Days as peggy

[Louis the fly]

Every morning at 0700 I would arrive at the storeroom with two cans which once contained peas or beans , the second steward would fill up one with dry tea and one with sugar ,also a tin of the very sweet condensed milk. That was it until the next morning , if it ran out during the night hard luck. I had another can with holes punched in the bottom and two holes at the top with twine passed through. I went around the showers looking for small pieces of soap , they went into the can and it was hung over the hot water tap in the messroom for washing the plates , knives , forks and spoons. After breakfast it was washing up , sweep and mop the messroom and alleyways , suggie any dirty marks off the bulkheads also clean the toilets , sinks and showers. When I had finished clearing up after dinner time I could turn to on deck for a couple of hours.
I can still remember some of the names from that first trip , the Skipper was Casey and the Bosun Collins , the cook was a black guy named Vic.
At night the AB's used to gather in the messroom and talk about the ships they had sailed on , the places they had been and all the funny things that had happened to them , my only ambition was to be one of them. The trip was four months , I didn't go back on that ship because I wanted to see all places the ABs had spoken of , now that I could call myself a seaman. Romney 1963.

[Stan Carter]

that certainly brings back a bunch of memories.....guess we had to start somewhere.
regards, stan

[Bill Cameron]

I was the seamen’s mess Peggy on the RFA Wave Ruler, I was an assistant steward, my duties were virtually the same as Louis did, this was in the 1960 Cod war off Iceland, we sailed round Iceland for 19 days a trip, refuelling the RN vessels up there, we were paid 10/- every day we carried out a RAS and we each got a tot of Pussers rum neaters of course. We refuelled various RV vessels from Frigates, Destroyers, the largest vessel we refuelled was HMS Apollo a pre war mine laying cruiser, she was enormous compared to us and could not reduce her speed because of the sea state, to below 15 knots, our max was 14 knots, some how our engineers got us up to the desired speed and we completed the RAS, I have never seen a ship disappear so quickly over the horizon as HMS Apollo, her max speed was over 30 knots.
We ended up in Leith dry docks for repairs we had loosened many rivets , the one good think from that trip was I first met the girl who became my wife.

[michael hooper]

my first ship was the Athlone castle there were eight peggies on board.i had the lowest job on the ship,i was the peggies peggy.longest six weeks of my then young life.happy days.

[Captain Kong]

MY FIRST VOYAGE TO SEA AS A DECK BOY. 1952..


