Description
FRANCE SS Champlain Compagnie Generale Transatlantique 68mm bronze medal 145 grams by R. Delamarre
French Medal struck to commemorate the Maiden Voyage of the French Line ship Champlain. Champlain established a settlement at Annapolis Royale in Nova Scotia, and went on to discover Quebec. The obverse of this medal was used for a Paris Mint medal celebrating the 400th Anniversary of Quebec in 2008.
Obverse: Samuel Champlain facing left in front of a port city ORBI ANTIQVO NOVUM CONJUNGIT / RAYMOND DELAMARRE (Trans: The new world joins the old)
Reverse: small 17th century sailing ship in front of the SS Champlain COMPAGNIE GÉNÉRALE TRANSATLANTIQUE 1603 "CHAMPLAIN" 1932
Edge: Cornucopia Privy Mark (Paris Mint) BRONZE
Raymond Delamarre (1890–1986) was a French sculptor and medalist. He played a major role in the Art Déco movement.
SS Champlain was a cabin class ocean liner built in 1932 for the French Line by Chantiers et Ateliers de Saint-Nazaire, Penhoët. She was sunk by a mine off La Pallice, France, in 1940—one of the earliest passenger ship losses of the Second World War.
Although not as well remembered as her larger fleetmates, the Champlain was the first modern ocean liner and embodied many design features later incorporated into the French Line's SS Normandie. When she made her début in June 1932, the Champlain was the largest, fastest, and most luxurious cabin class liner afloat.
At the outbreak of the Second World War, the Champlain was pressed into evacuee work, transporting refugees from Europe to the safety of North America. This included many European Jews escaping Nazi Europe. Vladimir Nabokov and his family were passengers on the last voyage to New York in May 1940. It was on the return trip that the Champlain met her fate. On 17 June 1940, the liner struck a German air-laid mine while swinging at anchor in the waters off La Pallice, France, near Île de Ré, and quickly heeled over on her side. A few days later the German submarine U-65 fired a torpedo into the hulk. Many sources quote a wire service report from 1940 that as many as 300 lives were lost but this is erroneous. Although there were many injuries there were only 11 or 12 fatalities. She was one of the largest ships sunk in World War II.
