NEARING AMERICA

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23806, 12 May 1939, Page 9

NEARING AMERICA

ROYAL LINER’S PROGRESS EMPRESS OF AUSTRALIA PASSING THROUGH ICEFIELDS (United Press Association) (By Electric Telegraph-Copyright) LONDON, May 10. The Empress of Australia has entered icefields and hopes to emerge to-morrow. The sea has abated and the liner has speeded up to 18J knots. Their Majesties last evening watched the escorting cruisers enduring a typical Atlantic dusting. They are now 620 miles from America. KINEMA PERFORMANCE QUEEN’S KINDLY THOUGHT LONDON, May 11. (Received May 12, at 1.15 a.m.) Specially invited by the Queen, the stewards, stokers and firemen crowded the main dining room last evening for a kinema show, which included two Walt Disney cartoons and Gordon Harker’s return of the frog. Some wore civilian clothes and others their working kit. Their Majesties in the afternoon watched the cruisers showing their gunnery efficiency. The Southampton put up a smoke shell cloud, which the cruisers’ anti-aircraft gunners peppered, white puffs marking hits. ROYALTY AWAITED CANADA'S PREPARATIONS VAST CELEBRATIONS VANCOUVER, May 4. Although according to the Canadian view, European tension has not been lessened, preparations continue for the reception of the King and Queen. The dominion will be ablaze with a vast celebration, starting at Quebec and continuing to Vancouver and Victoria, where their Majesties will rest for several days before making the return trip. The Prime Minister, Mr Mackenzie King, will accompany their Majesties across Canada and into the United Stales when they visit President Roosevelt at Washington, and on to the New York World’s Fair. No other Privy Councillor will be on the train. Old bickering between the Prime Minister and Mr Hepburn broke out anew when the Premier of Ontario, speaking in the Legislature, said that Mr King was obtaining cheap publicity by accompanying the King and Queen across Canada. The Prime Minister let it be known that he resented Mr Hepburn’s incredible statement. All possibility of reconciliation between the two leaders has been abandoned.

The Empress of Australia, in which their Majesties are travelling to Canada, has an unusually interesting history. Designed and named Tirpitz by the Hamburg-Amerika Company, she was launched at Stettin in 1913 for the line’s New York service. At the outbreak of the war her fitting-out was stopped and the work was not resumed until 1917, when special accommodation was provided for the Kaiser. Hopes were then held that she could be used as an Imperial yacht from which the captured British Navy could be reviewed. After the Armistice the ship was completed and sent to Immingham, Lincolnshire, and in 1921 she was purchased by Canadian Pacific Steamships, Ltd., and renamed Empress of China. Changed from a coal to an oil-burner, she was placed on the trans-pacific service in 1922 as the Empress of Australia. In the following year she saved nearly 3000 lives from the great earthquake at Yokohama. In 1926, the ship received a complete overhaul and was fitted with new machinery which gave a speed of 19 knots, an increase of near I v three knots., A year later she was transferred to the North Atlantic service out of Southampton. From that nort she carried the then Prince of Wales to the diamond jubilee celebrations in Canda._ She has since been used at intervals for round-the-world and shorter cruises, and recently carried troops to Palestine.