Here is another voyage, ESSO YORKSHIRE, in 1975.

[Captain Kong]

Here is another voyage, ESSO YORKSHIRE, in 1975.
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In January 1975, Esso flew me and six other lads, to San Francisco to join the ESSO YORKSHIRE, a 90,000 ton tanker. When we arrived the Agent put us in the Travelodge Hotel on the Wharf, The ship was anchored underneath the Bay Bridge across the Bay having just arrived from the Persian Gulf with a cargo of crude oil. My brother, John, was on board having joined a couple of weeks earlier in Singapore.
Next day the Agent put us in a boat to take us out to the ship and when I got there I went to John`s cabin and woke him up. What a surprise, for him, he didn’t expect to see me.
My cabin was next door to his.
The lad who was paying off was just leaving the cabin as I moved in .
He said you won`t get much sleep in here, it`s effing haunted. I just laughed thinking that he was joking.
The men who were going on leave left and went back to Frisco and for a flight home.
That evening after work , John, Ted and I got the boat and went ashore to Frisco for a few beers.
We were in Ginsbergs Bar on the waterfront when there was a lot of shouting, big car headlamps lit up the bar and then shooting. I was sat near the big plate glass window at the end of the bar when with a big crash it came in, shattered all over me, a bullet had come through. We all hit the deck as more shooting outside and then a man ran through the door, shouting he had been shot and then collapsed onto the floor.
I knelt up and looked through the window, the Bar Tender, shouted , “Get down you crazy Limie, the cops shoot anything that moves, I hit the deck again into a pile of broken glass and spilt beer.
Then it went quiet, a couple of Cops walked in with guns in their hands, we had to raise our hands and not move as they examined the shot man , he was dead.
They confirmed with the Bar Tender that we were just customers. Some more sirens and lights and then two ambulances, looking like armoured truck appeared outside. And then they removed the body, out side in the door way was another body. They were picked up, into the ambulances and then taken away.
The bartender gave us a beer each, and in a few minutes he had swept up the broken glass and mopped up the blood from the dead man and a few minutes later a van appeared outside and a new window installed. And a few minutes later the street and the bar was back to normal. The Barman said it happens a lot down there.
A few more beers and we went to the Wharf and got our boat back to the ship after an exciting night out in Frisco.
Next morning we heaved up the anchor and sailed up the Bay, we were going to a place called Bernicia where the oil refinery was, about 40 miles up the bay and river.
When we were mooring the ship a wire rope carried away and flung me across the deck and I hit the rails injuring my back, so I was sent to hospital in a place called Martinez City. I thought....,, I have been in Frisco for 24 hours and nearly been killed twice, be glad to get away from here.
I had x rays nothing broken but a few torn ligaments. I went back to the ship and was excused work for the duration.
The following day after completing discharging the oil we let go and sailed back down Frisco Bay, under the Golden Gate Bridge and out into the Pacific for a 42 day run to Ras Tannurah in Saudi Arabia, with a call into Singapore for fresh food stores.

It started on the first night at sea as we sailed across the Pacific for the Gulf , a 42 day trip.
I was /on the 4am to 8am watch and at midnight the cabin lights came on and there was a guy wearing a white boiler suit, Esso logo on, but face was just like a mist. He grabbed my leg and heaved me out of my bunk and I crashed onto the deck, I shouted and got to my feet and he was gone,
I legged it up to the mess room and the only guy around was the 12 -4 standby man, smoking a ciggy and drinking coffee, "Some bastard has pulled me from my bunk" I said " Have you seen any one?" He replied no, he had been there all alone.
On watch at 4am I told the Mate all about it, he had known about it but there were no spare cabins on board as we had 12 NIKO workers on board doing maintenance .so I would have to stay there.
This went on for several nights and my brother who had the cabin next door woke up one night and saw a man in a white boiler suit walk through his cabin door and then he heard the shouting and banging coming from my cabin, the coward legged it up to the mess room and stayed there for night , he did not come in to see what was happening to me.
The ghost could pick me up as if I was completely weightless and throw me across the cabin at the formica bulkhead and bounce me off it, The bulkheads were all badly cracked.. Then one night he got my ankle and twisted it round and heaved me out including the mattress and crashed me onto the deck and broke my ankle, the cabin was completely wrecked and I was lying there in screaming agony, My brother legged it up and got the Mate and the Captain and they were horrified at the destruction of the cabin and what they saw. Though they had known about it they didn`t realise how bad it was, .
The Captain said he could not log it as no one in the Office would believe it so he said he would log it as if I had fallen down a ladder. My ankle was strapped up with elastic bandages. I was off watch and laid up. I stayed up all night until about 2am to give the ghost time to sort himself out. I wasn’t in the bunk at midnight.
The Captain went through the old Log Books and discovered that a man, who was on the 8 to 12 watch had received a dear John letter from his wife and so he hung himself. in the cabin. So every night at just after midnight this man`s ghost was going to turn in and I was in his bunk.
At Ras Tannurah 3 weeks later I went to the hospital; and had it x rayed and it seemed that it had healed OK and I was kept on light duties on day work for another two weeks just to make sure it had healed.
After loading 90,000 tons of marine diesel fuel for the US Navy we sailed for Guam in the Mariannas, in the Pacific. When I got to Guam, John and I got a telegram to say my Dad had died. The Captain said he could only send one of us home so being the eldest I sent John home and I had to stay behind. Not very nice being out there with no contact with home at a time like that. Quite upsetting and a bad shock, a good man was Dad, he was fit and healthy when I left home a few weeks before. It was 12 April.1975.
John got a plane to Hong Kong and then a flight to Heathrow, and then home for the funeral.
I went ashore in Guam, a very nice tropical island, an American Service man, he had just been evacuated from Viet Nam, it was falling to the Viet Cong in Saigon, leaving his wife and children behind, got talking to me and Scouse, we shared a few beers and then he took us round the island, showing us the highlights, and a few more beers on the way round. There was a big Hotel , with a bar in the middle of the swimming pool, some of the lads off the ship were already in there. and in the lounge was a group of Korean Girls singing, They were very good too.
A couple of days later we sailed for the Gulf again. Over the top 0f the Philipines and down the coast of Viet Nam, the seas were full of American warships and we were buzzed a few times by their planes, Viet Nam had fallen when the American Embassy in Saigon was taken over by the VC.
After sailing from Guam, the haunting in my cabin stopped, after more than two months, I like to think my dear old Dad had a word with the ghost.
We called in at Singapore and brother John rejoined us again he had flown back the day after the funeral.
We carried on to Mena al Ahmadi in the Gulf to load a cargo of crude oil for Adelaide in Australia,
When we arrived in Adelaide, the agent was taking the crew who were due to go on leave straight down to the airport and away home.
John and I wanted to stay for a couple of weeks to visit relatives and friends so he kept us behind and then took us to a Motel and booked us in there.
We went to see Uncle Fred in Largs Bay and told him that Dad had died.
After a couple of weeks we flew to Melbourne and then Sydney and then a flight home via Singapore, Bahrain an then London.
The end of an interesting but sad voyage.
Brian

