Everard

[Robert George Young]

I think my dad spent a good amount of his time with Everard...ships ending in ity I remember

Would there be records of ships, cargo, incidents....basically anything...

Does anybody know what seaman were paid in the 50's, 60's and 70's?

Did they get a wage packet at end of voyage?
Would seaman have drank alcohol on board?

My dad had very good ability, very good conduct on his service books

But he was a bit of a lad...

Did he have to behave on board ships for two months, for example?

Any assistance on this will be great
Thankyou
Bob

[Captain Kong]

I sailed on the AMITY of Everards, an oil tanker, from December 1952 to June 1953. six months.
We got paid every week and then paid the Cook about 15 shillings a week for our food.
Pay for a seaman was around, £5 a week then plus
Not a lot of alcohol was drank on board, we were working Four hours on and Four Hours off. so not a lot of sleep. only in port depending on the port and how long in port.
You did have to behave or the Captain would sack you and pay you off.
We ran to Jersey quite a lot in that summer.

Cheers
Brian

[Robert George Young]

Thankyou Brian

Great, interesting reply.

Tell me more if you can think of it
Very kind of you
Bob

[Geoff Bray]

When I was an apprentice fitter at a ship repair yard in Birkenhead (1957-1962) we used to do a lot of repairs on the F.T. Everard boats( known as the ITY boats). One particular time the jouneymen were on strike, and as apprentices we were not allowed to strike, so the shipyard manager had us guys doing all kinds of stuff. One day he sent for me and my buddy apprentice Jimmy Morris and said he had a job that needed doing on an ity boat at Bromborough, which we agreed to do. This little tanker had a leak on it's stern gland and filling the bilges up constantly. Me and Jim were senior apprentice's, and often worked on our own in the shipyard, so off to in the shipyard truck with stern gland packing, and when the ship had discharged its cargo of palm oil to Lever Brothers, they took the vessel out in the river and beached it outside the lock gates wall and let the tide go out. Me and Jim put two or extra turns of stern gland packing in the stern gland and adjusted it, then when the tide came back in and the vessel floated the leak had been fixed. We got great KUDOS for that.... but a few bob would not have hurt

[j.sabourn]

Never heard them called the ITY boats , was the yellow perils to others. Used to hear stories from other people that they were given them jobs from the pool to serve their penance. Yet in latter years people would be only too pleased to get a job on, as were one of the last uk companies to show the flag. And were held up as such. Cheers JWS

[j.sabourn]

#1. I was 3 mate in 1957 and think I was on 37 pounds 7 and 6 pence a month and that was on A Articles so was above BOT. Think an AB from the federation on B agreement was on about 32 pounds a month plus overtime. Others will remember better. In the 60s your wife or next of kin had to go to the shipping office every month to collect their allotment. In the 70s most had banking accounts and your allotment was paid directly into that. In 1963 a 1st mates wage was 101 pounds 7 and 6 pence a month plus 27pound 2 and 6 pence a month in lieu of overtime . That was BOT. Believe coastal wages were different. Most seaman looked to overtime to makeup their money. If you sailed with an unobliging shipowner, he was only obliged to make your allotment 50 percent of your basic wage. As of 1957 this would or could be 16 pounds a month or about 4 pound a week for a wife and family. A month was calculated at 30 days. JWS.

[Louis the fly]

I spent a short time with Everard's , a coastal tanker , Austility. After coming from deep sea where we kept everything spotless this was a shock to the system , you wiped your feet coming out of the accommodation not going in. We also paid the cook every week when we were paid , he went shopping in Tesco , Asda or one of the others. Only ever did one more trip on the coast but this was a deep sea tanker , Hamilton Trader , registered in Hamilton Bermuda. She was being used as she could carry far more oil.
As a deck boy in 63 I was paid £16 a month , forget how much an AB was on.

