Career
HAPAG registered Prinz Joachim at Hamburg. Her code letters were RMVB. On 26 May 1903 she left Hamburg on her maiden voyage, which was to Mexico.
In September 1905 the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company (RMSP) announced that it would start running a fast passenger service between New York and Jamaica. HAPAG responded by announcing that it would put Prinz August Wilhelm and Prinz Joachim on its Atlas Service, which ran various routes between New York and the Caribbean.[1] In June 1906 HAPAG announced that it would transfer its cruise ship Prinzessin Victoria Luise to the New York – Jamaica route, and that Prinz Eitel Friedrich, Prince Waldemar, Prinz August Wilhelm, and Prinz Joachim would all work the route between New York and Colón via Kingston.[2]
On 17 January 1907 Prinz Waldemar ran aground on a reef in Jamaica and was declared a total loss. Prinz August Wilhelm took 30 of her crew back to New York, where they arrived on 29 February.[3] On 3 May Prinz August Wilhelm also grounded in Jamaica.[4] However, she was on a mudbank in Kingston Harbour, and was refloated undamaged on 27 May.[5]
On 25 February 1909 Prinz August Wilhelm was leaving New York in fog as the Norddeutscher Lloyd liner SS Kaiser Wilhelm II was coming into port. At about 07:30 hrs that morning Kaiser Wilhelm II was moving slowly in Gedney Channel when she sighted Prinz August Wilhelm ahead. Both ships took evasive action, and Kaiser Wilhelm II ran aground on a mudbank rather than hit Prinz August Wilhelm. Some of the passengers who saw the incident said that the ships cleared each other by less than 30 ft.[6]
By 1910 Prinz August Wilhelm was equipped with wireless telegraphy. By 1913 her call sign was DSB. By 1912, 92865 cuft of her hold space was refrigerated, with machinery made by the American Linde Refrigerating Co.
In 1911 the mountaineer Annie Smith Peck sailed on Prinz August Wilhelm from New York to Colón on her way to climb Coropuna in Peru.[7] For the season from September 1912 to January 1913, HAPAG advertised Prinz August Wilhelm making round trips from New York to Fortune Island (now Long Cay), Santiago, Kingston, Colón, Bocas del Toro, and Puerto Limón.[8]
