Great News From ‘Friends of TS QUEEN MARY’
“Four years of hard work (three as a registered Charity) have come to fruition.
We are delighted to confirm that at exactly 15:30, on Wednesday 21st October 2015, TS QUEEN MARY passed into the ownership of the Charity.
Forth Ports plc had to arrest the ship in July, when the former owner failed to pay berthing dues. By then TS QUEEN MARY was subject to a prohibition notice (declared unseaworthy) and was at a renewed risk of being scrapped.
Thankfully, we received a most generous gift that allowed us to go forward with a bid and – on 5th August – the Charity was informed that it had been selected as the preferred bidder. This was subject strictly to non-disclosure, pending completion of the sale.
Since August we have been engaged in an intense process, including surveying the ship at Tilbury (with representatives of the MCA, Ferguson Marine and V Ships) and dealing with a multiplicity of other technical issues that have surrounded the transaction.
TS QUEEN MARY now has a new owner and a chance of a bright future. This is the outcome that the Charity and its supporters have long hoped for.
It goes without saying that the Trustees will do their utmost to take good care of TS QUEEN MARY and bring her home to the Clyde, in 2016. Indeed, work has started in earnest and engineers and contractors are due to attend the vessel next week.
Further major announcements will be made over the coming days. There is a lot to do to get our Queen repaired and readied for sea.
We thank all of you for being a part of our journey so far. However, we pay a special tribute to the workers of Denny of Dumbarton, the yard that gave birth to TS QUEEN MARY. This moment is dedicated to them.
Stay tuned on our Facebook page for updates as the journey begins to bring QUEEN MARY home.
The Trustees
Friends of TS Queen Mary
25th October 2015″
Thanks to Andy Aitchison, Shawn Dake and Kenneth Whyte
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Good to hear this news! Her name changes are interesting. Built by Denny’s, Dumbarton for the Clyde excursion company Williamson-Buchanan Steamers Ltd. the 19-knot QUEEN MARY entered service in May 1933. Every day she would have sailed past the semi-completed 81,237gt Cunard liner at the John Brown yard. Because of the Great Depression, work on the new giant had been suspended in 1931 and only recommenced after the merger in 1934 of Cunard and White Star into Cunard White Star Limited. The name of the new ship came about with the desire of the new board of directors to break with the past. It was not as myth would have it, the result of a post-grouse shoot chat with the King but a carefully negotiated plan by the wily chairman Sir Percy Bates. Although a number of names had been considered, it was felt that as the Queen had agreed to launch the ship in September 1934, her name was the most appropriate. Bates persuaded Williamson-Buchanan to change its ship’s name to QUEEN MARY II and in July the new Cunard name was approved by the palace and the rest of the story is history. In May 1976 after the withdrawal of Cunard’s QUEEN MARY in 1967, QUEEN MARY II reverted to her original name QUEEN MARY.
This is wonderful news indeed, now we take a sigh of relief and hope that the SS United States gets the funding she needs before her deadline.
Nice to hear after the demise of the Akendiz , some good news in the classic ship preservation front! Still many struggles ahead ,but i hope she has a bright future
Fantastic news for the TS Queen Mary and the best of luck on the voyage home and your new future!
Great news. We sailed down the Clyde on this ship from Glasgow to Dunoon in 1951 on my first visit from Yorkshire to Scotland. Hope we can make a return trip on her in the future.
Regarding the recent media coverage of the successful purchase of Queen Mary by FOTSQM. As a Scot living in temporary exile I only found out about this story from a text from my brother who still lives in Scotland, and he read it online on the Sunday Mail website. As the Friends of Queen Mary are trying to raise £70,000 to bring her home to Glasgow next spring, I find news about this story is not getting the proper internet, media and press coverage outside of Scotland that it deserves. BBC Scotland should run this story as a proper news feature on the BBC Scotland website. Yes, BBC Scotland Newsdrive, the Sunday Mail and the Glasgow Herald covered the story and STV did an online article as well. There are many Scots working, exiled and living abroad, including myself, who read the BBC News Scotland website on a daily basis to catch up on all the news happening in their homeland. I spent my childhood on Queen Mary and her sister ships, sailing down the Clyde and in the Firth of Clyde. There are also many Scottish expats living in the rest of the UK and around the world as well as mariners and ship enthusiasts, who I am sure would be more than happy to donate to this very worthwhile cause if they were made aware of the latest developments in this ongoing story. As £20,000 has to be raised before Christmas, time is not on our side. I have supported and donated funds to Queen Mary, Waverley and the Maid of the Loch, long after they were taken out of service by Caledonian MacBrayne. All three ships now require funds at the same time, which means any donations that are being made are now being spread thinly between all three vessels. I suspect the majority of funds from private individuals/enthusiasts that are being donated at the moment are by an age group who remember the ships or who travelled on them during their childhood or early adult life. We need to get the younger generations involved in making donations, though I am sure the Waverley is already generating younger interest as she is still operating each year on the Clyde and around the UK. For me one impossible dream is about to happen next year. I am sure hundreds maybe thousands of people including myself will be there to witness an emotional moment when this historic and unique ship returns home to her birthplace and a secure and well deserved future and we can also witness the last surviving Clyde built turbine and paddle steamer together again in Glasgow. Not only will the Riverside Museum become a focal point for marine enthusiasts and tourists from around the world, it will enable visitors to become acquainted with the unique maritime and shipbuilding heritage of Glasgow and the Clyde.
The Friends of TS Queen Mary have now opened the full public appeal to return Queen Mary to Glasgow with a double page spread article in the Sunday Mail newspaper, which circulates widely in Scotland
The appeal is being fronted by renowned actor Robbie Coltrane who is patron of the charity
Funds have been received to undertake all the necessary repairs to allow for the tow of the vessel from Essex and around half of the British coastline back to Glasgow.
With all this in place the message (as headlined in the newspaper) is now simple – and hopefully one the general public in the Glasgow area and further afield can now identify with : “Bring Mary Home”
Details of the facebook page and website are here : https://www.facebook.com/tsqueenmary/ and here http://www.tsqueenmary.org.uk/
Extended (unofficial) details about the ship and her fascinating (and Cunard-linked) history is here
http://www.paddlesteamers.info/Turbine%20Steamers/QueenMary.htm
I don’t think there has been an updated news items since this – so I guess here is the place to update with the news that the Queen Mary was towed back to Greenock last month and now awaits work to prepare her for her static role in Glasgow. This morning a new appeal (for a much larger amount) was launched in a nice video by charity patron the actor Robbie Coltrane. All the latest information, photos and the videos can be found on the links in the post dated 28 Feb above
So wat ov her turbines better running on her own power with waverly