Porto Rico Line masters rotated between company ships. Borinquen and Coamo shared 4 captains between them: Captains Evans, Folker, H elgesen, and Lundstrom. Ca lifornia , in 1970. Today, portions of her hull are still visible as part of the Port Hueneme breakwater. The Coamo and the Borinquen had on ly four perm an ently assigned masters between them. They were: Captain Thomas Evans (Coamo and Borinquen), Captain Frederick W. Folker ( Coamo), Captain Nels H elgesen ( Coamo), and Captain Ernest Lundstrom (Borinquen). Captain Thomas Evans was born in Aberayon, Wales, in 1878. H e first went to sea as an apprentice at 13 in a sailing vessel shipping out of Liverpool. At 23 he earned his British master's license and joined the Lam port and Holdiner Tennyson as a 2nd officer on a voyage to Brazil and the Falkland Islands. His first co mmand came after four years sailing for the Porto Rico Line as m as ter of SS Porto Rico, 1,257 gross tons; he was the company's senior captain for many years. W h en he retired in Jan uary 1942, he had commanded rh e San Juan, Coamo, and Borinquen. Captain Frederick W. Folker was born in Nova Sco tia in 1878. He shipped out as a boy in a small barque, Stadacona, which called at European and Sou th American ports. From 1897- 1899 he worked on commercial runs between Canada, the United States, and South America. H e entered the service of the Porro Rico Lin e as a quartermaster aboard SS Mae before bei ng promoted to master of the Vasco and the "old" Coamo, ex-Californian. H e rook 28
over command of the 1926 Coamo from Captain Evans in 1931 and co ntinued as her captain until his retirem ent in June 1938 at the age of sixty. Captain Nels Helgesen, my father, was born in H auges und, Norway, in 1888. Ar 17, he emigrated to the US and found employment in coastal vessels. H e signed onboard the Jamestown in 1913 as 2nd offi cer and later served on a number of other vessels as 2nd and then chi ef officer. On 15 Ap ril 1918, during World War I, he received his first command with the Porto Rico Line: the seized German cargo ship Watauga. From there, he went on to command the Marianna, Choctow, Isabella, Manta, Porto Rico (ex-Prinz Joachim, another seized German vessel) , Montoso, Ponce, Huron, San Lorenzo, San Juan, Coamo, San Jacinto, Borinquen, and the Puerto Rico (ex- Haiti). The company rotated the masters between vessels; he served as relief cap tain of th e Coamo beginning in 1927 and the Borinquen in 193 1. In January 1942, SS Coamo was in the Atlantic off the O uter Banks of North Carolina when they sigh ted a li feboa t adrift in the open sea. Captain Helgesen and his crew rescued seventy-o ne survivo rs from the Canadian passenger liner Lady Hawkins, which had been torpedoed five
Captain Nels H elgesen days earlier en route to San Juan . On their return trip to New York, the Coamo was challenged by three enemy subma rines directly ahead. Captain Helgesen m ade an attempt to ram them, but the U- boats submerged too qui ckly. The Coamo pressed on to New York at full speed to safety. The rescue and U-boat incidents were reported nationally by the press . A month later, Coamo-sai ling as a US Army troop ship-carried 1,5 00 troops to Ascension Island before heading for Brazil and the Caribbean. On her second trip as a troop ship, she participated in the African Landing (Operation Torch) in earl y November
SS Borinquen (below) and SS Coamo both served as US Army Troop ships during World War fl Only Borinqu~n would survive the war and return to regular passenger service.
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SEA HISTORY 130, SPRING 2010