FACTS OF THE WAR

Wairarapa Times-Age, 3 July 1941, Page 5

FACTS OF THE WAR

BRITISH CIRCULATING EXHIBITIONS. WORK OF MERCHANT NAVY. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, July 1. Circulating exhibitions, each dealing with a particular phase of the war, have been organised by the Ministry of Information and will tour the leading towns of Britain and Northern Ireland. One of these, entitled “Lifeline,” illustrates the work of the Merchant Navy, and it was started off on its journey this morning by the Minister of Shipping and Transport. Lord Leathers, who asks people buying imported food to remember seamen like Victor Strobridge, whose photo forms part of the exhibition and who has been blown up seven times and sunk five times, and also Saidi All who spent several hours in the water after his ship was sunk and simply remarked afte'rwards, “It was very cold.” Showing how small actions could materially help the shipping situation, Lord Leathers said that half a slice of bread daily saved by every man. woman and child, would provide in the course of a year shipping space for sufficient steel to make 10,000 25-ton tanks.

This exhibition emphasises that, though nearly one-third of the world’s shipping flics 'the Red Ensign and the British Commonwealth possesses 17,000,000 tons of tramps and cargo vessels, the weekly average loss of 68,000 tons since the outbreak of the war necessitates the most rigorous economy in the use of imported foodstuffs and other commodities. The other exhibitions, which will be sent out later, will' deal with such subjects as the growth of American aid to Britain and the story of the free European forces fighting for freedom.