Batory was built in 1934–5 at the Cantieri Riuniti dell'Adriatico Monfalcone shipyard in Trieste, Italy,[1] under an arrangement where part of the commission was paid in shipments of coal from Poland.

She was also one of the last ships to leave St Jean de Luz during the final evacuation of Polish troops from France.

In June to July, she secretly transported much of the UK's gold reserves (£40 million) from Greenock, Scotland to Montreal, Canada for safekeeping (Operation Fish).

The journey had been a happy one, with so much music and laughter that the Batory was dubbed the "Singing Ship" and was the subject of a book of the same name.

Returned to post-war Poland in 1946, she resumed civilian service after a refit, transporting such eminent people as Ryszard Kapuściński.

From May 1949 through to January 1951, she was the subject of several political incidents in which American dockers and shipyard workers in the United States refused to unload her cargo, or to service the ship.

After these incidents, she was withdrawn from the North Atlantic route, refurbished at Hebburn for service in the tropics, and sailed in August 1951 from Gdynia and Southampton to Bombay and Karachi, via Gibraltar, Malta, Aden, and Suez.