A Crawford & Co

[Ivan Cloherty]

ref7, now that looks like a proper ship, brings a tear to the eye when i see various supposedly ships coming down the Solent. kt

Yep we worked on proper ships even though some were proper workhouses with anything of up to 24/30 sticks and tween decks and all the associated gear and the tween decks were a domino nightmare

[Keith Tindell]

Real ships indeed, my first couple of ships had timber hatch board hatches, steel beams etc, they certainly kept us fit, and then the tarps and wedges etc afterwards. Later came the doddle of Mc Gregor hatches. Then all the sticks to be lowered, before being readied for sea, lovely memories. kt

[Des Taff Jenkins]

HI Keith
You should have been on Union Steam always kept the sticks flying at sea, easy peasy when cluing up to sail.
Des

[John Arton]

The beaverfir, I was 2nd trip cadet on her, was a 4 hatch small general cargo ship, MacGregor hatch covers and tween deck covers of steel beams and wooden hatch boards.
Battening down on departure from Vic docks, the rather hung over deck crew managed to drop one of the Derrick's turning into a banana shape. Next port was Antwerp where the deck crowds first job was to unship the Derrick and land it so it could go to be repaired and returned prior to sailing. Once the job was done as per normal, the whole deck crowd went across the road to Erma's bar, leaving just myself and a first trip j.o.s to close the hatches at 01:00 when the stevedores knocked off. To close the Macgregor covers you had to top one of the hatch Derrick's up to almost vertical in order to get sufficient length of pull on the cargo runner, which you attached to the hatch closing pull wire, to fully close the hatch. Each Derrick had its own dolly winch attached to it's topping lift, the dolly winch being driven by its own wire that you turned up on the warping end of the cargo runners winch.
Myself and the j.o.s had managed to close all bar one of the covers and were in the process of topping the last Derrick when disaster struck . I was driving the winch and the j.o.s tending the dolly winch wire when he allowed riding turns to develop on the winch barrel end, for some unknown reason the j.o.s had lifted the bar on the dolly winch's ratchet wheel. The riding turn snapped the dolly winch wire and the Derrick came crashing down on the offshore bulwark, giving it a nice banana shape. Eventually got the hatches closed then off to Erma's to wake the bosun up to let him know that there was another Derrick to go ashore for repair.
Bosun, myself and j.o.s plus one a.b got the Derrick ashore before the stevedores started for the day and the repair yard had them both away and returned, repaired and tested by close of play. Overnight the deck crowd re rigged both Derrick's.
Rgds
J.A

[Des Taff Jenkins]

HI John.
The only time I saw a derrick drop was on the Trevose, we were going up the river to Adelaide topping the derrick's when this Maltese AB yelled out, he was going up hanging onto the topping lift wire, he crashed down onto the mast house, the derrick crashed onto the ladder to the midships, the Ab had put the stopping chain the wrong way around, the derrick passed a test and was OK, the AB didn't pass the embarrassment test.
Des

[Colin Wood]

On the Pacific Reliance working cargo in LA southbound, just after the evening meal the stevedores decided to either top or lower derrick at NO 4 hatch I was on deck with 3rd Mate who told me to go and tell Mate.
Mate was in smoke room with nearly all other officers watching tv. I told mate that hey had dropped a derrick at No 4 when the old man's voice said, 'we don't drop derricks on this ship cadet, we lower them.' to which I replied, well they definitely dropped this one. Nearly got trampled as Captain took off to check damage to 'his' ship

[John Arton]

Sorry for wandering off from the original topic of this thread but as a follow up to my #14.
The next voyage on the Beaverfir, again in Antwerp, that j.o.s attempted to commit suicide by jumping into the river while we're alongside. This happened just as we preparing to sail for Canada, he was prevented by a motorman who grabbed hold of him just as he was about to jump. The j.o.s went mad kicking and screaming and threatening to throw himself overboard when we were at sea. An ambulance was called by the agent but the j.o.s would only get in it if the chief steward came with him. It was agreed that the chief steward would go but jump out once the taxi cleared the quay which he did but as the ambulance drove away you could see the ambulance man struggling with the j.o.s.
When we got back to London at the end of the voyage, we asked how the j.o.s was getting on and was he home. The family knew nothing about him being hospilised in Antwerp and when we contacted the agent in Antwerp for an update he was unable to find any trace of him in any hospital, nor could he find any trace of the ambulance sent to the ship.
All very strange, it was almost like the lad had disappeared off the face of the earth. Don't think anyone got the truth about what happened to the lad.
Rgds
J.A

[Keith Tindell]

Reminds me of the long sea voyages, we always stowed all ropes below, and at sea we often stripped all the Derrick gear, greased and rerigged , and particular for the shore gangs in OZ, checked all the running gear , slightest sign of the wire needling, and the whimps refused to work.kt

[Ivan Cloherty]

and particular for the shore gangs in OZ, kt

Don't get me started, never met such a bunch of workshy people in my life, any excuse to stop work being enacted, never mind wires and other running gear, it was either too hot, or too cold, or too wet, or wrong flag, wrong crew. wrong shape, you name it, they'd use it

[j.sabourn]

Probably nothing much has changed Ivan. The stevedores of the era you mention we all encountered , they were typically labelled communist agitators . A term I disagree with , as they wouldn’t have lasted 5 minutes in a communist country , as they had to work to survive. They were mostly malcontents and as you say work shy , the communist bit was inept to its true meaning and fitted in with the various governments of the times. I for one fail to see a trade union serving in Russia or China, if they do have will be in name only. Cheers JS