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Mauretania Week

‘The’ Mauretania, Blue Ribband holder [fastest liner on the Atlantic] for 27 years, possibly Cunard’s most successfully ship, ‘Mauretania‘. 

Liverpool history
Mauritania, Liverpool

I am delighted to have been accepted onto the Facebook page ‘The Ocean Liner Enthusiasts’, a closed group.
Noticing the page has a ‘Mauretania Week’ I thought it might be appropriate and of interest to post the following.

Thousands turned out on a wet night to watch ‘Mauretania‘ make her maiden departure. 

People described her as “a blaze of electric lights”.

In those days electric lighting was a ‘coming thing’, as was Mauretania, a very advanced ship for her time.

Among other advances, she had the largest Parson’s steam turbines built to that date for her and her sister ‘Lusitania‘.

That was a gamble which worked out well resulting in the two fastest liners afloat.

My interest in liners was first aroused when as a child on a school outing we visited Southampton to see the great liners which that day included the ‘Queen Mary‘.

Painted long ago, carefully researched including the small craft and general ambience of the occasion, a private commission, the picture shows ‘Mauretania‘ making her maiden departure from Liverpool.

Mauretania was a real pleasure to research and paint. I still treasure my copy of ‘Engineering, Mauretania’ bought at that time. My efforts were encouraged by the late Harry Milsom, then editor of ‘Sea Breezes’, whom I met when visiting Liverpool.

Pictures of her early life are rare.

I still have a very few signed numbered prints in my chart desk, will they find appreciative homes?