Here is a story of my first trip to sea as a green Deck Boy, bullied by a bunch of bastards, almost driven to suicide by them and then I turned................
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............................... MY FIRST VOYAGE TO SEA AS A DECK BOY. 1952..
I had spent twelve weeks on the Training ship, VINDiCATRIX, in Sharpness, Gloucestershire. I signed on at the Pool in Canning Place in Liverpool and after six weeks of waiting I got the a ship, the Commodore Grant, ex Fort Grant. She was owned by a London Greek company, North East Freighters NEF of Montreal.
I joined the ship in Brocklebank Dock in Liverpool on 18 July 1952 where she had just finished discharging grain.
I signed on as Deck Boy on £10 a month for a voyage to India via Antwerp where we were to load bagged fertilizer for Madras.
I climbed the gangway with my gear and went amidships to find the Mate. The deck was littered with hatch boards, beams, wires and the Dockers wearing flat caps and long greasy overcoats puffing on Woodbines.
I found the Mate’s cabin on the port side and knocked on the door and walked in. There was the Mate, fastening his wife’s bra, “What the hell do you want”? he shouted as he tried to stand in front of his wife who was looking embarrassed.
“I am your new Deck Boy” I said, “Well Eff off down aft, I’m busy”.
So I Effed off down aft and found the mess room on the poop.
The deck crowd was in there, six ABs and three Ordinary Seamen with the Bosun. The most miserable bunch of bullying bastards I have ever had the misfortune to sail with. For fifty years I have searched every Bar and Whorehouse around the world looking for them to repay them for the misery and beatings that I experienced during that voyage but never saw one of them.
The accommodation was not good. On the poop was two mess rooms, one for the Sailors and one for the Lascar Firemen and two bathrooms , one each side.
Down below on the tween deck was three cabins for the Sailors and three for the Firemen. I was in a four berth cabin right next to the steam engine in the Steering Flat.
My job as Peggy was to clean the Bosun and Chippy`s mess and cabin amidships and the Sailors Mess Room, bathroom, alleyways and cabins down aft. Also I had to carry all the Sailors food from the galley amidships down aft to the Mess Room. Sometimes in heavy weather when a green sea came over the after deck and I was washed into the scuppers losing the kits of food I would get battered off the Sailors and when I went back to the galley another thumping off the big fat ugly Cook from Cardiff.
I also had pump up the water from the after peak to a tank on top of the mess room several times a day, The pump was a wooden handle on the bulkhead, I had to push it backwards and forwards for a long time to get the water up to the tank Then the Lascars would be using it for showers and running taps faster than I could pump it up and then the Sailors would batter me again because there was no water left. After all that I would have to work on Deck in the afternoons chipping and painting or greasing wires.
On Monday, 21 July we battened down the hatches and dropped the derricks, shifted all the dunnage off the decks and made ready for sea at noon.
We sailed light ship for Antwerp where we were to load 10,000 tons of bagged fertilizer for Madras and we were there for ten days loading.
I found Antwerp a fascinating place, my first foreign port with all the colourful lights and bars around Schipper Straat, or Skipper Street as it is better known.
In one bar a big sexy barmaid, Philomena took a fancy to me and I was on free ale all the time I was there. Some of the Sailors went into Skipper Street and paid ten shillings for a leg over, Expensive just for a few minutes.
When we had completed loading we battened down, dropped the derricks hosed down the decks and sailed at 2200 stowing ropes as we sailed down the River Scheldt.
I was on nine pennies an hour for overtime.
After a five day run at ten knots we passed Gibraltar and entered the Med and then an eight day run in beautiful weather to Port Said for the Suez Canal.
As we were mooring to the buoys in Port Said, I happened to swear at one of the ABs, Clarence. He battered me up and down the after deck accentuating with each smash of a big iron fist that I should not call him a bastard. I took a hint as in a situation like that I was a quick learner.
We loaded bunkers and fresh water, then loaded two Canal boats on deck. We hoisted up the Canal Searchlight over the bow and made it fast.
George Roby, the famous Bum Boat man came on deck and spread his wares on the hatch. I bought a music box for mother off him.
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Just after midnight we let go and joined the Southbound Convoy sailing through the Suez Canal.
After an interesting passage we past Port Tewfik and dropped off the
Two Canal Boats and the Searchlight into the water and sailed into the Red Sea.
The heat in the Red Sea was terrific and the Sailors and Lascars were using more and more water for showers and I was spending more and more time pumping up water for them, As soon as I had finished pumping up the water the Lascars would run it off and the Sailors would scream abuse at me in between thumps shouting `Get pumping you lazy bastard`
Five days later we were mooring up to the buoys in Aden to load bunkers again. We were soon surrounded by bum boats and a few cartons of ciggies were swopped for tea sets and music boxes.
Eight hours later we let go and the sailed round Steamer Point and towards the Indian Ocean.
We were in the South West Monsoon then with heavy seas sweeping over our decks. I lost a few meals trying to carry them from the galley amidships to the Mess room down aft. So I was hammered again by the deck crowd and the fat ugly Cook from Cardiff.
I got my own back on the Cook, he had a trumpet that he played very badly every day, the noise was diabolical. One day he turned in during the afternoon and left his Trumpet in the Galley. He had left his Trumpet in the Galley so I poured a load of chip fat into it and turned it round a few times and then when the lard set later it seized up all the valves.
When he went to play it that evening he was going demented, he was going to take a cleaver and kill the bastard who had done that.
Fortunately he never found out and the ship was a little quieter after that.
Eight days after leaving Aden astern we arrived in Colombo, Ceylon and moored up to buoys in the harbour to load bunkers.
Astern of us on the same buoy was the Cape Wrath, another old tramp that looked in a worse condition than we did.
The Sailors on the Cape Wrath shouted across to us that they had no cigarettes but had some cans of beer to do a swop with us.
