 miles to her final location of loss when she was seen off Harwich having exploded.

There is clearly more to discover.

Conclusion

The Terukuni Maru demonstrates the sense of menace present in the world’s shipping lanes from the outset of the Second World War and which would finally be brought to a close worldwide on VJ Day. The losses of Simon Bolivar and Terukuni Maru in close temporal and geographical proximity brought home in headlines around the world the danger posed to neutrals by unsignalled minefields in the early years of – and throughout – the war. As a neutral at this stage of the war, Japan was outraged, and this was a rare maritime loss for Japan prior to her entry into the war at Pearl Harbor in December 1941. So this wreck marks a moment in time for Japanese vessels during the Second World War.

Despite press censorship, we see also a positive shift in the documentation of shipwrecks by the growing medium of photography and the development of war journalism. The wreck’s dispersal in 1950 echoes the parallel efforts made in post-war minesweeping and the constant reminders of war debris in various forms. From September 3, 1939 to August 15, 1945, the Terukuni Maru was but one of many victims of the war in English territorial waters: the remains of some 349 vessels, some positively identified, some with potential attributions, and some unknown, are recorded in Historic England’s dataset, with many more known only from documentary evidence. [20]

It seems there is more to discover, so we may well return to the Terukuni Maru in due course.

The one Japanese loss of the Second World War in English waters, the Terukuni Maru has been an appropriate wreck to mark the final edition of the Diary of the Second World War on this blog. We will continue to cover other shipwreck stories within English waters: all Second World War entries, and those for the Diary of the First World War will remain archived and accessible.

Footnotes

[1] Lloyd’s Register Foundation Archive and Library, completion report for the Terukuni Maru, 28th June 1930, LRF-PUN-W283-0129-R. There is some confusion in some secondary sources over whether she was built at Kobe or Nagasaki, possibly because some elements of her construction were overseen by the Kobe surveyor, necessitating some correspondence with the Nagasaki surveyor, all of which is also in the Lloyd’s Register Foundation archives.

[2] Rohwer, J and Hümmelchen, G 2007-2025 Chronik des Seekrieges 1939-1945 November 1939 (Württembergische Landesbibliothek: published online) (in German); New York Times, 23 November 1939, No. 29,888, p2 (subscription service).

[3] Terukuni Maru Nippon Yusen Kaisha (NYK) Line 1930-1939 https://www.derbysulzers.com/shipterukunimaru.html, based on contemporary newspapers. This source covers the Terukuni Maru as a motor vessel fitted with Sulzer engines. Attribution to a parachute mine is supported by eyewitness accounts from Frinton-on-Sea, Essex, reminiscences in 2007 of a witness who had, with a friend, seen parachute mines being dropped as a boy of 14 on 20 November 1939.

[4] The Times, 22 November 1939, No.48,569, p8

[5] ibid.

[6] Malaya Tribune, 22 November 1939, p1

[7] Straits Times (Singapore), 6 December 1939, p10

[8] The Times, 22 November 1939, No.48,569, p8

[9] The Times, 25 November 1939, No.48,572; convoyweb Convoy HXF 8. The falcon was a peregrine falcon which arrived at the Zoo on 23 November 1939, listed as ‘caught at sea’ and presented by the Chief Officer of the SS Beaverford, Surrey Commercial Docks. It died on 29 July 1940. With very warm thanks to the Librarian at the Zoological Society of London for this information.

[10] Daily Mirror, 22 November 1939, No.11,220, pp 1, 10-11, 20

[11] New York Times, 23 November 1939, No. 29,888, p7 (subscription service)

[12] Daily Mirror, 22 November 1939, p20

[13] United Kingdom Hydrographic Office (UKHO) report 14537, 28 November 1939 onwards

[14] Lloyd’s Register Foundation Archive & Library, Report of Total Loss, Casualty, &c. for Terukuni Maru, 29 February 1940 LRF-PUN-W283-0109-W

[15] Correlation of the wreck’s charted position with key seamarks and landmarks using geospatial information tools

[16] The Times, 22 November 1939, No.48,569, p8

[17] Eyewitness writing in 2007 on his experiences as a teenager witnessing the wreck on the Warsailors Forum

[18] e.g. in De Limburger, Vol. 70, No.284, 5 December 1939, p6 (in Dutch)

[19] https://www.derbysulzers.com/shipterukunimaru.html

[20] Examination of the National Marine Heritage Record (NMHR), Historic England, August 2025