Montreal's silver cane

[John Arton]

Re #17. I sailed with Bill Williams on the empress of Canada, I was a lowly 5th mate and he bollocked me for being improperly dressed one day, I was just crossing the alleyway outside my cabin to go to the bathroom opposite for a piss and was not wearing my uniform jacket, hence the bollocking.
I later sailed with him when I was 3rd mate with him on a VLCC, he was a completely different person, very friendly and approachable. My main duty was when berthing at a loading or discharge terminal was to ensure that when he went out on the bridge wing with the pilot he put his cigarette out before leaving the wheelhouse, he was a 200 a day senior service cigarette smoker and was rarely seen without one in his hand.
Dave Greenhalgh was chief officer on the Canada when I was on it and always remember going onto the bridge at midnight to start my watch, he was on the bridge writing up his night orders for the deck watches (not they took a blind bit of notice of them, just followed the bosun's mate instructions) when the master at arm's came panting onto the bridge saying " chief officer, come quickly, there's a passenger attempting to murder another". The chief officer just said , I'm off to bed now, you deal with it 5th mate.
So off I went with the M.A to deal with it, the end result being that one passenger ended up being locked up in the padded cell for the rest of the voyage before being taken off in Quebec under guard and flown back under guard to the U.K.
Dave Greenhalgh later went onto work in personnel for C.P when they opened an office in the isle of man.
I also did a number of trips as third mate on the C.P. Ambassador, the last one in 73? When we abandoned ship when the engine room flooded, having been on it a number of times going back to when I was cadet on her when she was lengthened and converted to a fully cellular container ship, t
Built as the Beaveroak but renamed C.P Ambassador upon conversion.
Rgds
J.A.

[j.sabourn]

#21 John is that the same Bill Williams who used to be on site years ago ? Think if remember correctly he finished up with someonelike World Wide or Kaiser Williams if that is correct name . He had an extra masters. JS

[John Arton]

#21 John is that the same Bill Williams who used to be on site years ago ? Think if remember correctly he finished up with someonelike World Wide or Kaiser Williams if that is correct name . He had an extra masters. JS

JS
No a completely different person, bill Williams (tit willy) was a empress boat captain who had only ever worked for Canadian Pacific
Rgds
J.A