Hullo Old Home

Empress Of Britain

Tommy appeared on deck next morning wearing a pair of sunglasses; seamen ,never, ever wore them, they were thought effeminate or poseurish . Tommy had to wear them though ,one side of his face looked like summer pudding.
The story of the previous nights to do I learned, second hand, Tommy was tight lipped about it , But something like this occurred????????.Neil invited Tommy to his cabin to have a few scoops, all went well until they got to talking about the fight game. They had downed quite a few cans and Tommy was well relaxed, talk then turned to their own abilities, what was said no one knows, but in Toms words Neil got up to do some refills while he lay back on the coach/divan. Next thing he knows is that a haymaker come crashing into the side of his face ,totally surprising him. What happened then is a matter of conjecture. Neil was locked up in the brig and that is how things remained until we got home.
Our last port of call was Lisbon, I had to go ashore there ,if only to visit the places that had been so hospitable to me when I was a DBS.
We tied up right in the town, just before the Plaza Comercio, you could almost touch the bars from the ship. We were there for just 24 hours ,and what a 24 hours that turned out to be. It was the start of Mardi Gras. Portugal was still a catholic dictatorship then ,Salazar had been in power since the 1930?s and still held the country in an iron grip ,so Mardi Gras was a welcome few days for everyone ,rich or poor. They had a carnivale in the truest sense of the word.
I had heard about Brazils? fabulous carnivals, Lisbon had no Samba schools ,but she knew how to party nevertheless. When we went ashore at about 8.0?clock the bars were fairly quiet ,I met a couple of barmen who treated me well just two years ago, there were a couple of girls who remembered me too. One of them asked me why I was?nt masked. I did?nt understand the question , she then explained about Mardi Gras, husbands and wives would wear masques and masquerade .I must have looked puzzled ,she then told me the masquerade allowed husbands and wives to dally with other partners ,just for one night. The lads with me were excited as hell, ?When does all this happen then?? one of them asked ?tonight ,later? was all she said. It would be about midnight when the carnivale kicked off, a conga line came snaking into the bar, there were smartly dressed men and women sashaying round the tables ,all of them wearing masques, not the ones you buy in a joke shop but ones that were made by craftsmen . They were like miniature beaded curtains, strung across the forehead the beads hung down over their eyes and nose so that they hid the faces. They were all the colours of the rainbow and some were exquisite. Some ladies had black diamente and had such air of sexual mystery. The conga line broke up as the men and women sought fresh partners from the tables. I saw such scenes of sexual activity that had me almost speechless. Some of our lads were taken where they sat as these ladies straddled them , one of our lads had two women take him. It was unbelievable, the professionals were at it too, the men, presumably the ladies husbands, were making love too. And all the while the barmen kept serving, they had seen it all before. I tried to imagine a similar thing happening in the Queens Head, but my imagination could?nt stretch that far.
Next morning we left Lisbon ,the streets littered with last night streamers, it would be decades before I walked those pavements again.
The Empress of Britains living quarters for us sailors were quite basic, it was 8 to a cabin and no port holes either, I found that a bit claustrophobic at first , it was very fuggy, you can imagine the amount of gas 8 bodies can generate, you could almost slice the air in there. I don?t know whether I got my sore throat from the lack of fresh in that cabin, but it did?nt help it. On the morning we were due to dock in Liverpool I went along to see the ships doctor, he gave me the once over and then examined my throat. By this time we were anchored off the Pier Head awaiting o go alongside the passenger terminal. The doctor told me he would have to discharge me and he called someone on the ships phone , after he had finished chatting he told me to go and see the purser, he would pay me off and arrange for my signing off . I went along to the purser,he had my money ready and waiting;it was then off to see the Bosun to show him my discharge and then it was off to pack my gear and then go ashore in the launch. They were not letting me stay for docking at the Pier Head. I went to the cabin and put my money in my coat. I was the only one in the cabin , I was the only one in the accommodation! I went and cleaned myself up and then went back to the cabin to change into my shore gear. It was when I putting my jacket on that I noticed something was amiss, my wallet, my wallet was missing. I searched everywhere it could have been ,nothing. I then ran to the Bosun and he sent a couple of lads with me to see if they could find it . They emptied my case, went through my pockets, there was nothing ,zero. I was shattered. The robber had struck again. Word soon got round and the whole crew had a whip round, I was overwhelmed when they brought it to me, there was more there than I could possibly have earned in a month. As I was leaving ,Big Georgie Macklin , him off the ship I came home DBS on , shouted, ?Eeze always doin? that, e? was the same on the Patrician? Even I had to laugh.
I found out why my services were terminated , the company was afraid I might infect the passengers, still it got me home earlier than expected.

