The Bars of Bone

Hi Peter, no unfortunately I don’t recognise the name either when I was with Prince Line or Manchester Liners. Bearing in mind though, my last British ship was in 1962
which, unbelievably, is 60 years ago.

Hi David, thanks for that info. Bob Clow by all accounts was a hard case old-school captain, he once kicked a sailor in the head for daring to come onto the bridge complaining about something or other. Both Bob and Alex served in the Merchant Navy throughout the second world war, both survived being torpedoed more than once, I think Alex was torpedoed three times! By the way, my best school pal was called David Mullins, unfortunately, he died quite young at about 60. Dave's nickname was 'Posser' that was his excuse when he came into school late one morning. He told the teacher, "Sorry, Sister, I had to poss my mum's washing" the whole class started giggling, and the name, 'Posser' stuck with him all his life. I made Posser a character in my latest novel. PC

Hello again Bob, my Grandfather and my uncle were both with ML during the war. unfortunately my uncle, George Langslow was a crew member of the MV Manchester Merchant which was torpedoed by the U628 in 1943 and was one of the fatalities. His father William Langslow later became catering superintendent for ML. Another Uncle, William Black who in the early part of his life sailed on Tea clippers and Barques was also with ML and he eventually headed up the ML shore gang in Salford.
Think my love of the sea was in my family veins. Although I look back as these being the best years of my life, it made life difficult coming ashore, finding a decent job and settling into family life. Which eventually I did.