Farewell Dinner and Presentation on board S.S. Orama, March 12, 1940

by Tony Magee

My grandfather on my Mother's side, Mr Clarence Boston, was Chairman of the Australian Aircraft Technicians during WWII.

This is the program for a Farewell Dinner and Presentation, including tongue-in-cheek menu and order of events for the evening of March 12, 1940 on board the Orient Line steamer S.S. Orama.

Orama was sunk three months later in June 1940*

I discovered it amongst a pile of papers in a desk just today (May 13, 2024) and reproduce below:

Builder: Vickers-Armstrong Ltd., Barrow-in-Furness, England, for the Orient Steam Navigation Co. Inaugural voyage London-Brisbane, November 1924. Base Port: London. Gross Tonnage: 19,777 grt. Dimensions: 201.m x 23m, draught 9m. Power: Six Parsons S.R.G. steam turbines @ 20,000 SHP. Service Speed: 20 knots. Screws: Twin. Passenger Decks: Eight. Crew: 420. Passengers: 590 first and 1240 third

Departure of the passenger liner SS Orama from Sydney on 10 January 1925.

Converted to a troopship in 1940, Orama was used to take members of the British Expeditionary Force to Norway after the German invasion. 

*On the 8th June 1940, she was 300 miles West of Narvik, Norway, together with the aircraft carrier HMS Glorious, two destroyers and an oil tanker, when she was spotted by aircraft from the German High Seas Fleet comprising Scharnhorst, Gneisenau and Admiral Hipper. Orama was sunk losing 19 killed and 280 taken prisoner. 

One of those prisoners was Richard Flynn, Able Seaman, of Tramore, Co. Waterford.

Photos and above text from a website dedicated to Abel Seaman Richard Flynn, aboard Orama when she was sunk, taken as a POW. Link is here.

Additional information by Audrey Magee

As the family understands, the trip was undertaken for the purpose of a group on engineers doing a feasibility study for the Australian Government on the possibility of building Beaufort Bombers at the Railway Workshops at Chullora, NSW.

At the time, Dad was employed by the Railways as an engineer. 

The fact that a journal kept by my father contains no details of the study would be because of security concerns.

Note: The then Prime Minister of Australia, Mr Robert Menzies had announced that Australia was at war with Germany in September 1939, so the trip across was not without danger as already German submarines were active.

The Orama departed one month later on October 28, 1939