I went back to the Pool 14 days later, I?ve drawn a veil over my leave ,nothing was changing.
Charlie Repp gave me another banana boat , I did?nt care how long the trip would be ,the longer the better as far as I was concerned..
The Chirripo was her name ,I had sailed on one of her sisters ,the Chuscal and had an aborted voyage on the Chicanoa, if I had stayed on her I would?nt have been in the pickle I was now in. Unfortunately I was not gifted with foresight and could not have foreseen what was happening to us.
Our voyage was to be the same as the one on the Chuscal, to Tiko in the Cameroons, there was no heavy mauling to do , just clean up the detritus of her previous load and then, as soon as we hit warmer weather, start repainting her. We were like Hollywood sailors, suntan oil and a comb were our essential tools for this job, no overhauling of heavy lift gear, no splicing ,we could have been casual labourers, excepting for watch duties. My cabin mate on this trip was a kid called George, I can?t remember his surname; he was about my age and size ,and ,like me ,was newly married.
We got on like a house on fire and used to spend a lot of time musing over married life, I was envious of him , he had married the girl of his dreams and they were looking forward to their first child. George was also an organiser and it was not long before he organised a sweep, I seem to remember it was for the Grand National, we would know who was the winner on the way home.
We had a trouble free run to Tiko, the ship was sparkling and we could take things easy day for a day or two. Some of the deck crowd were regular runners on this ship and knew a lot of the shore gang , They had played the locals football in the past and ,as the following day was Saturday, had organised another game of footie for tomorrow. We had all the gear, and come Saturday afternoon the crowd of us were sat on the little train chugging through the plantation .
Some of the local team were at the other end of the line waiting to take us to the pitch. There was quite a lot of spectators waiting at the pitch , we got ready ,and went out to play the game. They were far too good for us, barefooted , they were not afraid to tackle us and we had the old leather boots on. George was our goalie and let in more goals than was reasonable, they were just to quick. He dived to save a ball and slightly misjudged things and crashed into the metal goalpost , hurting his knee and thigh. He could have been a professional the way he rolled in agony. After a humiliating defeat, the boys from the home team invited us all for a cold beer at their local. The atmosphere was great, the juke box had a lot of Hi life records and the music was just right, tinny horns and a deep bass beat, very infectious music ,you could?nt stop your feet moving to the music. George was?nt enjoying things much, he was still rubbing his leg and grimacing. We mocked him ,telling him that we were losing before he hurt his leg and not to go blaming the result on it. I don?t know how long we had been in the bar when this small tallyman came over to me. ?Your fren? is very hurt, he must see doctor? We just laughed and told him that George was playing the old soldier, ?Eeze very bad ,no joke? Some one said ?If he?s that bad ,why don?t you take him to the doctor!? The little tallyman went over to George and gave him a piggy .back, he looked so incongruous, a huge whiteman being carried by someone near half his size.
We finished off in the bar an hour or so later and the captain of the shore team asked me if I would like to go to his home for some dinner. He lived in a conical straw hut and ,just in front of it was a fire ,there was a lady standing by it and a couple of little black cherubs playing nearby. This was home,and it was very welcoming, I was invited to squat on the ground just inside the hut and my new friend sat squatted opposite me. His wife brought two cold beers, which had been in a bucket, as we were supping the chilled nectar his wife pulled some big earthen balls from the fire. She brushed off the ashes and ,with a machete, cleaved open the balls inside of which was a perfectly baked fish. She dissected one and gave her husband and me half each, served up on a palm leaf. It was delicious , the pure white flesh flaked into your fingers and was so tasty. I think it was carp, but I have?nt tasted anything like it since. It was pitch dark when the husband walked me back to the little railway, the trains were still working but I was the only passenger on the way home.
Next morning we were making ready to sail, George?s bunk had?nt been slept in and when I asked the lads if they had seen him since last night everyone said no. And then we remembered the Tallyman; the hospital, he said he would take him to hospital , ?more likely took him home and ate him ? someone said unkindly.
I told the bosun what had happened and he took me to see the mate. When he heard our story ,the mate told me to take the train to the hospital, it was the stop beyond town ,and check if he was there. It did?nt take long for the train to get there, the hospital was a single storey building and was right by the line. When I walked in, I was greeted by a smartly dressed doctor, in an immaculately starched white coat. When I asked after George he looked grave and said ?It was a very close thing, he is sedated now but must not be moved for some hours? I asked him what the matter was , and he replied ?He had a very bad thrombosis, if it had been left for an hour longer I am afraid he would have died? I left the hospital thinking how we smart assed whitemen could have killed him ,while one small native had been wiser than all of us. I?ve often wondered if George knew just how lucky he was and who he truly owes his life to.
It was odd having noone to talk to all the way home.

