CITY OF WINCHESTER
Photographer
Frederick Garner Wilkinson
(1901-1975)
Date2 October 1924
Object number00040930
NameGlass plate negative
MediumEmulsion on glass
Dimensions83 x 108 x 2 mm
ClassificationsPhotographs
Credit LineAustralian National Maritime Museum collection
DescriptionCITY OF WINCHESTER was photographed at the FS Buoy on Thursday 2 October 1924. The general cargo vessel made two round trips to Australia prior to the outbreak of World War II conducting trade between Britain and America. In 1924 it was registered in the British port of Liverpool.HistorySS CITY OF WINCHESTER was the second British vessel to be named after the English city. The 7891 ton steam merchant vessel was built in 1917 by Palmers Shipbuilding & Iron Co Ltd, at Jarrow and Hebburn-on-Tyne. It was owned by Ellerman Lines Ltd, London and had its homeport in Liverpool. World War II halted the CITY OF WINCHESTER's normal trade route between Britain, the United States, New Zealand and Australia carrying refrigerated and general cargo. On 9 May 1941 while travelling to London - Capetown - Beira it was torpedoed by a German submarine and sunk off the coast of Dakar.SignificanceThis photograph represents the CITY OF WINCHESTER and trade between Australia, America and Britain during the first half of the 20th century.
It is part of the F G Wilkinson Photograph Collection, comprising more than 700 glass plate negatives of ships in Sydney Harbour between 1919 and 1936. The collection provides an extensive and well-documented coverage of the changing styles of shipping in the port of Sydney before the gradual decline of the coastal trade, and in a period which was probably the peak reached by commercial shipping in Australia. The backgrounds also reveal the changing face of the city and harbour foreshores.