Our Sailors got a wooden box made a lashing on it and put a few cartons of ciggies in and told me to swim over to the Cape Wrath.
The distance from our gangway to their gangway was a few hundred yards, I told them I couldn’t swim that far.
After being thumped a few times I decided that I was a fantastic swimmer and was over the side in no time at all.
It was a long hard swim across to the other ship dragging the wooden box, the water was quite choppy with the movement of ships and tugs in the harbour. The Sailors were jeering and cheering all the way.
When I got on board the Cape Wrath the Sailors were gasping for a ciggie, they had run out a week before. I had a beer with them, they told me they had been out for eighteen months and didn’t know when they were going to get home.
After hearing our Sailors screaming abuse across the water I put 18 cans of beer into the box and went back down the gangway and into the water again. It was a long hard swim to get back to the Commodore Grant. I was totally worn out when I got back on board.
I never got any beer, the Sailors drank the lot without offering me any. I must have been mad to have done it. When the Galley Boy dumped the garbage over the wall a big shark zoomed in along side to eat it.
We let go later that evening, sailed around Dondra Head and headed north into the Bay of Bengal. Two days later we tied up alongside the wharf in Madras, we were to be there for around ten days to discharge the bags of fertilizer.
Madras was hot stinking, sweaty and noisy. What a contrast to being at sea with the cool refreshing breeze and only the sound of the sea.
As soon as we were alongside the deck was swarming with hundreds of Indians shouting, screaming and stripping the hatches of tarps and throwing hatch boards and beams on deck and the clatter of the steam winches as they started discharging.
The deck was soon filthy with the spilt fertilizer and red betel juice spit all over. The Indians had no toilets and would just squat in the scuppers and crap filling the ship with their stink and millions of flies.
We had to keep the ports and doors locked or they would have stolen everything and made a stinking mess on the bathroom deck.
Every day the beggars would come down to the ship begging for food scraps, the saddest ones were the little kids who were like skeletons
pleading with squeaky voices, `No Mamma , No Poppa, dash me baksheesh.` I would give them any gash left over by the Sailors if they left any.
Dhobi Walla’s would come down and ask if they could do our dhobi.
The Sailors decided to hire one and made me in charge of him, I had to watch him all the time to make sure he didn’t steal anything.
He eventually did, stealing all the Sailors dungarees, shirts and our towels. We had to provide our towels in those days.
This resulted in me being beaten up again by all the Sailors.
On the first Saturday in Madras I heard there was a dance at the Anglo Indian Club in town. By the time I had scrubbed out both mess rooms and pumped up the water tank, showered and changed all hands were ashore and I went ashore on my own.
I didn’t know where this club was so I got a Rickshaw to take me. The rickshaw boy towed me around the City for a couple of hours and ended up at the gangway again saying he didn’t know where the club was. He was demanding 15 rupees, I only had a sub of 25 rupees and so I told him to get stuffed and gave him five and went to climb the gangway. He started to scream and grabbed my shirt and in an instant I was surrounded by a big crowd of screaming Indians.
I got a bit scared then so I gave him another ten and ran up the gangway. I thought what a lousy night out, first night ashore for over one month and it cost more than five days wages just to have a ride in a rickshaw.
On Sunday afternoon the galley boy, a lad called Keating from Wallasey, and I went to the beach a few hundred yards from the docks. It was a beautiful beach, completely deserted and stretch for miles with clean white sand and lined with palm trees, we spent a couple of happy hours swimming in the surf.
The following Saturday night there was another dance at the Anglo-Indian Club so this time I walked into the city and found it, no more rickshaws.
In the Club I saw an attractive young lady, I danced with her, she was the same age as I was and she told me her name was Elizabeth.
After the dance she took me over to the table where her mother was sitting and introduced me to her. Her mother, Mrs Thompson, was an Anglo-Indian and before she was widowed was married to a Liverpool man and they had lived there for many years before returning to Madras, where Mr Thompson had died. As I lived near to Liverpool they were quite interested and we got on quite well with each other.
At the end of a pleasant evening, dancing and talking, they invited me to dinner their home on Sunday evening.
They lived 30 minutes ride on a train south of Madras, so I finished work early and arrived at their house around 7pm.
They had a beautiful home built in Colonial style and surrounded by lush tropical gardens.
We had a fantastic dinner, waited on by Servants, it like something out of a movie for a young lad out of Bolton on his first trip.
Elizabeth introduced me to her brother, George, who was around 20 years old, he had been born in Liverpool and was easy to get along with.
All to soon the pleasant evening ended and I had to get the train back to Madras. Elizabeth and I wrote to each other for a while then it faded away and I never went back to Madras.
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42 years later, in June 1994, my elder brother Jim and I went to London to see the Liberty ship, JEREMIAH O`BRIEN that had sailed from San Francisco to London for the 50th Anniversary of D. Day. We had both sailed on Sam boats and so it brought us a few memories.
We stayed at the Merchant Navy Hotel in Lancaster Gate.
In the evening we went into the hotel bar which was empty except for one very attractive young barmaid. We got chatting to her and found that she was a Student from Liverpool who worked in the Hotel in her spare time.
I could see that she was part Indian and mentioned this to her. An incredible story unfolded. She told me her father was an Anglo-Indian who had lived in Madras for many years before returning to Liverpool where he got married.
I had a strange feeling, and said, “Is your name Thompson?”
She gasped in amazement. I told her that I knew a family by the name of Thompson who lived outside Madras and there was a pretty young girl called Elizabeth, way back in 1952.
I described the house and location and her brother George.
The barmaid confirmed that was right, George was indeed her father and incredibly Elizabeth still lived in the house, she had never married. I wondered if she was still waiting for me.
The barmaid had been to the house many times on holiday to stay with her aunt Elizabeth.
My brother, Jim, could not believe it, an incredible story, of all the Gin Joints in all the world we had to choose this one.
We went into the bar on the next two nights but she was not there, another barmaid had taken over. It was amazing to have found her that night.
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Meanwhile back in 1952 in Madras, we completed discharging, battened down the hatches and dropped the derricks, hosed down the decks to clear the filth away.
Then a little Indian fellow turned up, he was a tattooist, and said he would tattoo all hands if we would stow him away and take him to Vizagapatam a couple of hundred miles up the coast. After he had tattooed us all we stowed him down the dunnage hatch with a load of burlap bags to sleep on. I had to feed him now and again.
Two days later we docked in Vizagapatam where he disappeared into the jungle of a million shanties.
Vizagapatam was just a stinking port, the town just consisted of filthy hovels and shanties and what seemed to be millions of Indians screaming “Baksheesh, Baksheesh.”
I only walked ashore once and that was enough. No one went ashore there.
We were her for seven days to load Manganese ore for Birkenhead, great we were homeward bound.
We completed loading and battened down again ready for sailing, dropped and secured the derricks and then hosed down the to get rid of the ore dust then let go and sailed south down the Bay of Bengal.
Four days later we moored to the buoys again in Colombo Harbour for bunkers. I bought 12 pounds of Broken Orange Peko Tea for mother back home. Tea was still rationed in those days.
Eight hours later we let go and sailed into the Indian Ocean bound for Aden eight days away.
On the voyage across the Sailors were getting a bit bored so for entertainment they would beat me up on Number five hatch every evening, they all thought it was funny, I was only a skinny kid and had no chance against the big Abs.
Some nights I was so fed up with it all I would climb over the rails lean out, count up to ten and when I got to ten I would let go and end it all.
It looked very tempting, looking into the dark water which was lit up with swirling patterns of phosphorous. In the end I would climb back inboard. Those bastards were driving me to suicide, but I put a stop to it when we were berthing in Aden.
As we were approaching the buoys in Aden one morning a big fat AB called Mush, started to knock me about the after deck.
By this time I had had enough, I had nothing to lose now and so went berserk. I smashed him several times in the face with my fists, bursting his nose and lips. I got him by the rails and heaved him over, I don’t know where I got the strength from.
He was clinging to the bottom rail on the outboard side hanging over the propeller, screaming for help while I was stamping on his fingers to make him let go, then I got the chain stopper and started to lash him with it, I just wanted to kill the bastard.
The Second Mate and one of the other Abs dragged me away from the trails and pulled Mush back inboard. He had to go below to his bunk to recover. He was a quiet man for the rest of the voyage after that and all the Sailors treated me with a bit of respect. I should have done that earlier in the voyage, I felt ten feet tall.
Any whinging off the Sailors after that I would just snarl at them. Some of them even helped me to pump up the water and occasionally washed the dishes in the mess after the evening meal.
I was never beaten again in all my years of seafaring.
After leaving Aden we steamed up the Red Sea to arrive in Suez Bay and then anchored to await our turn in the next convoy.
The sight there is something we will never see again, the bay was full of dozens of British ships, Union Castle, P&O, Orient, Blue Star, Blue Funnel, Federal, Clan, Shaw Savills, Port line, troop ships and so on.
Later in the morning it was our turn and we heaved up the anchor and followed the convoy into the Canal. A couple of hours later we anchored in the Great Bitter Lake and the convoy anchored again while the South bound convoy slowly steamed past. We were there for a few hours and so we had time to leap over the wall to swim in the warm turquoise waters of the lake. It was very refreshing as the heat was terrific. Once the South bound convoy was clear we heaved away and sailed on towards Port Said.
Next morning as we steamed between the lines of ships at Port Said, we lowered the two Canal boats into the water and dropped off the searchlight, the Agents boat came out with mail and papers.
We sailed past the statue of Ferdinand de Lesseps and out of the breakwater dropping off the Canal Pilot and into the Mediterranean.
We didn’t load any fresh water there so water was rationed. The Mate had a padlock on the pump and water was only allowed to be pumped for one hour in the morning and one in the evening, that suited me fine, save quite a bit of work.
The voyage to Birkenhead took 14 days along the Mediterranean and up the Atlantic coast. We picked up the Pilot at Point Lynus off Anglesey and on a cold grey Friday morning at the end of October and docked at the East Float in Birkenhead docks.
What a contrast Merseyside was with its forty shades of grey compared with the bright colours of the tropics, still it was good to be back.
The following day Saturday the Liverpool fellows and I went home for the weekend except the two Southampton Abs, when I got back on Monday morning the two of them had used every plate and piece of cutlery in the mess, they had not washed their own dishes, saving it all for me when I came back. Mush started to shout abuse again for not staying on board to look after them but when I threatened to throw him over the wall again he shut up.
We stayed in Birkenhead for ten days discharging the Manganese ore then we were to take her to Glasgow dry dock. I thought the breakers would have been more suitable.
On a cold wet windy day we sailed light ship, We cleared the Mersey Bar dropped the Pilot off and headed north into a screaming northerly gale which turned into a hurricane force 12. The ship being light was bouncing and rolling her guts out, after two days and nights we were off the North Wales coast making no headway. Eventually the gale eased and we crept up the coast to Glasgow four days out from Birkenhead. We entered the dry dock at 6 am and were paid of by 11am.
I paid off with £8 and a train ticket home, not bad for four months hard labour. I packed my bags and went down the gangway for the last time and into the taxi for Glasgow Station, I looked at the Commodore Grant for the last time as we moved away, lying in the dry dock, rusty and battered looking, I never saw her again, thank God.