Nice one Brian.

Thank you Pablo,I am writing about a very difficult period of my life at this juncture, I don't want to come across as a whinger or bleeding heart. This is about what I was doing all those years ago ,there are good times to come ,and some heartache too.But I am trying to keep it real; I hope you have got patience out there,there is still a great deal more to write about.. Those two pics on my last page? they were taken on the Banana boat, she was like an ocean cruise liner,I'd love to be on her now.........but I can dream eh!
BrianD

Keep going Brian, really interesting, in fact fascinating! I wish I could recall as much of my life as you can. Certainly does not come across as whinging, just true to life as we all experience it. Did you keep notes, or a diary that you are recalling from?

Many thanks, and keep it up.

Tony

Keep 'em coming Brian. I really enjoy them.

Chirripo 2

I spent three days at home, it was enough. I was beginning to realise that feeling sorry for someone is not the same as loving them. I was too embarrassed to speak to my parents ,and would?nt have dreamt of talking things older with my Uncle Bill ;but I should have. As far as the world could see was that I was spending more time away from my ?family?; they never knew why.
M. did?nt seem too bothered about me being away, she was in the bosom of her family and that was good enough for her.

On the 11th of April I re-joined the Chirripo in Garston ,there were a few new faces in the deck crowd, nearly all from the south end so it promised to be a good trip. The engine room crew had no new faces in the crowd, the Chirripo was a good berth for them. One of them was a very unhappy chappie though ,we called him Pancho. The reason he was unhappy was this????seamen ,whether they be Royal Navy or Merchant, are great boasters of their sexual prowess. You would hear stories over the mess room table that would make your toes curl because they would be so preposterous.
The lads would each try to top each tales of priapism with some outlandish epic of uninhibted sexual displays. Before we docked in Garston on the previous trip ,one of the A.B.s was relating his present girlfriends speciality ,she liked making love in the ,so called , Greek manner. No sooner had he finished his tale than it was topped by some other guys story about the Grecian way. I kept my couinsel while all these tales were passing forth across the table. Pancho ,well Pancho took it all in. He really believed these guys when they said women preferred it that way. He found out otherwise when he tried to be greek with his wife. He spent his leave sleeping on the coach and returned to the ship looking pretty sorry for himself!!