[Ivan Cloherty]

I spent a short time with Everard's , a coastal tanker , Austility. After coming from deep sea where we kept everything spotless this was a shock to the system , you wiped your feet coming out of the accommodation not going in. .

After some years deep sea I spent five months on the 'Speciality' (a yellow peril) under two Masters one HT and one FG, both good men and willing to pass on their knowledge and ship handling expertise onto a young 2/m; I learnt much on that worthy vessel and accommodation was spotless both midships and aft, even though she was a hard working ship (only about four years old when I was on her) and we kept her as spotless as we could considering the hull was yellow and we were in and out of port numerous times per week 'keep her off the knuckle' was a familiar shout, when we requested paint, we got it. Our Ck/Stwd was very effeminate but not gay but considered the crew 'his boys' and we had in general no complaints about the food, (but as always there will always be one moaner) we knew he skimmed a bit off the food allowance, but he did the shopping in his spare time and never missed a meal and would even bring sandwiches to the bridge at night. We treated him with respect and he reciprocated. She was hard work, but had few crew changes, rarely on a regular run and deepsea would have been considered a tramper for her trading patterns, carrying clinker one trip and grain the next, then coal and so on, all requiring hold cleaning at short notice. I would recommend coasting to any deep sea man, especially deck watchkeepers, it is a great learning curve for close quarter navigation, ship handling no water under the keel, lack of navigation aids, slow engines and fast tides, etc etc, so glad I had the opportunity, and luxury compared to the trawlers I served on in earlier years.

Incidentally Louis didn't realise you were so young!

[j.sabourn]

In 1953 nearly everybody over 24 years of age who served at sea had served during the war years this included nearly all the mates engineers and the largest proportion of deck and engine room, cooks and stewards, nearly everybody apart from apps and boy ratings. During the various strikes and disagreements with the wages and conditions most shipping owners and the general public had very short memories of how these men had served their country. The strike in 1966 saw most of these veterans pack in the sea. There loss was a loss to the country, Harold Wilson was in power at the time and I can't help feeling it was a calculated ploy by his government to get rid of the British MN. Everyone has their own views on this, but I will go to the grave thinking just that. Rgds JWS

[Captain Kong]

The AMITY was a nice little tanker, we had single berth cabins, , she used to have a crew of about 40 when she was in Singapore after the war,, As the Empire Tedassa, Everards had a big fleet of them. We had three ABs and me OS, two mates and a Master, and two engineers. and a cook.
The Yellow Perils were Cargo ships, with Yellow hulls. the tankers were black hulls white topside.
She was a good job, that is why I stayed for over six months.
Many adventures on her, in the storm that sank the Princess Victoria with a loss of 135 , searching for survivors,
We did all around Ireland, the Hebrides, Orkneys , Shetlands, all the Scottish coast and then the English and Welsh ports and in the summer on the Jersey and Guernsey run. The Captain had his lovely daughter on board for the school holidays , same age as me, He gave me a fiver in Jersey, told me to take her ashore and give her a good time, BUT LAY ONE FINGER ON HER AND I WILL KILL YOU.
She could not understand why I refused to hold her hand on the beach.
I learned how to drink on that one, The ABs were all hard cases, If you come ashore with us, "You Drink like a man, You act like a man and You will pay like a man. or else." the Big iron fist. I would sit and be terrified of making a false move,
We had plenty of `ladies` on board at various ports, Henry Boland Morse, a Canadian AB who was a plonky joined a couple of days late, He was sent up from Liverpool to Ardrossan on the train but fell off the train as it was hurling through the Lake District and ended up lying all night on a hillside until a farmer found him, He got him to another station and eventually got to the ship.
In Aberdeen he brought well known `Shaky Mary` on board, she was in his bunk shaking and he thought she was cold so he woke me up and wanted to borrow a blanket to keep her warm, She was later found dead in the harbour along side a Norwegian ship with another girl.
Many stories on that coast.


I was sad to leave after six months. and went back deep sea a much better man.
Cheers
Brian