The vessel on this stamp is given by Stanley Gibbons as the hospital vessel "ALEDA E. LUTZ", comparing the stamp with a photo of the ship she looks identical.
Ateliers & Chantiers de France at Dunkirk built her for the Compagnie Générale Transatlantique.
18 July 1931 Launched under the name "COLOMBIE".
Tonnage 13.391 gross. Dim. 155.13 x 20.29m., between pp 148.73m.
Two steam turbines, manufactured by Ateliers & Chantiers de Penhoët, St Nazaire, hp?, speed 17 knots. Twin screws.
Passenger accommodation for 201 first, 146 second and 144 third class.
Built for the West Indies Service of the C.G.T. 13 August 1939 made her first voyage from Le Havre to New York, Montreal and Quebec before sailing back to Le Havre.
1939 Refitted in an armed merchant cruiser X-10. 1940 Laid up at Martinique. Dec. 1942 seized by the USA at Casablanca.
Between 1943-45 used as a troopship, managed by C.G.T.
13 Feb. 1945, after a refit in a hospital ship for the USA Army, she was renamed "ALEDA E. LUTZ", in honor of Lieutenant Lutz, who was killed on a flying mission to evacuate wounded personnel from the forward front lines.
She arrived on 16 March 1946 at New York from Hawaii with on board 152 patients, after disembarking the patients, she was handed back to the C.G.T. and got her old name "COLOMBIE" back.
She made first two round voyages between France and New York before going back to the West Indies service.
1948 Rebuilt by the Dutch yard of the De Schelde at Vlissingen (Flushing,) one funnel and tonnage 13.808 gross.
Passenger accommodation for 192 first, 140 cabin and 246 tourist. 1964.
Sold to Typaldos Bros Ltd. Greece, renamed first "ATLANTIC" but the same year altered in "ATLANTICA". 1970 When the company became bankrupt, she was laid up at Perama, Greece. Later that year sold for breaking up at Genoa, but she was resold.
1974 Broken up at Barcelona.
Belize 1988 75c sg 1046, scott 907.
Sources: North Atlantic Seaways by Bonsor. Register of Merchant Ships Completed in 1931.
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