Our work on this trip was pretty much the same as before, this time I was prepared for those spiders and went down the hatches with nary a bit of skin exposed..
My cabinmate on this trip was a southender called Norman Harris. He and I had met before on the picket lines during the ?60 strike. He was about my age and size and looked very South American ,he had the top bunk and I the bottom ,we were on the same watch and we would swap yarns when we were in our bunks. He was married and happily so, he used to say how he?d like to work ashore instead of leaving home so often.
The rest of the crew were a good crowd too; the recreation room would be full each night as we played our games, rummy and brag being the most popular. And then one night we decided to do something a little different. I had been telling them about my schoolmate Ernie and the way his mother used a ouija board to talk to her dead husband. No sooner had I finished my tale than a demonstration was called for. We cut little squares of paper and laid them out clockwork fashion ,putting a letter of the alphabet on each one. We put two pieces of paper at the top and bottom of the circle,one had Yes written on it and the other had No on it. We got a small whisky glass and put in the centre of the circle. One of the lads was given a pad and pencil to copy down any letters that might appear and four of us (it was amazing how reluctant a lot of guys were to join in) sat one each side of the table.
I was given the job of summoning the spirits. So we each put the right index finger on the glass and I called out ?Is there anybody there?? .Bear in mind that we were just off the West Coast of Africa when this took place. Suddenly the glass vibrated and we all looked at each other to see who was playacting; the glass started moving at a terrific speed and the lad with the pad asked us not to go so fast. Only ,we were not pushing it, the glass stopped dead and we sat back relieved. The bystanders were laughing and jesting about how I was a good ?un, I was quite bemused . What did the letters say ,if anything? The lad put his pad in front of me and I saw the following B R I A N S T O P T H I S I T IS DA N G E R O U S H A R R Y. No aboard this vessel knew of Harry, I had?nt got around to telling Norman and everyone else aboard was unaware of him too.
We cleared up and wended our way back to our cabins. As we lay having our last cigarette of the day , Norman asked ?Who was Harry Brian?? I told him and he got out of his bunk. He paced up and down the cabin like an angry cat, shoulders hunched ,dragging on his cigarette. ?Were you ?avin? us on in there?? I told him no and then I told him how the glass had been forcing its own way about the table. ? D?ja mean to say your mates ?ere with us? I could?nt answer that, but how else did that glass move.?

A few nights later Norman related a tale that was so fantastic that it stretched the bounds of belief. I will relate that tale here????????..

His father in law was a man called Billy Swinchin, like Norman he was a merchant seaman. At the height of World War Two he was on a Moss Hutchinson ship sailing from the Cape to England ,they were in a convoy and one day he and his watchmate were standing by the ships rail when their ship was struck by a torpedo from a U boat. There was a huge explosion and Billy and his mate dived in the sea to escape being drowned by her sinking. A life raft had been blown into the sea and they managed to board it. There were stores and some fresh water so they were safe ,for now. Two days later a half sunken lifeboat came floating near and Billy?s mate suggested they board and get her baled out so they would have a better chance. Billy would?nt budge and his mate struck out for the lifeboat. He boarded it successfully and that was the last that Billy saw of him. A blackbacked gull landed on the life raft and seemed to keep Billy company. The food lasted 32 days and Billy then lapsed into unconsciousness ,he never knew what happened to him after that. All he knew was blackness. Forty three days later a German U boat spotted him and went along side him, this was Bills 75th day on the raft. The captain and crew were so stricken by pity for him that they took him aboard and nursed him all the way to the U boat depot. He was regaled in the German press and then sent to a prisoner of war camp . I went to sleep thinking ? if you are going to tell a tall story ,you may as well make it fantastic?
Next morning Norman asked me to tell no one that story. I did?nt ,in 2007 I wrote to a merchant navy historian and asked him if he had heard of this story. He replied in the positive, and he e.mailed me a copy of the letter the U.boat commander had written to Bills? wife verifying this tale. This year I had a bit of a do at the Liverpool by the Victoria monument. The Land lord Fred Billingsley arranged it for me, Fred is Normans stepson and had seen a posting I had done on Yo about Norman and contacted me. Sadly ,both Norman and Billy have gone to Fiddlers Green now ,but I hope that their story will never be forgotten .
Pictured below are some of the Chirripos crew, a motley crowd of firemen ,and deckhands plus the chippy. If you know any of them tell them to get in touch,
BrianD

Brian, you really should have your writings published in book form. It would sell plenty ! Be great with some added pictures too.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by M6AJJ

Keep going Brian, really interesting, in fact fascinating! I wish I could recall as much of my life as you can. Certainly does not come across as whinging, just true to life as we all experience it. Did you keep notes, or a diary that you are recalling from?

