Nonesuch Silver Prints The Great Britain 1969

1969 March - Falkland Islands [Malvinas]. This picture of a wooden bulkhead above the crew's toilets near the bow, was taken on the hulk of the Great Britain as it lay beached in Sparrow Cove. The wood must have been painted with the traditional white lead paint and then re-painted grey to give a tempting 'scraper board'. The graffiti includes initials and dates presumably drawn by the crew. Marion who visited the toilets which by 1969 were little more than holes in the hull said the wind howled incessantly even though the ship was beached.

Camera - Nikon F 35mm with Nikkor 5.8cm F1.4 lens. Film - Kodak Kodachrome ll 1/30 second F2. Kodachrome was a silver halide based colour film in which the silver was converted to dye colours during processing - look to our Art of Silver section for details. This picture has been included in our silverprint collection for its rarity.

In 1970 the original hull designed and built by William Paterson was taken from the Falkland Islands [Malvinas] to Bristol, England. After many years the hull has now been restored and forms the basis of the splendid reconstruction of the 1843 steamship SS Great Britain, conceived by the Victorian engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel.