lightermen

[Tony Taylor]

had two great uncles .....both drowned at different times at dunston on the tyne,,,,,my gran would always say to me keep away from dunston ......and i must say i never liked that place on a collier i was on all hands paid off at dunston believe she was going to the breakers and i didnt like that place one bit...and that was when i was a young man .....

Dunston Staithes are now listed, doesn't stop arsonists from trying to burn it down occasionally and huge beams falling off from time to time. I actually hit one in my little 22 footer back in the nineties, running up river at dusk after a day out fishing; fortunately my boat was steel built with a large dia steel round bar for the stem and heavy steel skeg so we rode right over the top, Tupperware or wood built would have disintegrated.

[cappy]

one of the drowned fell in on boxing day .....festivities perhaps ......one drowned boarding a vessel called the malabar...this of course in the early 1900sthe brothers all sailed except one but all helped with planting mainly tatties and veg on the croft my gramp among them ....and seabirds eggs stored for the winter in shetland..the great grandfather was a american who jumped a sailing vessel here and ended up in old age weaving he came from maine in the usa

[j.sabourn]

#12 Didn’t they hold a flower show or something similar there in the 80”s. Remember taken the wife and the mother in law in her wheelchair there , she didn’t trust me , the mother in-law that is , and wouldn’t have me push her anywhere near the edge of the quay, or on any slope , and there were quite a few leading down to the River. As though I would do such a thing. JS

[j.sabourn]

#13.. It’s a fact of life Cappy people who work around Shipping especially on waterways and the sea will have its quota of deaths . I was comparatively lucky as apart from the first natural death at 16. Did not witness any more until about 1978 when a Japanese stevedore fell to his death down the hold. I missed 3 more deaths of people I knew just by days so to speak one was an AB falling off a gangway, a good friend of mine drowned in the North Sea, and another one who some may know Murdo McLeod , there are quite a few with the same name from the same place Stornaway , who was drowned in Dundee . I was away from the ship at the time doing trials for the MOD in the Bristol Channel . These are the ones as individuals that spring to mind. The 167 that died at the Piper Alpha was a totally different experience that I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. Deaths in shipping do happen the same as elsewhere but they are always a sad time. Anyhow there is none of us immortal. I think I would rather have a send off at a wake rather than a church , and people dancing on the bartop. Cheers JS

[Tony Taylor]

#12 Didn’t they hold a flower show or something similar there in the 80”s. Remember taken the wife and the mother in law in her wheelchair there , she didn’t trust me , the mother in-law that is , and wouldn’t have me push her anywhere near the edge of the quay, or on any slope , and there were quite a few leading down to the River. As though I would do such a thing. JS

Yes, it was a huge success, held on reclaimed land formerly a coke works, all houses on there now with house on the riverside also.

[Keith at Tregenna]

Thanks for the info Tony.

Interesting.

K.

[Des Taff Jenkins]

One of the more nastiest, avoidable accidents I saw at sea was in Tauranga in NZ, the wharfies where lowering a big sling of timber down the holds when the whistle went for the dinner break, the blokes on the winches raced the load down, and as there was no one to guide it, it landed on the edge of a piece of timber that shot across the hold and killed this Maori bloke outright.
Another nasty one was in Galveston when the heel block on a derrick came away and took this Negro winch drivers head off, they had overloaded the sling and it ripped the whole block away from the mast house bulkhead.
Des

[George Bis]

In the 1970's with Sugar Line we used at times transship sugar into lighters at Sammy Williams wharf on the London river

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One hand for yourself, another for the ship wasn't idle speach It was the difference between life and death

[j.sabourn]

Going back a bit further George, have recollections of taken sugar to Purfleet, near Grays , on the Thames anywhere in that area ? JS