Help about a dirty picture
- 12 April 2009 22:5119363I have an oil painting of the old SS Canterbury, which I should think was painted before WW1.
The artist is one J.W. Jessey, does anybody know anything about him, I would have thought he was a local person. - 12 April 2009 22:5619366we have always had a lot of jessey's in dover dave.
- 12 April 2009 23:0719368OOh Howard you are awful.
- 12 April 2009 23:1219370This SS Canterbury ?
http://www.scienceandsociety.co.uk/results.asp?image=10282855&wwwflag=2&imagepos=22Been nice knowing you :) - 12 April 2009 23:2019373Not that one Paul. This one has hardly any passenger decks and 2 of the possibly 4 lifeboats are stowed in the centre and the stern of the vessel.
- Ross Miller
- Location: London Road, Dover
- Registered: 17 Sep 2008
- Posts: 3,709
12 April 2009 23:2519375Cannot find anything on the web (so far) on the artist and this is the only painting I have found of the ship
http://www.scienceandsociety.co.uk/results.asp?image=10282855"Dream as if you'll live forever. Live as if you'll die today." - James Dean
"Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength,
While loving someone deeply gives you courage" - Laozi - 13 April 2009 00:2019376Snap, thats the one I posted above !!
Been nice knowing you :) - 13 April 2009 00:2319377The only other Canterbury is one built in 1929 and broken up in 1965 - do you have an image that you can post ?Been nice knowing you :)
- 13 April 2009 05:5519379Beautiful picture but unfortunately the details are wrong. This is the legendary Canterbury built in 1929 and scrapped in 1965. She carried the passengers for the Golden Arrow service in great luxury. The picture is actually taken from a British Railways poster produced in 1948 on the resumption of the service after the war. Science and Society also have this in their collection at the url below. I have emailed them advising them of their boob.
http://www.scienceandsociety.co.uk/results.asp?image=10173400
The Canterbury which preceded her is almost certainly the one to which Dave1 is referring and was built in 1901 and scrapped in 1927. She was one of the fleet of little cargoships which the SECR, latterly amalgamated into the Southern Railway, used to shuffle cargo between the continental ports and the UK whilst the passengers were carried on the dedicated passenger steamers. Today the cargo travels in the artics on the RORO ferries.
They were very small and the Canterbury had a gross tonnage of 561 tons and was twin screw. She was able to carry a handful of thirty passengers. Here is a postcard of the slightly earlier single screw Maidstone, built in 1899 for the LCDR. I think she would be very similar in appearance.
- 13 April 2009 07:0819383Thanks Ed - great info. and great pictures too.
Roger - 13 April 2009 11:0919394Thankyou everybody for your help.
Ed, she is definitely the sister ship to the SS Maidstone and I am grateful for identifying her for me.
The picture itself is quite large mounted in a gilt frame. Unfortunately it has suffered over the years and needs a good clean, a somewhat expensive process.
It has been in my Wife's family for many years and it is believed was given to her grand mother by a Miss Boynton who was a local merchant banker. - 13 April 2009 18:3619407Sounds interesting. No luck looking up Jessey or Boynton. The ship was built by Denny of Dumbarton so possibly the picture was painted in Scotland unless the scene is identifiable as local. Jessey appears to be a Hampshire name according to the National Trust 1881 census database. Again, the ship would have traded to a variety of ports around the south coast so the artist may not have been local to the Dover area. Equally, I suppose that he/she may just have been a gifted amateur or even one of the crew.
http://tinyurl.com/dzknj8