Many thanks, and keep it up.

Tony

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Hi Tony,sorry it's taken so long to get back to you. Writing.........Most of my material is stored between my ears, I am constantly reminded of things past by tastes, smells, the light on a flower petal. Words,we could be talking and a word or phrase will drag memories from the corners of my mind. My Discharge book provides with the dates and ships. Once I got embarked on this journey two years ago I have re-lived most of these things; as I go to sleep I fall into a reverie and tomorrows writings start appearing . I'm 67 ,some one will have to shoot me to stop,I've only reached twenty one in my writing.
Anyway,thanks for asking ,watch out for the next instalment,
BrianD

Thanks Brian, I, along with countless others are all eagerly awaiting the next instalment.

Tony

Hi Brian,

I really enjoyed reading your story, more of the same please!

And welcome to this very friendly forum.

Time For A Change
We were back in Garston for the 5th of May, one day before my 21st birthday, on ?channel? night the lads were asking if I was going to have a 21st party or going out for a drink. From the tone of M.s letters that was?nt going to be likely. We docked in mid afternoon and, as my sister now lived not from the docks in Shakespeare Street ,I thought I would pop in and see her before I made my way to Kirkby. She lived half way down the street ,right next door to a tiny corner shop. I had?nt wrote to her and she would?nt have any idea I was coming so I was taking a chance that she would be home.
Life ?under the bridge? was considerably different from life in Kirkby ,or ,indeed ,than in any other part of Garston. It was like Coronation Street pretended to be in those far off days and I was given proof of this when I made my way to my sisters house. The women who were on their steps chatting to each other and nodded at me as I passed. I heard them saying ?that must be Jessie?s brother.? A burglar would have stood no chance of passing unnoticed.
The door to my sisters was ajar so I walked straight in, there was no sign of her in the living room or kitchen so I called out down the yard ,no answer. I went back in and called upstairs ,again no answer. There was afire in the hearth so I settled on the coach to await her return. I almost dozed off with the warmth of the fire when there was a bustling sound as a lady walked pst behind the couch, I craned my neck to see who it was and I did?nt know her . She smiled at me ??Allo luv, are you Brian ? ?Yes ? I answered. ?Jessie?s gone up the village, she should be long, I?ve just come to pinch some of her butter?
I was amazed, it was?nt grand larceny ,but it was something we would never have done in the Tennies.
Jessie came home about ten minutes later and I told her what I had just seen. She laughed when she saw how serious I was. ?We never lock our doors here,everyone looks out for each other? And I found with the passage years that that was how it was . In those tiny little cramped streets there was a sense of community that was as strong as steel. Iwill come back to that little demi paradise later, in the meantime I had to get back to my reality.
I was expected home at M.s first off, the days of dropping off the bus at Walton to both sets of Grandparents were ended, M had made them ?No Go? areas. I had?nt seen them since my wedding which was over a year ago. All of my relatives were out of bounds and I was restricted as to how much time I could spend with my parents who lived 500 yards away.
My body was beginning to react against the little privations ,who I could see, how long I could see them for ,I had no choice in the way we lived at home and I was getting near to exploding. I went around to see my folks on my birthday ,Dad was at work but Bette an Chris were home as was mum. Bette had brought a classmate home with her and Mum thought it would be a good Idea to get the box Brownie out and take a picture of me on my birthday. I was stood in the middle with Mum and Bette and her mate beside me. An innocent little picture. It was developed within a couple of days and when I called round to Mums before going off on another trip ,she gave me a copy of it. When I got back to M.s I showed her the picture and she went quite mad. ?your mothers trying to fix you up with that little tart!!? she screamed.
I was stunned, I could?nt believe what I was hearing, me ,who could have had untold sex with any mount of ladies in foreign ports ,but did?nt because I was being faithful. I went for a walk to cool down and when I got back I asked if her she wanted to go out,I did?nt want to go away like this. We settled on going to see a new block buster at the Odeon in town. Another wrong move.
I bought a programme ,the were 10 shillings and I only had a fiver so the usherette said she would bring me the change. I sat waiting patiently ,four pound tn was lot of money in them days. Every time the usherette passed I would try to catch her eye to remind her of my change. The movie was nearly over by the time she brought it to me. M. started as soon as we got on the bus home. She accused me of trying to get off with the usherette, ?Yer cud?nt keep yer friggin?eyes off her!? I said nothing, my heart was turning to ashes and I just wanted out.
I left home for the last time on May the 14th 1963,I was seen off with a frosty ?See yer? and I walked with leaden feet to the bus stop. No one knew of what had passed between ma and M., I had?nt discussed things with anyone for I was afraid I would get the ?I told you so ,Did?nt I? and they would have been right,but I was too pig headed to admit it.
