The original ship was called Lahneck and belonged to the German company "Deutsche Dampfschiffarts GeselIschaft Hansa". It had the capacity for 2000 tons of cargo and to sail at 10 to 11 knots, it was 84.79 m long and had a powerful 2000 hp engine. She was one of the German ships requested by the Government on 23 February, as a result of what Germany declared war on 9 March. Days later, she was renamed. It was named after one of those men who revolutionized history and who only know that he was from the Algarve and was called Gil Eanes. But it was he who, in a simple boat, dared to challenge medieval fears and pass beyond the Bojador. And, from the place where he "passed beyond the pain" as the Poet says, he appeared to the Infante, not with a bleeding sword or with a group of captives, but with a bouquet of flowers, which the Portuguese dedicated to the Patroness of Africa and remained calling "roses of Santa Maria". It was "Gil Eannes" that this German-born German now came to be called.

It initially served to transport troops for the War that made him Portuguese; she was later chartered for Maritime Transport, having served in the Azores career.

They later decided to adapt it to a fishing assistance vessel on the banks of Newfoundland. In Holland, she received the necessary modifications, and on May 16, 1927 she finally left for Terra Nova, from where she returned to Lisbon on 14 November.

However, we were already under a new regime: that of the May 28 Revolution, from where the Estado Novo would come out. However, despite the situation of infra-humanity in which our fishermen lived and worked on the banks of Terra Nova, the priorities were different. Gil Eannes was used to transport prisoners. Only in 1937 did she return to Terra Nova.

But the situation of our fishermen was distressing. Illness and death hovered as a permanent evil. The Portuguese were, therefore, the target of the greatest attention on the part of the population of St John's and the Eskimo fishermen who nurtured a great solidarity for our countrymen, largely out of compassion. At the same time, the regime supported shipowners to increase cod fishing in the banks of Terra Nova and Greenland, in order to make us at least self-sufficient in a product of intense demand in the spectrum of national consumption. It was then that Gil Eannes, integrated in the Navy, started to give regular support to our cod fishermen, until 1941. He was, after that, disarmed, in 1942, when he was handed over to the National Society of Cod Owners, to whose service he made 27 trips, 14 of which were for trade and assistance. When he provided it, he supplied our cod fishing fleet with water, oil, coal, bait, salt and food. She had a medical service on board, carried mail and dispatched and received telegrams.

However, with the turn of the half century, Portugal was benefiting from the crisis of post-war European economies and, although it did not enter World War II, it also benefited from subsidies for national reconstruction and entered O.C.D.E. Now, the regime, through the corporate route, developed a social assistance policy focused on the problems of workers and guided by the social doctrine of the Church that it claimed to profess.

And it was also then that the second part of the history of our ship began (the current Gil Eanes ship that we see here) It was now a robust hospital ship of 2274 tdw, 98,450 m in length, 5,490 m in draft, speed of 12.5 knots and capacity for 72 crew, 6 passengers and 74 patients. And, what was an innovation at the time, had cold chambers to supply fresh food. In fact, we all know, and Os Lusíadas echoes dramatically, that its lack is a direct cause of scurvy, a disease suffered by the "white fleet" of our sailboats in Newfoundland. One of the missions of old Gil had been, therefore, to acquire animals on land for slaughter intended for food consumption. With so many oxen, pigs and chickens on board, the humor of our fishermen called the "Noah's Ark". Now, with the means of cold that this new ship was equipped with, there could be fresh meat daily and without direct dependence on land. It was the work nº 15 of the shipyards in vienna, delivered in 1955 to the Guild of Shipowners of Cod Fishing Ships.