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The 30 pruta stamp shows the Shomron of the Zim Israel Navigation Co. Ltd., built by Kieler Howaldtswerke A/G at Kiel in 1955 as part of the D.M. 3,450,000,000 Israeli-German Reparations Agreement reached in 1952. Twelve ships were ordered under the agreement in 1954 for delivery within three years. The Shomron, taking her name from the ancient town near Nablus, is a motorship of 5,430 gross tons with three sisters, the Dagan, Tappuz and Yehuda, each carrying 12 passengers in the trans-Atlantic trade during the summer months. In winter these ships were employed in the citrus fruit trade to Europe including the United Kingdom.
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Immediately before the State of Israel was established after the Second World War the Jewish authorities in Palestine acquired an odd assortment of vessels to run the British blockade carrying thousands of “illegal” Jewish immigrants. This stamp shows one of the smaller vessels of this fleet, the wooden-hulled auxiliary Nirit, built in 1945 by the Cantieri Navale Torre del Greco, Italy, as the St. Antonio 11. Bought in 1948 by Ships and Vessels Ltd., later merged in the Shoham Maritime Services, she became an immigrant carrier under the name Nirit although her name was not officially changed until 1951. This craft remained in the Shoham service until 1956 when she passed to Italian owners for use as a fishing vessel.
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The stamp shows something of the ancient maritime connections of the Jews beginning with a craft of the period 200-400 A.D., largely drawn from a model made by M. Pliner, a naval architect. This craft was between 40 and 50ft. in length with a tonnage varying from 70 to 90. She depended on a large square sail and was steered by two great oars over the stem. The model, now in the Maritime Museum at Haifa, was made from a drawing of an ancient merchant vessel discovered in the cave tomb at Beith She’arim in 1936.
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Built as a chemical/oil production tanker under yard No 0010 by Hyundai Mipo Dockyard Co. Ltd. Ulsan, South Korea for Ashley Shipping Marshall Island.
11 June 2001 keel laid down.
12 September 2001 launched under the name ASHLEY, she has four sisterships.
Tonnage 23.217 gross, 11.113 net, 37.270dwt., dim. 182.55 x 27.38 x 16.7m., draught 11.2m., length bpp. 175m.
Powered by one Hyundai-B&W diesel ?hp, one propeller, speed 14.5 knots.
19 November 2001 completed, under Marshall Island flag and registry.

www.equasis.org gives for 2006, owned by Ashley Shipping, Marshall Islands and managed by Omi Marine Services, Stamford, Ct. USA. IMO No 9228849.

February 2007 sold to King Eric Tankschiffahrts GMBH, Germany, renamed KING ERIC.
Still under Marshall flag and registry.

Marshall Island 2006 39c sg?

Source: DNV Exchange. Some web-sites.

Built as a bulk carrier under yard No 10468 by Oshima Shipbuilding Co. Ltd., Saikai, Japan for Ocean Carrier Maritime Corp., Marshal Islands.
Launched under the name CENTURION.
Tonnage 40.060 gross, 25.444 net, 76.838 dwt., dim. 225 x 32.26 x 19.39m., draught 14.12m. Length bpp. 215m.
Powered by MAN-B&W diesel engine, manufactured by Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding Co. Ltd, Tamano, 12.662 hp., one shaft speed 15.4 knots.
Bunker capacity 2207 m³.
7 Holds, with a total capacity of 90475 cubic meter.
25 August 2005 completed.

27 February 2006 when at anchor at the outer anchorage at North Pula Laut, Indonesia, three robbers armed with guns and knives boarded the ship via the anchor chain. They held a watchman hostage at gunpoint and forced him to lie down on deck. Robbers stole ship stores and property before they escaped.

www.equasis.org gives for 2006: owned by same owners, and managed by Primerose Shipping, Piraeus, Greece. IMO No. 9304174.

Marshall Island 2006 39c sg?

Source: Bureau Veritas. Some web-sites.

Built as a 3-masted steel mother-ship by N.V. Scheepswerf De Haan & Oerlemans, Heusden, Netherlands for Parceria Geral de Pescaries, Lisbon. Managed by the Bensaude Line.
Launched under the name ARGUS.
Tonnage 696 gross, 414 net, 608 dwt., dim. 209 x 32.6 x 17.0ft., length bpp. 189.2ft.
Powered by a 4-cyl Sulzer diesel engine, 475 hp.
Bunker capacity 130 tons oil, and 70 tons fresh water. Could carry 11.093 quintals salted fish.
Crew 72, and carried 53 dories.
Schooner rigged.
Ice strengthened.
March 1938 delivered, and sailed under command of Anibal da Graça Ramalheira and a Portuguese crew to Lisbon, her homeport.

She was designed by the Brit Alexander Slate, and completed in time to take part in the 1939 fishing season.
Fitted out with electric light, radio installation and a refrigerated bait-room, which could hold 40 tons bait.

