Empress of Canada

[Doc Vernon]

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Long-vanished, British-based Canadian Pacific Steamships could never have guessed. Their last liner, the Empress of Canada is seen here at Malta in the early Sixties during one of her 60-day winter Mediterranean-Black Sea cruises (remember, it was still New York-to-New York – no segments in those days). And it was $1,250 & up for those 60 days.



Commissioned in 1961, life for the 27,000-ton, 1,050-passenger ship as the Empress of Canada lasted only just ten years. Among other problems, the airlines had stolen almost all of Canadian Pacific's trans-Atlantic passengers. The ship was put up for sale, sitting in the London Docks for easy inspection by perspective buyers. An unknown named Ted Arison came along, bought the ship and laid plans for his brand new cruise line. He took the ship across the Atlantic to Miami. The Empress of Canada was rechristened Mardi Gras, the very first ship in a new, discount, fun-in-the-sun cruise company: Carnival Cruise Lines. The rest is history, great history – today, the Carnival empire includes 15 separate cruise lines (including Cunard), some 105 liners and with another dozen or so under construction or on order. Although long since retired and demolished (out in India), the former Empress of Canada was the beginning for mighty & extraordinary Carnival.

[Captain Kong]

Thanks , the old discharge book is in pieces and faded, it is nearly 65 years old now , I remember the name now.
Cheers
Brian

[Chris Allman]

The guy I am talking about would be the period just prior to them leaving the Mersey middle to late 60s.

[Jim Brady]

I sailed with captains Bell,Dobson and Duck.I remember a Gillette his father was the mayor of London can't remember if he was Chf.Off.or capt.
Regards.
Jim.B.

[happy daze john in oz]

[QUOTE=Des Taff Jenkins;229495]Hi Vernon.
Lovely picture of a lovely ship. One of the things we have over the present day seamen is that the ships we sailed on were ships, not blocks of flats.
I don't like the new liners it would be like staying in a huge hotel, the Container and bulk carriers are ugly and impersonal, can't imagine anyone sitting on no five hatch yarning.
Cheers Des


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Sit on number five hatch? You would be hard pressed now to even find one let alone five or more. Bit of a squeeze there mate.

[John Arton]

I saw the Canada later on when she was the Apollon and she was looking pretty rough. They had fitted a huge diesel generator onto one of the upper decks and it was belting out huge volumes of dirty smoke.
An aunt of mine, whose husband had been chief officer on the original Mary and Elizabeth and who later moved to C.P. and became Master on the Empress ships, always said she preferred the white Empress's over the Cunarders as the fittings etc. were lighter and less Victorian in appearance.
The working alleyway on the Canada in the 70's was a rat run with the original crew "pig" just an empty space. The crews pig and whistle was situated in one of the tween decks in the forward hatch and was well fitted out. C.P. had converted the space in an attempt to make life for the crew a little better.
Now I know this will make some members mad but by the early 70's the crew on the Canada had a lot of trouble makers amongst them. I regularly used to find our 12-4 watch keepers pissed and passed out on the small deck at the base of the main mast (where the look out was meant to be stationed in the crows nest), 1st class waiters who never showered from one trip to another , just washing the visible parts of their bodies and then dousing themselves in deodorant to mask the smell of their unwashed body. The amount of theft of ships stores that went on when storing alongside at the landing stage was incredible, whole cases of best steaks been lifted off the slings and been put into to stevedores cars and this in front of the catering superintendent a galley that if shown to a passenger would have left them all sick and refusing to eat any food prepared there. The pilfering was allowed as the bosses were terrified of causing a strike if the intervened to stop the thefts. The graft reached right up to the top and into the office with free meat and drinks parcel being handed out left right and center.
The England, with a Southampton crew, was supposedly a happier ship with less theft going on but as I never sailed on her I could not comment on that. All I can say is that despite having almost full passenger numbers even on her last year in Atlantic crossings, with the standards of and amount of problems amongst the crew, including some of the officers (alcoholic 3rd mate and alcoholic senior 2nd Engineers) you could see the writing was on the wall for her and it was a firm belief amongst many of us that the problems and standards of those on board in a large way led to her demise.
Having said all that I was saddened when she was sold off as the passenger accommodation and its fittings were magnificent and the time I spent on her as a junior watch keeper was some of the best times I spent at sea, meeting some very interesting people whilst doing my bridge tours along with some very nubile young lady passengers.
rgds
JA