SS ''Kavirondo'' was a steam tug on Lake Victoria in East Africa. She was named after a local Lake Victoria region and was one of many compact Lake Victoria steamships operated by the

Uganda Railway The Uganda Railway was a metre-gauge railway system and former British state-owned railway company. The line linked the interiors of Uganda and Kenya with the Indian Ocean port of Mombasa in Kenya. After a series of mergers and splits, the li ...

Bow, McLachlan and Company Bow, McLachlan and Company was a Scottish marine engineering and shipbuilding company that traded between 1872 and 1932. History 1872–1914 In 1872 William Bow and John McLachlan founded the company at Abbotsinch, Renfrewshire, where it made s ...

of Paisley in

Renfrewshire Renfrewshire () ( sco, Renfrewshire; gd, Siorrachd Rinn Friù) is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland. Located in the west central Lowlands, it is one of three council areas contained within the boundaries of the historic county of Re ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...

built her as a "knock down" vessel; that is, she was bolted together in the shipyard at Paisley, all the parts marked with numbers, disassembled into many hundreds of parts and transported in kit form by sea to

Mombasa Mombasa ( ; ) is a coastal city in southeastern Kenya along the Indian Ocean. It was the first capital of the British East Africa, before Nairobi was elevated to capital city status. It now serves as the capital of Mombasa County. The town is ...

Kenya ) , national_anthem = " Ee Mungu Nguvu Yetu"() , image_map = , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Nairobi , coordinates = , largest_city = Nairobi ...

. The kit was shipped by railway to

Kisumu Kisumu ( ) is the third-largest city in Kenya after the capital, Nairobi, and the coastal city of Mombasa (census 2019). It is the third-largest city after Kampala and Mwanza in the Lake Victoria Basin. Apart from being an important polit ...

on the shore of Lake Victoria for reassembly and launch in 1913. In the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

''Kavirondo'' was armed as a

gunboat A gunboat is a naval watercraft designed for the express purpose of carrying one or more guns to bombard coastal targets, as opposed to those military craft designed for naval warfare, or for ferrying troops or supplies. History Pre-ste ...

. In 1921 she was still recorded as a functioning vessel based in Kisumu - her telegraph address was recorded as 'Kavirontug'. Between 22 August 1927 and 19 February 1928 the SS ''Kavirondo'' was chartered by Michael Graham on behalf of the British

Colonial Office The Colonial Office was a government department of the Kingdom of Great Britain and later of the United Kingdom, first created to deal with the colonial affairs of British North America but required also to oversee the increasing number of c ...

in order to conduct the first ever

Fisheries Survey of Lake Victoria Lake Victoria supports Africa's largest inland fishery, with the majority of present catch being the invasive Nile perch, introduced to the Lake in the 1950s. Prior to the introduction of Nile perch as well as Nile tilapia, the fish community w ...

. During this time the vessel was used to deploy a wide diversity of fishing gears and to provide transportation for the scientists.Graham M. (1929.) The Victoria Nyanza and Its Fisheries: A Report on the Fish Survey of Lake Victoria 1927–1928 and Appendices. London: Crown Agents for the Colonies. 256pp. In about 1984, she was laid up at Kisumu and later was used as an accommodation vessel. She later sank alongside, but in 2005 was raised. Her purchasers intended to lengthen and re-engine her for use as a tanker.

References

Ships built on the River Clyde Lake Victoria 1913 ships World War I naval ships of the United Kingdom Uganda Railway Tugboats of the United Kingdom {{Kenya-stub