I was closing a chapter of my life and stepping into a very uncertain future.
I got a berth on an Everard Tanker called the Assurity, there was a Jos joining it and we travelled together to join it in Eastham. We were replacements for two crewmen who had decided to finish their stint . I was expecting another knacker like the Austility but was quietly surprised, she was not too old ,had single berth accommodation and possessed a good cook . She was also on foreign going articles which meant that we were paid monthly and the food was paid for by the company. I was lucky with my cabin ,the previous occupant had been quite house proud, the deck was brightly coloured and highly polished and all of the brasswork was gleaming ,there was a leather daybed and a beautifully carpentered bunk. It did?nt take long to turn theat little old space into a home. The Jos who journeyed with me was a good kid, Jimmy was his name and he became my watchmate. We were put on the 12 to 4 ,my favourite watch, during the night hour hours you seemed to have more thinking time and lots of space to think in. And I was doing plenty of that lately.
I was leaving her ,M., that is. She had a baby so I was?nt going to leave her high and dry, the baby was?nt mine ,but that was?nt the babies fault. So < I planned to leave them an allotment as I had done when things were o.k. but that would be it. I would have nothing more to with them. If she met someone new then so be it; as for me, I would take whatever life chose to put my way.
We left Eastham on the evening tide., the rest of the crew had been aboard for quite some time and were well settled in. The galley boy cum steward was a lad from Lisburn in Northern Ireland, he was a burly kid with ever twinkling eyes ,always waiting for a joke ,he seemed to have an endless supply of tartan shirts and blue jeans ,for that is all he ever wore, or maybe it was the one pair and he kept them very clean. The cook was a big rawboned New Zealander who spent a few years in the Kiwi army, Sid was his name and he was laconic by nature..The bosun was a man from Sunderland, quiet ,big built and very calm,one of the good guys.The captain was a man called Fane, a little Jack Russell , he did?nt suffer fools or wasters and never,ever wore uniform,he did?nt need to ,you knew who was in charge. The chief officer was a nice guy who had never quite made it to the top, he was at least twenty years older that the captain but he was, well , past it. The second mate ,well in another company he would have made a good midshipman, he was obsequious to
his superiors and quite overbearing with his juniors. It did?nt take long to settle his hash..
It was time for our first night watch when we were past Point Lynas and heading down the coast of Wales. I did the first spell on the wheel and Jimmy was on the lookout, no stand by man here. The second mate was in chatty mood when were on the bridge , he asked if I had ever heard or read anything about the ship before I joined her and I told him that I had o idea of her existence. He said she was very popular with spiritualists and ghost hunters for she was reputed to have ghosts, Dennis Wheatley ,the author ,had been in correspondence with one of the captains and had written about her somewhere. There had been unexplained incidents that were beyond rational explanation, on one trip they had a hardened cynic who thought it was all baloney and was giving vent about cranks and looneys who made a living peddling such drivel. They were in the Channel at the time and the sea was like glass, and all of a sudden the bookcase on the bridge, which had reinforced glass and locking bars on its doors, burst outwards and shattered glass and books all over the bridge. The man near fainted and paid off at the next port. He told me that there had been sightings of the ghost, a hairy crooked backed old man who was seen in the sailors quarters . I nodded and looked as though I was interested. At 4?o clock when we got off watch , Jimmy was nearly exploding with news of the ghost; he had just spent the last two hours on the bridge and the second had given him all the gory details. Jimmy?s eyes were like saucers as he related the story, I added a few details , like how he wore a raggedy old jersey and sea boots. We finished our supper and went to our cabins. I got my old sea bag out and pulled out a wig that I had used for a crossing the line ceremony ,a badly knitted sea jersey that M. had packed for and my old sea boots. I hurriedly put them on and went out into the alley way to go and scare Jimmy. I was adjusting my posture to that of a hunchback as I stood outside
Jimmy?s just about to tap it when it opened and he saw me standing there. His face contorted into mask ,he was screaming ,silently and I realised that he was terrified . I stepped toward him to tell him it was me ,Brian , and he took enormous steps backward into his cabin. He had his arms pushing forward as though to push the nightmare away. ?Jimmy, Jimmy? I yelled and that only mad matters worse ,his eyes rolled upwards as though he was about to pass out.
I ripped off the wig and shook him and his eyes refocused . ?That was feckin? ace? he gasped getting his breath back ?Let?s go an? do it to Joe!? I was amazed at how quickly he recovered and so went to call on Joe ,the lad from Lisburn. I stood over him as Jimmy shook him awake, he opened his eyes ,looked for a second and then passed out. Jimmy and I went to our cabins and said no more. I was beginning to enjoy life again.