Her first voyage was when she sailed on 27 May 1939 from Lisbon and via Ponte Delgado, arrived at the Grand Banks on 8 June. The fishing was not so good and on 22 June she sailed for Greenland, where she fished in the Davis Strait mainly on the Store Hellefiske Bank from 29 June till 28 August then sailed back to the Grand Banks where she fished from 04 September till 11 October before she sailed fully loaded for Portugal via Ponta Delgado, arriving Lisbon 23 October.

Then she left every spring from Portugal for the Grand Banks even during World War II when she sailed in convoy till the end of 1945. During World War II in the off season used as a freighter between Portugal and the Portuguese Islands.

On voyage 12 in 1950 Alan Villiers sailed with her and wrote the book “The Quest of the Schooner Argus.” She was then sailing under command of Capt. Adolfo Simões Paião.

In 1969 she made her last voyage to the Grand Banks under command of Capt José Luis Nunes Oliveira, thereafter laid up.
1974 She was sold to the Canadian company White Fleet Cruise Ships for 7.000 Euros’, the same year al sold to Commander Mike Burke of the Windjammer Barefoot charter company based in Miami.

She was now refitted in cruise vessel, fitted out with air-condition and 52 double cabins, two Admiral suites and 3 cabins with berths for six people, each with its own bathroom. A new deck was added. New masts were placed with new sails.

She wax renamed in POLYNESIA II and registered in Honduras. Owner given as Bimba Ltd.
Tonnage then given as 696 gross, 413 net, with a displacement of 820 tons. Dim. 75.40 x 10.90 x 5.40m. (draught), length bpp. 51.60m.
Rigged as a 4-masted staysail schooner.

She is based at St Martin and sails from this port every week for a six day cruise in the Caribbean.
In the summer and autumn season she visit St Lucia, Grenada, Tobago and St Vincent, while in the winter and spring she calls at the Leewards Islands.

She was later registered in Equatorial Guinea till 2003.
After 2003 registered in Saint George’s, Grenada, and owned by Polynesia.
2008 as given by www.equasis.org IMO No 5023564, owned by same owner.

2007 The Barefoot Windjammer cruise company got in financial difficulties and in 2008 is given that she are out of business.
A web-site gives that the crew has abandoned the POLYNESIA in Aruba, and she still is there berthed in July 2008.

( The Portugal stamp showed only her steering-wheel with one of the men of the crew, Old Jacinto Martins, the photo is depict in the book by Alan Villiers “The Quest of the schooner Argus” on page 148. The vessel in the background of the stamp is the GAZELA PRIMEIRO see index.)

Nevis 1980 $3 sg 54 and 1981 $3 sg 471 as POLYNESIA
St Kitts 1985 $3 sg 172 as POLYNESIA
Portugal 2000 85$ sg?,

Source: Great Sailing Ships of the World by Otmar Schäuffelen.
http://www.marinha.pt/extra/revista/ra_mar2005/pag_15.html Lloyds Register.

Built as a steel passenger-cargo vessel under yard No 244 by Caird & Co., Greenock, Scotland for the Royal Mail Line.
13 September 1886 launched as the ORINOCO. (2)
Tonnage 4.581 gross, 2.349 net, dim. 124.87 x 13.72 x 7.75m.
One 3-cyl. triple expansion steam engine, manufactured by the yard, 5.800 ihp., speed 14.5 knots.
Passenger accommodation for 257 first class and 26 second class passengers.
Clipper bow, three masts.

She was the first steel ship built for the company, and also the first fitted out with electric light. She was the last vessel of the company fitted out with cross-yards.
02 December 1886 left for her maiden voyage from Southampton in the West Indies service under command of Captain Jellicoe.
1897 Took part in it Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee Naval review at Spithead together with the DANUBE of the same company.
1901 Hull painted white, which in 1903 again painted black with a white band.

21 November 1906 in collision with Norddeutsche Lloyd liner KAISER WILHELM DER GROSSE on the road of Cherbourg during thick fog, the clipper bow saved the ORINOCO from severe damage, but three of her crew members were killed, when a lifeboat capsized. On the KAISER WILHELM DER GROSSE four were killed, and she got severe damage.

After her repair again in the service to the West Indies.

1909 Sold for scrap, scrapped at Bridgeness in the Firth of Forth, Scotland, during the scraping she got on fire in which she badly was damaged.

Bahamas 1984 31c sg 676
Cayman Islands 1989 25c sg 678

Source: Royal Mail Line by Haws. British Passenger Liners of the five Oceans by C.R. Vernon Gibbs.
Some web-sites.

