RMS Carmania Paquebot Bermuda

Paquebot from Cunard RMS Carmania in Bermuda

Type: Paquebot Cover
Date: 16th April 1968
CDS: 16DEC68A PAQUEBOT BERMUDA
Cachet: R.M.S. CARMANIA PAQUEBOT MAIL
Address: Shirley, Southampton, Hants, England
Stamp: Great Britain Queen Elizabeth II 4d POSTAGE & REVENUE

About RMS Carmania

RMS Carmania started life as RMS Saxonia, a British passenger liner built by John Brown & Company at Clydebank, Scotland for the Cunard Steamship Company for their Liverpool-Montreal service. She was the first of four almost identical sister ships built by Browns between 1954 and 1957 for UK-Montreal service. The first two of these ships, Saxonia and Ivernia were extensively rebuilt in 1962/3 as dual purpose liner/cruise ships. They were renamed Carmania and Franconia respectively and painted in the same green cruising livery as the Caronia.

Carmania continued transatlantic crossings and cruises until September 1967 when she closed out Cunard’s Montreal service. She and her sister had been painted white at the end of 1966 and from 1968 Carmania sailed as a full time cruise ship until withdrawal after arriving at Southampton on October 31st 1971. In August 1973 she was bought by the Soviet Union-based Black Sea Shipping Company and renamed SS Leonid Sobinov.