Great Britain SS (Brunel)

[john sefton]

SS Great Britain was an advanced passenger steamship designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel for the Great Western Steamship Company's transatlantic Bristol—New York service. While other ships had previously been built of iron or equipped with a screw propeller, Great Britain was the first to combine these features in a large ocean-going ship.
At the time of her launch in 1843 she was by far the largest ship in the world, over 100 ft (30 m) longer than her rivals, and the first screw-propelled, ocean-going, wrought iron ship. On 26 July 1845, the ship undertook her maiden voyage to New York, a journey completed in 14 days.

In November 1846, the ship went aground on the sands of Dundrum Bay, Ireland and there was doubt as to whether she could be re-floated. Brunel himself advised that if anyone could rescue the ship, it was the naval engineer James Bremner. He was engaged and the Great Britain was re-floated on 27 August 1847 with the assistance of HMS Birkenhead. However, the cost of the salvage bankrupted the Great Western Steamship Company, and the SS Great Britain was sold and turned into an emigration ship.
In 1852, she made her first voyage to Melbourne, Australia, carrying 630 emigrants. She excited great interest in Melbourne, with 4,000 people paying a shilling each to see over her. During her time, she was considered the most reliable of the emigrant ships between Britain and Australia.
Between 1855 and 1858 she was used as a troopship, during the Crimean War and the Indian Mutiny. In 1882, she was turned into a sailing ship to transport bulk coal but, after a fire on board in 1886, she was found on arrival at Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands to be damaged beyond repair. She was sold to the Falkland Islands Company and used, afloat, as a storage hulk (coal bunker) until 1937, when she was towed to Sparrow Cove, 3.5 miles from Port Stanley, scuttled and abandoned. In her role as coal bunker, she served to refuel the South Atlantic fleet that defeated Admiral Graf Maximilian von Spee's fleet, in the First World War Battle of the Falkland Islands. In the Second World War, some of her iron was scavenged to repair HMS Exeter, one of the Royal Navy ships that fought the Graf Spee and was badly damaged, in the Battle of the River Plate.

The salvage operation, made possible by several large donations, including one from Sir Jack Hayward, and the late Sir Paul Getty, was organized by 'the SS Great Britain Project', a group chaired by Richard Goold-Adams. Ewan Corlett conducted a naval architect's survey on the ship, reporting that in his opinion the ship could be refloated. A submersible pontoon, Mulus III, was chartered in February 1970. A German tug, Varius II, was chartered, reaching Port Stanley on March 25. By April 13, after some concern about a crack in the hull, the ship was mounted successfully on the pontoon and the following day the tug, pontoon and the SS Great Britain sailed to Port Stanley harbour for preparations for the transatlantic voyage. The voyage (code name "Voyage 47") began on April 24, stopped in Montevideo from May 2 to May 6 for inspection, then across the Atlantic, arriving at Barry Docks, west of Cardiff on June 22. ("Voyage 47" was chosen as the code name because it was on her 47th voyage from Penarth, in 1886, during a tempest that SS Great Britain had sought for shelter in the Falklands.) Bristol-based tugs then took over and towed the ship, still on its pontoon, to Avonmouth Docks.

The ship was then taken off the pontoon, in preparation for her re-entry into Bristol, now truly afloat. On Saturday 5 July, amidst considerable media interest, the ship was towed up the River Avon to Bristol. Perhaps the most memorable moment for the crowds that lined the final few miles was her passage under the Clifton Suspension Bridge, another Brunel design. She then waited a further two weeks in the Cumberland Basin, until a high enough tide occurred that would get her back through the locks to Bristol's Floating Harbour, back to her birthplace, the dry dock in the Great Western Dockyard in which she had been built.
The original intent was to restore her to her 1843 state. However, the philosophy of the project changed in recent years and the conservation of all surviving pre-1970 material became the aim.

By 1998, an extensive survey discovered that the hull was continuing to corrode in the humid atmosphere of the dock and estimates gave her 20 years before she corroded away. Extensive conservation work began which culminated in the installation of a glass plate across the dry dock at the level of her water line, with two dehumidifiers, keeping the space beneath at 22% relative humidity, sufficiently dry to preserve the surviving material of the hull. This was completed, the ship was "re-launched" in July 2005, and visitor access to the dry dock was restored.

Various sites inc Wikepedia.

GB SG782 Falk Is SG146, 185, 258/62, 527/30, 685/6, 835.

See also article by Peter Crichton:
http://www.shipstamps.co.uk/forum/viewt ... 455#p10691

[aukepalmhof]

GUINEA ? 750F sg?, scott? The Guinea stamp gives the name as GREAT BASTERN
British Virgin Islands 1986 $1 and $1.50 sg 621, MSsg623, scott?
Senegal 1999 1000f sg?, scott? (in margin of MS)
Paraguay 1981 0.50gs, sg?, scott?

[Arturo]

SS Great Britain

Sierra Leone, 1996

[Arturo]

Great Britain SS (Brunel)

Ascension Island 2006, S.G.?, Scott: 897a-b.