A fine local craft is featured on the 12 cents stamp of Sarawak. It is the “Barong Panau”. The word ” barong” means a boat, in the language of one of the tribes, and the word “panau” refers to net-lifting fishing. These fishing craft are locally built, the keel, ribs, and frames being built up in western fashion from local hardwood. The masts can be taken down when not in use while sails are made of imported cloth. The crew of the craft usually consists of 10 or 12 men.
SG194 Sea Breezes 1/58

IN September 25 1965 the Argentine Government issued an 8 pesos stamp to commemorate the centenary of the Welsh colonisation of Patagonia. The stamp design shows the tea clipper Mimosa, which was specially converted into a passenger vessel for this voyage, against a map of the Province of Chubut, where the Welshmen made their settlement. They landed at Puerto Madryn, Patagonia on July 28, 1865, sailing from Liverpool on May 25.
From 1853 onwards successive Argentine Governments had devised various measures for attracting emigrants. Contracts were made for bringing families of agricultural workers from Europe. Land was granted to these colonists and many of the settlements, sometimes after years of hardship and struggle, flourished and became permanent. The Welsh settlement was one of this group.
It was led by an ardent Welsh Nationalist, Mr. Michael D. Jones, who was convinced that there must be somewhere in the world an isolated place where a colony could be established for the purpose of preserving, uncontaminated, the Welsh language, customs and Nonconformist religion. Mr. Jones was impressed by the Argentine Government’s offer to settlers, promising land, sheep, horses and grain for 12 months after the settlers’ landing, and Patagonia seemed ideally remote from any other peoples and cultures to preserve the Welsh culture he so ardently championed.
The Welsh leader had not been to Patagonia and could have no idea of the desolate territory he had chosen. It seemed ideal for his purpose and the 152 Welsh immigrants who sailed with him in the Mimosa. This clipper was built by Alexander Hall at Aberdeen in 1853 and was a vessel of 410 gross tons, with a length of 139 ft. 9 in., a beam of 25 ft. 5 in. and 15 ft. 6 in. depth. Her official number was 1973 and signal letters HFMN.
The Mimosa was a full-rigged ship with raised fo’c’sle and quarterdeck. Obviously the stamp designer had no idea of the vessel’s appearance and has merely given an impression of her. She first appears in Lloyd’s Register of 1874.
Welsh records give the ship’s tonnage as 447. The discrepancy in these two tonnages could easily be explained by the amount of conversion work necessary to convert the clipper into a passenger-carrying ship. Cabin space was provided by dividing up the holds with stout planks and boards and there were no portholes. She was no pleasure ship; all passengers were carried at steerage rates, £12 for each adult.
Conditions on the specially printed passenger tickets specified that the shipowner would provide each passenger with three quarts of water daily, apart from that required for cooking, and a weekly food allowance of 31/2 lb. of bread or biscuit, not inferior in quality to Navy biscuit; 11 lb. of wheat flour; 1′/2
lb. of oatmeal; 11/2 lb. of sugar; 11/2 ozs. of mustard; 1/4 oz. white or black pepper; 2 ozs. salt and a gill of vinegar.
History records that these courageous folk left Liverpool singing hymns as they sailed towards the New World. They must have been nearly heartbroken when they reached their promised land in the middle of a Patagonian winter, after two months at sea. Although the Argentine Government advertised for agricultural workers, only four of the adult Welsh male settlers came under this category. They were an ill-selected company for an agricultural settlement and suffered terrible privations for several years. Their crop plantings were a calamitous failure and they would certainly have starved but for the supplies of food sent to them annually by the Argentine Government or left occasionally by a British warship. It was the local Araucanian Indians however who helped them most, teaching them to manage horses, to use the bolas and lasso, and to hunt wild animals such as the guanaco. During the conquest of the desert the colonists did not take up arms against the Indians, unlike the Argentinians, who tried to wipe them out. The Indians returned the Welshmen’s friendship and they became lasting friends.
After learning to canalise the waters of the Chubut River for the irrigation of their fields, the settlement began to prosper, until today the territory of Chubut contains some 12,000 descendants of the original Welsh settlers and those Welshmen who followed them to the area. Of these some 5,000 still speak Welsh, although the Spanish language is now compulsorily taught in the schools of the province under Argentine law.
The territory of Chubut nowadays has a population of approximately 150,030, but is still avoided by most Argentinians because of its cold, barren wastes. Wales is naturally very proud of her South American settlers and keeps in contact with their descendants.
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The 12 cents stamp of St. Vincent shows the liner Antilles of the French Line alongside the Deep Water Wharf at Kingstown. The Antilles was built by the Arsenal of Brest in 1952, her gross tonnage being 19,828 tons. She is on the company’s Havre—Southampton— West Indies run and can carry 303 first-class, 285 second-class and 89 tourist-class passengers, with 100 first or second interchangeable.
She has eight steam turbines developing 42,000 s.h.p., driving twin screws. Her sister ship is the Flandre, but fortunately the latter has a black hull, making the identification of the Antilles a much simpler task than it might have been.
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