Shown below are young Jimmy with Ray ,who became my best pal on the Allurity. We are having A Sunday out on the ships jolly boat on the River Loire by Donge, The Allurity is astern of us and is also shown,looking a bit battered, alongside the Jetty in Donge.

Nice one Brian.

Assurity

The Assurity had been on contract to a French company and was on a regular run from Donge to Eastham. We were on foreign going articles but were practically coasting,an odd situation, for the men who liked to get home often it was ideal, we were never more than a week away from Liverpool; me ? well I never went home in those first few weeks, a period of peace and quiet was what I needed and I was getting plenty of that on this old boat. We had a new junior engineer join us on our second trip to Eastham he had been a fitter in an Engineering works in Manchester and had just joined the Merchant Navy.
The Assurity was his first ship and he came aboard with a full uniform, the gold braid sparkly new and his peaked cap with its white cover and badge fit for a commodore. He also brought his wife ,still a rare thing in those days. They both had pony tails ,only he had the beard. The look on Captain Fanes face was enough to tell you what he thought of the poor guy.. He seemed a nice enough person when he was in his boiler suit and his hands black with grease, but of an evening out came the uniform and he became ?an officer?. His wife wore hippy clothes and seemed excited about her old man being an officer ,they had never been on a ship before let alone been to sea. It was on the evening 4 to 8 watch that things came to a head, I was on the helm, we were just off Bishops Rock ,the captain was in the chartroom and into the wheelhouse came our junior engineer and his bride. He looked very smart in his rig and she was looking up at him adoringly , he held a pair of binoculars to his eyes and she was saying ?Wot can you see Snake? when the Captain looked out from the chartroom. ?Oo the feck are yew?? he says to our new engineer. ? Erm, er? came the embarrassed reply while his wife looked askance. ?git the feck orf my bridge you silly sod? says the Captain and thus began the end of the junior engineers job on the Assurity.
When we got back to the Manchester Ship Canal we sailed up to Irlham instead of the usual stop at Eastham, I needed some dental treatment and went to the Manchester Dental hospital. You could get immediate treatment in those days if you went to the dental training school, it was something I had done often in Liverpool and was happy to do the same here. It was a bit like a mass production process, you were passed from chair to chair as groups of trainees examined you ,assessed you ,gave you local anaesthetic and then did the business, extraction, filling ,whatever was needed. It was fast and you met a lot of new faces. I was in a line between a little middle aged guy and a Swedish student. The man had a red raw cheek where he had been nursing it because of his pain, I just needed a filling and the Swedish student ,I learned ,was having a bit of grief with a wisdom tooth. We chatted to each other as we made our way down the line,not much conversation with the little guy ,he could hardly speak for pain, the Swede was rather nice, away from home for the first time she was glad of company. When we had finished our treatment I ended up wandering around Manchester city centre with the girl, the was a film showing at one of the cinemas, ?A Taste of Honey? with Rita Tushingham, we spent the afternoon watching that and,when the numbness had left our jaws, kissed each other good bye and went our separate ways. I was glad of that interlude, I had spent so long beating myself up that I thought I was completely unattractive to women.
