Summary

Publicity bookmark issued by the Orient Steam Navigation Company Limited, of England (trading as the Orient Line) to promote their latest passenger ship the new Royal Mail Steamer 'Oronsay' on her maiden voyage from England to Australia in June 1951.

Built by Vickers Armstrong, of Barrow-in-Furness, north-west England, the 'Oronsay' was launched on Friday 30 June 1950 and completed ten months later. The 'Oronsay' was the second new passenger liner built for the Orient Line's England-Australia service after World War II and was named after one of four Orient Liners lost by enemy action during the 1939-45 war. The name had originally been taken from the Scottish Island of Oronsay in the Inner Hebrides. The ship's emblem adopted by the company incorporated a stylised clansman's targe or shield and broadsword. The 'Oronsay' departed on her maiden voyage to Australia on 16 May 1951 under the command of Captain Shurrock, sailing via the Suez Canal, Fremantle (Perth), Adelaide and Melbourne, before arriving in Sydney on 18 June 1951.

Specifications of the 'Oronsay' were: registered 28,000 tons, engines 42,500 horsepower, service speed 22½ knots (41.7 km/hr), length 709 ft (216 m), breadth 90 ft 6 in (28.5 m), construction cost £4½ million (Australian), capacity 660 first-class & 730 tourist-class passengers.

Physical Description

Printed in colour on the front and black ink on the back of a narrow horizontal strip of stiff card. The front features an illustration of the 'Oronsay' under steam showing the ship in its original appearance with distinctive Orient Line livery with a corn coloured hull, green below the waterline, white superstructure and single yellow funnel with black top.

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