Holy stone

[Louis the Amigo]

Hi shipmates, Lime juice in tenants larger on the poop deck, watching the wake far from land , priceless ... young and fit with no worries seems like a dream today...

[cappy]

Hi shipmates, Lime juice in tenants larger on the poop deck, watching the wake far from land , priceless ... young and fit with no worries seems like a dream today...

#####dont be greedy you will get a lager not a bleedin larger .....which is were cappy is going now to his regular tues meet with the old portline engineer who no doubt will go on about his kiwi love who is now if still hear91 ...and he gets ratty when i saythis to him ....regards cappy

[Captain Kong]

I always enjoyed the Holystone, On the Cunard and CPR Empresses in the 50s, the 12 - 4 watch washed down the boat and prom decks and squeegeed, Then the 4-8 watch would holystone a different stretch every day across the western.,
We always had a good crowd of commedians and we all sang doing the stoning, good excersize.

The worst one was on the GEORGIC in 1955 when we were bringing back the French Foreign Legion from Viet Nam.
The Mu slims had the Starboard side Prom deck to themselves and slaughtered sheep when they had their `services`, every day. When they cut the sheeps throat the blood went everywhere, and soaked deep into the wooden deck.
We scrubbed and holystoned but made no difference, the huge stains stayed there.
Happy days.
Brian.

[happy daze john in oz]

I











Interesting post, most of the modern cruise ships have a wooden deck on the promonade deck. All good timber with bitcamen or other substance between each piece but have only ever seen it washed down, no stones used.

[Ivan Cloherty]

I










Interesting post, most of the modern cruise ships have a wooden deck on the promonade deck. All good timber with bitcamen or other substance between each piece but have only ever seen it washed down, no stones used.

Deck probably much higher above sea level than on the old liners and certainly cargo ships, so would probably not experience the green seas that we did, and the wood treatments now before installing are numerous and wonderous John, some timbers being immersed in chemicals for 3/6 months before being used.

[Captain Kong]

A lot of the new cruise ships have artificial wood, like plastic,,and the caulking looks as tho` it has been painted on. Holystoning would wear it out in no time, So they just wash down every am 4-8
Two years ago I was on the old Queen Mary in Long Beach, they had a team of men caulking the teak decks on the after decks the original way.
The teak decks on her are over an inch and a half thick. They could not afford to do it today.
Here is a piece of it, It was presented to me by the Queen Mary Foundation on the 70 anniversary of her launch for some work I did for them.
Cheers
Brian

[Richard Quartermaine]

Re 34
Bunkering at Aden in February 1950 on the Port Saint John there was also a french troop ship en route to (or from) "Indo Chine". It was daybreak and the hot dry heat was stifling. On the upper there were about twenty or so soldiers in full kit running around under the supervision of some officers.
Richard

[John Arton]

Re 34
Bunkering at Aden in February 1950 on the Port Saint John there was also a french troop ship en route to (or from) "Indo Chine". It was daybreak and the hot dry heat was stifling. On the upper there were about twenty or so soldiers in full kit running around under the supervision of some officers.
Richard

Richard
Saw something similar on a US Navy ship in Naples. Every morning the whole crew were assembled on the deck and went through an hour or so of physical exercises such as press up, star jumps etc. and then they all did laps of the deck, she was a helicopter landing ship so had a big open top deck.
Guys who had been naughty the day before or late on watch or whatever had to do extra laps. There was one day where after all crew had completed their exercises and laps there was one poor guy left doing laps for hours afterwards. Every so often someone would appear on deck and shout at him to keep going. It was well after midday before he was allowed to stop.
Often wonder what sort of misdemeanour this guy had done to deserve such punishment.
rgds
JA

[Richard Quartermaine]

It's times like those John that Merchant Navy life was a cabaret. I never got closer to South America than sailing along the coast to Curacao but I was told that in BA if you were put in the cells overnight, next morning you wore a yellow garment of some sort and swept the streets. If so, I imagine the next stage would be to get logged!
Regards,
Richard

---------- Post added at 05:02 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:36 PM ----------

Lime juice bloody terrible but on the D/Bedford we were given liquid quinine that's was a lot worse then they brought out in tablet form atropine (I might have misspelt ) they say to much of that turned your skin yellow maybe some of you guys could would know about that ???

Lou, atropine is right. It is formulated from deadly nightshade. When I got malaria in 1948 I was given quinine and the yellow tablets atabrine which is related to quinine. It also turned the skin (and whites of your eyes) yellow and going to Blighty I used to get a tan that combined with the atabrine to 'hopefully' turn on the girls. Over 7 years of the occasional sweats and the shivers gradually ceased.
Cheers, Richard

[j.sabourn]

#39... John probably had one of his many medals in the wrong order of ascendancy. With probably his left shoe lace the wrong length. JS

- - - Updated - - -

#40... Richard if you were lucky the skipper would be on the same work party. You getting back to the ship at same time and his hands were tied. He would wait and get you some other time. Cheers JS