SS Mount Temple The SS " Mount Temple " was a Canadian Pacific Lines cargo ship that was sunk during the First World War by the German commerce raider SMS " Möwe " . Originally a Beaver Line ship , she was purchased by Canadian Pacific in 1903 . She was one of the ships that responded to the distress signals of the RMS " Titanic " in 1912 . In 1916 , while crossing the Atlantic with horses for the war effort and carrying a large number of newly collected dinosaur fossils , she was captured and scuttled complete with her cargo . Early history . " Mount Temple " was built in 1901 in Walker - on - Tyne , England by Armstrong Whitworth & Company . The ship was launched for the Elder Dempster ' s Beaver Line on 18 June 1901 . The ship was named for William Francis Cowper ( 1811 – 1888 ) , Baron Mount Temple , an English politician , Lord of the Admiralty and chairman of Armstrong - Whitworth . The ship was 8 , 790 gross tons and was 485 feet long . She had one funnel , four masts , twin screw propellers , and a top speed of 13 knots . The " Mount Temple " saw use in November 1901 as a Boer War transport ship . In 1903 , Canadian Pacific Lines purchased the ship , with 14 others , and equipped her with a wireless telegraph . In the early days of wireless telegraphy , the call sign established for the SS " Mount Temple " was " MLQ . " After two successful Liverpool – Quebec City runs in 1903 , the ship ran aground on West Ironbound Island , Nova Scotia in 1907 . No lives were lost , but the ship was stranded until 1908 , when it was refloated . Assisting the RMS " Titanic " . The SS " Mount Temple " was one of the ships that responded to the RMS " Titanic " s distress signals on 14 April 1912 . The ship ' s master , Capt . Moore , stopped short of helping " Titanic " , claiming the ice was too thick to safely pass through . Controversy abounds concerning Moore ' s recollections of the " Mount Temple " s true speed on the evening of 14 April 1912 , how far away she was from the distress position when she turned to help , and how far she was from " Titanic " when she stopped . Rumors that " Mount Temple " under Capt . Moore ignored " Titanic " s distress rockets abounded at the time and persist to this day . It is said that " Mount Temple " was the " mystery ship " seen by officers and passengers aboard the " Titanic " five to ten miles away , rather than the SS " Californian " as implied by Lord Mersey and the British Board of Trade at the British Inquiry . War service and loss . For use during World War I she had a 3 - inch ( 75 mm ) gun mounted on her stern for defensive purposes . The " Mount Temple " departed from Montreal on 3 December 1916 for Brest , France , and then Liverpool , England , with Captain Alfred Henry Sargent at the helm . The ship ' s cargo was 710 horses and 6 , 250 tons of goods , including 3 , 000 tons of corn , and 1 , 400 cases of eggs . Also on board were 22 wooden crates of dinosaur fossils , collected in the Badlands of Alberta by the Canadian paleantologist Charles H . Sternberg . These were en route to Sir Arthur Smith Woodward , keeper of the British Museum ' s Natural History Department . The ship was captured roughly half - way between Cape Race and Spain , roughly north of the Azores on 6 December 1916 . The SMS " Möwe " , outwardly a cargo ship , closed with the " Mount Temple " . After the gun crew of the " Mount Temple " fired , the Germans fired back and with their superior firepower silenced the gun . Four crew members aboard the " Mount Temple " were killed in the brief battle . Over a hundred crew and passengers were taken off before explosives were used to help scuttle her . On 12 December 1916 , they were brought aboard the captured British ship " Yarrowdale " and they arrived at Swinemunde , Germany on 31 December . The US citizens among them were released in early March 1917 as the United States was neutral at the time . The others were interned as prisoners of war . The " Mount Temple " was the fourth vessel that Canadian Pacific Lines lost during the First World War , and by the war ' s end , CP Lines would lose a total of 18 ships . Its sister ship ( the " Montezuma " ) was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine UC - 41 on 25 July 1917 . Crew members lost . The four crew members lost on 6 December were :