1939 RMS Mauretania Maiden Voyage, Liverpool CDS

1939 RMS Mauretania maiden voyage. Thomas Dear purple illustrated cover with a Liverpool CDS. Scarce illustration, first one we have had to offer since 2018.

The RMS Mauretania was completed in May 1939 with a tonnage of 35,739, an overall length of 772 feet and a maximum speed of 26 knots. With the outbreak of war her commercial service did not last long before being requisitioned and sent to America in December 1939 to be converted into a troopship. After the war the Mauretania returned to serving as a transatlantic ocean liner but by the early 1960s faced stiff competition from modern liners. She completed her final voyage in 1965 to the shipbreaking yard in Fife, captained by John Treasure Jones.