Singularity

[Robert George Young]

Dad was on this ship for over two years in mid sixties.
Would that be normal or not so?

Thank you
Bob

[John Pruden]

robert you sign articals for 3 years well you did them days one of my brothers was away 27 months supposed to be a six week trip?jp

[Doc Vernon]

With UCL we signed on for 2 Year Articles. But as said there were many that did such long Trips! Not me though !!!

[j.sabourn]

#1. George in general on British foreign going ships I am not sure about home trade articles, there were 2 types
1 the old 2 year articles which had to be broken on the vessels return to the UK or a continental port within home trade limits. 2. The 6 months running Agreement was also in existence where every 6 months those articles had to be renewed. On those articles being closed all agreements the seaman had signed for ceased and he was free to go. Your father at the most could of been retained for 2 years and was then up to himself if he wanted to stay if asked. But he would be on another set of articles. 1966 is like yesterday to a lot of us. The Chippy who was on the Pennyworth a bloke called Ken Coulthard from Middlesborough had been on the ship 3 years , that was 6 sets of Running Agreement Articles. Think he only left when they made his job redundant a number of years later when they used the AB/ handyman with less money attached. This was after the seaman’s strike in 1966 when a lot of good seamen left or were pushed out of jobs they had done for years. That particular strike different people have different views on it , but it was to me one of the biggest misdemeanours ever acted to a seaman’s disadvantahge it was one step forward and 3 steps back. And the start of what one sees today. JS

[j hardy]

my dad was 12 years on one of stevies "silver banders" the Murdoch, cook steward. different coastal on the colliers i presume.

[Captain Kong]

In the 50s Home Trade ships signed 6 Month Articles,
I did 7 months on the AMITY =same as Singularity, so two Discharges.

Foreign Going Articles were 2 Years, with an extra 3 months if ship was loading for UK

[j.sabourn]

#6... Brian I flew out to Philadelphia to join a Bahamas registered ship. The 2 years British Articles had expired in Japan and ship was loading for the Eastern Seaboard of the USA , all the midships crowd were European and was stipulated in the new agreement they would take the ship back to the USA and be flown home from there on completion of discharge. This is probably where the 3 months comes in, but it was all done by mutual agreement. No matter what flag ship I joined however and whatever Articles were signed I always stipulated 12 months maxinum for myself , I did sometimes go over as was a necessity sometimes. The ship I joined in Philly for example I was there for 13 months. When I did join and all the others had left, they were replaced by Indians. The Chinese later in the trip were replaced by Indians in Japan, that was not so easy a changeover as the Chinese were only fairly new into their contract and went into a sit down strike and would not leave the vessel until properly compensated by the Owner another Indian. The ship was the Maratha Endeavour a good ship when not messed up by shore interference. Cheers JS

[Colin Wood]

My memory is not the best now, but I thought that 2 year articles could be extended if you had cargo on board for UK or home trade limits. There is the ,probably apocryphal, story of the Bank Line having a case marked London being loaded on their ships after about 1 year 11 months.

[j.sabourn]

Your probably right Colin but in the the case quoted the ship was not going back to the uk. I wasn’t on her in Japan when the articles expired , maybe the master just inserted in them himself the Agreement . This was in any case not a uk ship by any means Bahamas registry or not. There was no dispute on board and all were happy to do the 2 years and 3 months. It suited most of their own Requirements .They were mostly unmarried , and one of them was getting divorced and the over 2 years away suited him financially as then got a poor mans divorce on the grounds of being separated so long. The master that was there a long time dead now, had never touched the uk for 6 years, he retired in a house he bought in Malta. Those sort of seamen don’t exist anymore , they get home sick and want to go home every 6 weeks or so , or pack the job in. I reckon out of the nearly 50 years I had in, I was home for maybe a total of 10 years , so was at sea maybe 40 years , been ashore now 19 years so really have lived ashore since 16 for about 29 years , so as to shore mindedness I’m only 30 so still have a lot to do. Only hope the body holds out. Cheers JS

PS Another ship I have posted on the Sun Princess had both British and Liberian Articles , I never read the Liberian ones joined and signed as was immaterial as signed a contract with company as to what the salary was, as suppose today that is the General way things go also. This signing off and on in front of a shippping master finished a long time ago and never saw one after 1966. Cheers JS

[j.sabourn]

Talking in general about ships opens up the memory banks and have suddenly remembered in the forgotten past an incident that I had put out of my mind long ago , but shows how seamen live in a world of their own. Here in Australia for the 11 years I worked on Australian manned ships I was on one ship forget which one but was probably a seismic ship as carried a Cook. I was in the galley one time talking to him and noticed he had all his knives out in their home made canvas hold all and stencilled on it was m.v. Pennyworth my first permanent job as mate with Dalgliesh in 1963, this opened up a whole new world of reminiscing. Jump 5 or 6 years and was master on a survey ship working out of Sydney doing a sea bottom survey between Bondi beach and Auckland. The cook I had was the son of the cook off the Pennyworth , so lines of communication were reopened . To cut a long story short the younger man had strife as his Russian wife was taking him to the cleaners and if he didn’t get back to Fremantle to answer charges in a magistrates court he was going to be bankrupt. The father got in touch with me and put me in the picture and asked if I could help his son , which I was only too pleased to do. I wrote to the magistrate and explained the circumstances how it was not possible to attend his court, and giving the boy a glowing report on his behaviour and how gentle a person he was . The case was put back and when finally got to court it was shown that the lady in question had married him to get into the country and then decided to fleece him into the bargain , Think she went to gaol and then deported or maybe that was wishful thinking. Life at sea was full of incidents , some worked out , others didn’t. But in most seamen were always at a disadvantage usually. JS.