I have a set of tables that i purchased recently, and on one of the tables is a small plaque that states 151 Alice F.Palmer Launched 3:43 Ron Jon Kalchboards Ship Bottom NJ..If any one can give me some information about the table that would be greatly appreciated . I read the Story about the Ship and 22 men in a life boat. anyone interested in the Tables Please Email me .thank you Jennifer S.
Re: SS Alice F Palmer
Posted by Wanda (Ellis) Bode on February 28, 2012, 8:35 am, in reply to "SS Alice F Palmer"
My father Leonard Elijah Ellis was one of the men aboard the SS Alice F Palmer when it went down. He was on the # 2 lifeboat Chief Mate. one of the 22 men that the story is about. If anyone has any information that is not noted in the story (A Lifeboat Journey)I would love to hear from you.
Re: SS Alice F Palmer
Posted by Jon on September 20, 2011, 9:55 am, in reply to "SS Alice F Palmer"
Do you still have these tables? I am interested in taking them off your hands if possible.
Do you still have these tables? I am interested in taking them off your hands if possible.
Thanks, Jon
Re: SS Alice F Palmer
Posted by Ron Carlson on October 13, 2009, 1:56 pm, in reply to "SS Alice F Palmer" Message modified by board administrator October 23, 2009, 6:47 pm
Dear Jennifer,
Thank you for your inquiry.
I'm guessing that the table you have consists of a wooden top about four feet long by about three feet wide by about three inches thick with inset hand holds in each corner. The tops are often described as hatch boards or hatch covers and are sometimes purported to be from a World War II-era cargo ship, sometimes a Liberty ship.
The Liberty ship SS ALICE F PALMER was built at the California Shipbuilding Corporation ("Calship"), in Los Angeles, California, in February-March 1943. Construction took just 44 days. The number 151 refers to the hull number assigned sequentially by the shipyard to the ships built there. See http://shipbuildinghistory.com/history/shipyards/4emergency/wwtwo/kcalifornia.htm and scroll down to hull number 151. The ship was named after Alice F. Palmer (1855-1902), an educator and former president of Wellesley College.
More than 2,700 Liberty ships were built before and during World War II in 18 shipyards around the country. Of that great fleet of virtually identical ships, only two survive as operational vessels: the SS JOHN W BROWN, which is owned and operated by Project Liberty Ship of Baltimore and on which I sail as a volunteer crew member, and SS JEREMIAH O'BRIEN in San Francisco.
Less than four months after launching, while on a voyage from California to Australia to India to Ceylon to South Africa, ALICE F PALMER was sunk by German submarine U-177 on July 10, 1943. The sinking occurred about 55 miles south of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean. There were no casualties. The crew survived in four lifeboats, three of which made land between July 26 and July 30, and one of which was rescued by aircraft three days after the sinking. See http://uboat.net/allies/merchants/ships/3001.html. You may have found the lengthy story of one of those lifeboats at http://www.armed-guard.com/lboat2.html.
U-177 was sunk in February 1944 with the loss of 50 crewmen; 15 sailors survived.
As to your questions about the hatch board table, such tables are common enough and are often quite handsome, although very heavy. Whether a given hatch board came from a Liberty ship, or any other class of ship, much less from a specific ship, would be extremely difficult to document. It is very unlikely that any records were kept as to which hatch boards were installed on which ship, nor were the hatch boards marked to identify the ship on which they were installed. It is even less likely that the hatch board used for your table actually came from ALICE F PALMER. If anything would be salvaged from a sinking ship it certainly would not have been something as mundane as hatch boards. Moreover ALICE F PALMER sank far from land.
The marking "Ron Jon Kalchboards Ship Bottom NJ" may refer to a business known as Ron Jon Surf Shop in Ship Bottom, NJ, on the Atlantic seacoast north of Atlantic City. It is possible that this shop sells or used to sell hatch board tables such as the one you have. In fact, "Kalchboards" looks suspiciously like "Hatchboards."
If the business meant to honor the memory of a specific ship with a representative piece of nautical flotsam, more power to them. If the dealer sold the table claiming the hatch board actually came from the ship in question, that would be stretching the truth beyond all reasonable limits, in my opinion.
Best wishes.
Ron Carlson, Webmaster Armed Guard website www.armed-guard.com
Re: SS Alice F Palmer
Posted by Jennifer on October 14, 2009, 12:26 pm, in reply to "Re: SS Alice F Palmer"
Thank you Ron For your explanation into my what i misread as "kalch" Because of the script it is written in it looked like a (k) and an (L) instead of an (h) and a (t )now as for where i purchased them ...it was a second hand store somewhat like a consignment shop ..they new nothing about it..except that it is VERY Heavy ..noone else wanted to buy it and since i have two young boys i thought it would be a sturdy table ..it has held up well (smiles).I read the story of 22 men in lifeboats after looking up the Alice F Palmer ...that is why i wanted to find out information about it through you. After Reading the Story i was a bit confused how a store in N.J. could come by Pieces of a ship that went down off the coast of Madagascar as to why they dedicated it to the Alice F Palmer seems we may never know ...thank you once again take care,Jennifer