In May 1940 she was torpedoed and sunk in the North Sea while evacuating UK and Belgian soldiers, airmen and civilians from Ostend on the last day of the Battle of Belgium.

Swan, Hunter and Wigham Richardson built the ship at Wallsend on the River Tyne in north-east England, completing her in November 1920.

[1] In 1934 London and Channel Islands sold the ship to Monroe Brothers of Liverpool, who renamed her Kyle Queen.

The company, which traded as the Khedivial Mail Line (KML), renamed the ship Abukir after the coastal town of Abu Qir on the edge of the Nile delta and registered her in Alexandria.

In 1940 the UK Ministry of War Transport requisitioned seven KML ships and placed five of them, including Abukir, under the management of the General Steam Navigation Company,[6][9] a subsidiary of P&O.

That afternoon at 1754 hrs the Needham Mission at the Belgian GQG reported that King Leopold III planned to negotiate a surrender to Germany.

The Mission was among more than 200 BEF soldiers, RAF and Belgian Air Component personnel who crowded onto Abukir, along with 15 German prisoners of war,[15] six priests,[8] 40 to 50 women[8] including a party of nuns from a convent in Bruges[16] and a group of British schoolgirls.

As Abukir slowly headed west for England, Luftwaffe aircraft bombed her for an hour and a half but failed to hit her.

[8] At first light five Royal Navy destroyers came to search for survivors: HMS Anthony[21][22] Codrington,[21] Grenade,[21][22] Jaguar[23] and Javelin.

[22][24] They spent several hours searching between the North Goodwin lightvessel and the Kwinte Bank lightbuoy but found only a small number of survivors (accounts vary between 26 and 33),[17][25] [unreliable source?

[7] They are named on one of the bronze panels in the Second World War part of the Merchant Navy Monument at Tower Hill, London.

One Merchant Navy seaman, 17-year-old William Blair, is also listed on a bronze memorial plaque from the Prince Of Wales Sea Training Hostel.

Items found at the wreck site included plates, cups, teapots and cutlery initialled "KML" for the Khedivial Mail Line,[35] Lee–Enfield .303 calibre rifle ammunition and rosary beads.