A very nice dockyard model of an Atlantic Ocean Liner. The model features a laminated and carved hull with lined lacquered boxwood decks with detailed gold-plated fittings, white-painted superstructure, stayed liveried funnel, davits with fitted boats, masts with derricks and rigging. Housed in a later mahogany display case with original ivorine builder's plates on glazed display base and stand.
History of the Vessel:
Between 1928 and 1937 Reardon Smith & Sons ran a liner service from England to West Coast cities of the US and to Vancouver B.C. and accordingly named several vessels of the service after their regular ports including this ship, the VANCOUVER CITY. She was a large vessel of nearly 5,000 tons.
Reardon Smith moved their North American Liner offices to Vancouver B.C. from 1933 until the declaration of war in Britain in 1939.
VANCOUVER CITY was sadly one of the first casualties of WWII. The ship was sailing from Suva, Fiji bound for the United Kingdom with a cargo of sugar when, on 14th September 1939 (eleven days after War had been declared), she was torpedoed by the German submarine U-28, a type VIIA U-boat of Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine, and sunk in the Celtic Sea southwest of Ireland with the loss of three crewmembers. The company had ceased liner operations in 1937, transferring all vessels to tramp service, thus the VANCOUVER CITY was on a port to port commission for a cargo between Fiji and the UK when she was sunk.
Though the Vancouver office closed in 1939, having established contacts and partnerships locally they would continue trading through the port for decades to come. Reardon Smith Ltd. would go on to name two of their later vessels VANCOUVER CITY- one in 1942 and the other in 1979.
