Here we have "The Golden Hind", and we used this card because the text tells us that "This ship, originally "The Pelican", took Sir Francis Drake on his round-the-world voyage through the Magellan Strait."
Which seems an opportune time to mention that this was named after Ferdinand Magellan, who is often said to have been the first man to circumnavigate the globe, whilst looking for the East Indies. However that is not strictly true, as he died during the voyage, and the fleet was brought home under the command of another man, Juan Sebastian Elcano. That technically means that our man, Francis Drake, was indeed the first to complete the circling of the earth in its entirety.
There is a slight inaccuracy in the text of our card though, and we will find out about that with tomorrow`s card.
This set has a curious story, revealed in our World Tobacco Issues Indexes, where the header to the first section of this issuer`s output reads :
1. 1948 - 1949 SERIES. Inscribed "Amalgamated Tobacco Corporation (South Africa) Ltd., Johannesburg." . Series prepared 1948-49 : [our set] was not used in South Africa,because of Government restrictions, and the entire stock was transferred to the U.K. and issued in 1952. Backs in English and Afrikaans.
The set itself is described as :
FAMOUS BRITISH SHIPS. Md. 75 x 48. Nd.
1. "Series No. 1". (25)
2. "Series No. 2". (25)
There was also another set, "History of Aviation", in a similar format, which is listed below our set, but it is not stated in the header that this one too was brought to England and issued there instead. I did have a look online and it seems to be listed as an Export Issue, so perhaps by the time this one was issued the Governmental shauries had settled down, or were confining themselves to more important things.