The City of Ely, a Liberty ship

In 1940 Great Britain stood alone fighting the axis powers and after nine months of war had already lost one million tons of shipping that had been sent to the bottom of the Atlantic by German U boats. The U boats were sinking ships faster than the British yards could build them.

In September 1940 a British Merchant Ship building mission headed by a representative of J.L. Thompson & Sons of Sunderland was sent to the U.S.A. with the sole purpose of ordering ships to be built. To speed up the possible production they brought with them the Thompson designed Dorrington Court plans, and so it was, with slight modifications that the Liberty ships came to be built by the Joshua Henry Ironworks Co. of Sunnyvale, California

A total of 2,700 ships were constructed and whilst “built by the mile and chopped off by the yard” they are credited with not only saving Great Britain but in the Allied cause, they saved the whole world from disaster. They were built to make just one trip with supplies but many years later some were still sailing the seas.
My husband Bob worked as a longshoreman on many of these ships in the 60’s. He enjoyed the work and now enjoys building all sorts of ship models and this one was completed March 14th, 2012

The City of Ely represents the civilian version of these famous ships. The model shown is of a standard armed cargo ship serving with the United States Navy.

This model is 1.384 m in length

185mm beam

Scale 1/96

16kgs.