Oceans of Fate

Peace and Peril Aboard the Steamship Empress of Asia

Book Cover: Oceans of Fate

The remarkable story of how one ship--doomed by war--intersected lives and crossed into history.

Completed in 1913 for Canadian Pacific, the Empress of Asia plied the oceans for nearly thirty years. Built for peacetime travel, she saw wartime service as an armed merchant cruiser and troopship before Japanese dive bombers destroyed her off Singapore in 1942.

Through the Roaring Twenties and Great Depression, she brought continents and people together, delivering mail and multi-million-dollar consignments of silk. As a luxurious passenger liner, she was the "Greyhound of the Pacific," encountering enormous storms and smashing transpacific speed records. From stokehold to bridge, steerage to first-class staterooms, she steamed with a kaleidoscope of lives, including  courageous and recalcitrant crew, immigrants and refugees seeking a better life, drug smugglers and weapons dealers, and the idle and not-so-idle rich. This is the dramatic story of how that one ship--and the lives of her passengers and crew--intersected during a tumultuous period of world history, culminating in her destruction off Singapore and the perilous fate of her crew.

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4 Thoughts to “Oceans of Fate

  1. Dear Dan,
    Looking forward to this book.
    Lots of great stories.
    Please let me know of book launch.

    Cheers to you & A

  2. Congratulations, Dan! Have you seen Dr Wally Chung’s 14-ft model of the Empress of Asia at UBC? It’s amazing!

    1. Hi Debbie, and thanks for commenting. I have yet to view in person the model of the Empress of Asia at UBC, but looking forward to a visit to that beautiful province.

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