[thomas michael]

Here is another voyage, ESSO YORKSHIRE, in 1975.
.
In January 1975, Esso flew me and six other lads, to San Francisco to join the ESSO YORKSHIRE, a 90,000 ton tanker. When we arrived the Agent put us in the Travelodge Hotel on the Wharf, The ship was anchored underneath the Bay Bridge across the Bay having just arrived from the Persian Gulf with a cargo of crude oil. My brother, John, was on board having joined a couple of weeks earlier in Singapore.


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The end of an interesting but sad voyage.
Brian

hi capt
sad about your old man, but it was another tale worthy of your memoirs.
tom

[Doc Vernon]

As always Capt
Your stories if the past are of great reading and interest ,as I have said in the past your Memory too is amazing,with such detail in all your postings!
A credit to you !
Thank You
Cheers

[Captain Kong]

More next week Vernon. that is what the site is short of, did anyone go to sea who is on here, ? surely they must know if they had any thing to write about of their voyages. cannot all have been so boring.
It is all about cars, eating, silly Christmas jokes. etc.

Cheers
Brian

[Doc Vernon]

Well Capt
I guess like me there may be many that did go to Sea and have their Stories tucked away but again like me really don't have the inclination or possibly writing skiils as you have ,you are one of the Lucky ones in that Area.
Yes I agree that more should be told,and hopefully some will get down to writing their memories here!
But it is Xmas and the Spirit of it is starting to show, as for other Threads like Cars etc,well there again lots of us have interest beyond the Sea.
Cheers

[thomas michael]

More next week Vernon. that is what the site is short of, did anyone go to sea who is on here, ? surely they must know if they had any thing to write about of their voyages. cannot all have been so boring.
It is all about cars, eating, silly Christmas jokes. etc.

Cheers
Brian

hi capt
I'm concerned that my tales may be the finish of me, ?
as they always ended in some form of well antisocial activities, with repercussions,
tom

[Doc Vernon]

Many of mine too Thomas and if I told the Truth (as it should be) I more than likely would be booted off the site poste haste LOL
also I am sure that many of my true life Stories would not be believed,as I really have done some wonderful and weird things in my life@
Cheers

[thomas michael]

Well Brian I did a reasonable Time at sea,20 years,and certainly seen many countries and sights.. ! My imagination is not lacking as you will know,but sadly I can't use it to embellish my boring sea life.

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Treasure your adventures Brian.You are fortunate to have had them,and thanks for sharing them in such well written stories, a great talent.For me it's akin to curling up with a good Hornblower....

Cheers!
Gulliver

hi guliver
boredom, well that's always a matter of opinion, glass half full etc, but one guy from warrington or wigan a non sailor or yachtie as a matter of fact he had never been to sea but some years ago he built his own steel forty foot yacht sailed it half way around the world, and was eleven hundred miles on the same port tack,coming back up round the horn to the uk.
but just imagine what it must be like never to have done that, and just sat in the garden whilst life past you by,at least all of you on this site do have those memories,
tom

[vic mcclymont]

I never kept (wish I had) a detailed diary like Brian, so a lot is down to memory.
Plus as stated in an earlier post we didn't have a large crew and times ashore was limited.
Vic
PS enjoy the stories Brian

[Captain Kong]

I still have my Overtime books, from the early 50s , which show all the ports and various jobs we did and extra comments on all the outstanding happenings and daft things we got up to just like a diary.
I never had any education, didn't learn to read and write until I was 11 years old at the end of the war, schools were closed in WW2 and then only as part timers when open, mornings one week and afternoons the next week. so it was easier to play hookey and go up on the moors to play up there, no one cared, then left school at 15, engineer apprentice for three months, sacked, Six months down the Coal Mine, never saw daylight. and three months in a cotton mill before going to sea., Then I was Happy, Loved it. the best life a lad could ever have, the best education a lad could ever have, and ended up with over 40 years at sea. Great life, some bad and sad times but a great life over all..
Cheers
Brian