Ship Fact Sheets Guide

The Ship Fact Sheets cover nearly 2,500 ships owned by P&O, its subsidiaries and associates.  As a general rule ships owned and disposed of by subsidiary and associate companies before they became part of the P&O Group are not included.

The fact sheets were originally compiled for the Group’s own use from P&O and subsidiary company records and from outside sources both published and unpublished.  They are primarily concerned with ships’ P&O Group service histories, and should not necessarily be treated as a definitive service record for any vessel.  In particular, a ship acquired second-hand or sold for further trading will therefore have a non-P&O career which may not have been recorded.

Each Ship Fact Sheet contains the ship’s Official Number; a number unique to each vessel.  Official Numbers were held by British and Empire registered ships regardless of name changes until or unless sold on to foreign registry.  If the ship was later re-registered as British the former official number was normally reallocated. Some countries, e.g. USA, also allocated Official Numbers.  Today, ships have an International Maritime Organisation (IMO) number, this is a unique 7-digit identifier which remains with a ship no matter how many times it changes name, flag, owner etc.

It is necessary to identify the Official Number of any vessel you are searching as many repositories and online databases require you to search by that number rather than by the ship’s name.

In addition the following caveats apply:

• Dates given in brackets alongside ships’ names indicate the completion date, not the date of launch (which may have been in a preceding year).
• ‘Base data’ given for each vessel is as at the time it entered P&O Group service.  Any changes during Group service are noted on the sheet with an (*) and recorded in the Career section.
• Original builders’ specifications may not be recorded if the vessel was acquired second-hand by P&O or one of its subsidiary companies.
• Shipbuilders’ locations are correct at the time of building (e.g. Kiel is listed as West Germany prior to reunification in 1990).

Compilers/Authors notes

We are aware that the sheets are by no means fully comprehensive.  We welcome corrections, or information on additional dates and notable events, provided that the contributor can include written and/or pictorial evidence to verify the correction or addition.  Please contact us with any details.

Special acknowledgement is due to the World Ship Society whose various publications on P&O Group companies have been a major source of information – even if much of this many have been culled from P&O files in the first place!

© P&O Heritage Collection 2010