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Hope you enjoyed it.
Cheers
Brian.

[Trampshipman]

Apologies. .....Incorrect info`.

[happy daze john in oz]

Not all Peggies had it bad.
Remember the PO Peggy on the Windsor, small dinning room but he had a great time and was well paid in tips at the voyage end.
Easy job for him and he did it for years.

[Louis the fly]

Starting sea life as a peggy was a good way to learn and gain experience. The training schools were a waste of time , instructors who had not been at sea for donkey years , you came out just as ignorant as when you went in. The only thing you found was whether you could handle being away from home and family.
As a peggy you learnt how important hygiene and cleanliness was , how to live in a confined space with people who once were strangers , how to respect your fellow crewmates and their belongings , never to walk into a cabin without knocking even if the door is open , when to speak and when to listen. These and many more aspects of shipboard life were the groundworks of a happy and successful life at sea. When you came home you were a far better person than when you left.

[Stan Carter]

#8, amen to that....
regards, stan

[john middleton]

Wonderful account, I was a galley boy on my first trip around the
same time 1951 away for 9 months of a scheduled 4 months
would have paid off if the trip had not been held up by the N.Z.
dock strike. Did the full trip and stayed 11 years, progressing to a 1/c
waiter, last trip the maiden voyage of the Oriana 1960.