British Trust

[Tony Frost]

The BRITISH TRUST was the only "Bird" class BP Tanker not named after a bird,but was to be called BRITISH THRUSH.Was it the connotation of the word that they dropped it?(They only had to add a 'H' to its name and would have had more problems)

[Gulliver]

....and I would think in her later years ,the T at the beginning of the second word TRUST was obliterated appropriately by.......rust?

[happy daze john in oz]

377.jpgI have been sent a recent photo of the British workman but am not sure if it is genuine.
Can anyone confirm?

[Graham Payne]

Hi John
Genuine methinks

[byebyetankers]

Bit late to reply, but I think I can supply the necessary explanation.
The 'Trust' was launched by Dame Pattie Menzies, the wife of the then Aussie Prime Minister. He was hugely anglophile and complained to someone influential that his wife had never launched - and would love to launch - a ship. The Trust was the first available. The change of name was a diplomatic finesse - said to symbolise the trust between two great nations.
When I joined (on the first change of crew after launch), the blokes all said that Dame Pattie was genuinely excited by the whole process. One of the reminders of her visit was a multi-volume set of The Australian Encyclopaedia. To my knowledge it was never ever looked at. I'd love to know where it ended up when the ship was disposed of.