We sailed around to Immingham from Irlham, not the nicest place I have been to but welcoming, we?d had a new deckhand join us in Irlham and he was ,like Joe from Lisburn.. It was strange when they met, secret signals seemed to pass between them, Joe later told me that they had identified each other as both being catholic and were happy to know each other. I had no idea of how bad things were in N.I. at that time and it would have been a wise man who could say what was to erupt six years later. However our newbie was a welcome addition, he was about 10 years older than me and had been around the block more than a few times. He was not unlike Richard Harris the actor ,had a deep baritone voice and a rueful smile. His most prominent feature was a star shaped scar on his right cheek, it gave him a rakish appearance, he joined the Royal Navy when he was in his teens and saw a bit of the world, but not enough. When he was nearly twenty he went AWOL and joined the United States Airforce. He liked it there and after a year or so he was posted to England ,at RAF Ben****ers. He was getting on famously and was at the Armistice Day parade in Norwich in his USAAF uniform ,he said he could feel a policeman taking long looks at himas he stood to attention at the memorial. Two days later Royal Navy Policemen came to the camp at Ben****ers and he was court martialled for desertion. His American C.O. put in a good report to the court and he served a light sentence after which he joined the M.N. He was a colourful guy in every respect, slow to temper and quick to laughter, the women flocked to him. So there we were in Immingham, the place was abuzz about a train robbery that had taken place, million of pounds in used notes, the stuff of Hollywood movies. Joe Meeks Telstar was riding high in the pop charts and there was a pop group from Liverpool advertising Lee Cooper Jeans in the Daily Mirror, the Beatles. I first heard them on a juke box in Immingham ,it was a Polydor record and it sounded great. The place was heaving with women and it was only mid afternoon ,turned out they were fishermen?s wives who had come to see their men off, they were in a flirty mood and the big feller was getting most of the attention. Come closing time we ordered a taxi to take us back to our ship ,there was Ray, Jimmy ,myself, the Big Feller ??and a fisherman?s wife.! ?Aw , she?s only come to kiss me goodbye ? he said. When we were just a short way from the pub ,he asked the driver if he could pull over on to some heathland, when we were parked ,He asked us if we could leave him and his lady alone for a while. It was a Hackney cab, the type that used to have a space for cases beside the driver. Two of us sat on the step and had a cigarette and the others , driver as well, leaned on the big old mudguard while the cab was gently rocked by the lovebirds in the back. It was like something out of an absurdist play.
The mail had arrived when I got back on board ,there was one from M. for me. I was nervous when I opened it ,not sure what to expect, I read it and could?nt understand what I was reading, I sat and tried reading it again and I was nearly sick, I was gagging vomit back. It was the vilest missive I had ever held in my hand. I was so ashamed that such words could be penned that I did something stupid ,I burned it. I never wanted to see those words again ,how could giving your Mum or sister a hug be interpreted so? Even now ,46 years later ,I still feel the revulsion. But that was it, I had thought of leaving ,I was going to leave, now I was out of it. I did?nt evade my financial responsibilities and I never told anyone of what had passed between M and me. I was never going home again.

When we went ashore that night I got myself a ladyfriend,I did?nt burden her with ?my wife does?nt understand me? yarns; I just had a good time,the first of many.
The company won a contract with the Continental Oil Company, ConOco, to carry Jet Petrol from Germany to the U.K. It was a prestigious contract and we had to go to Sunderland to discharge what we were carrying from Immingham and then head for Brunsbuttelkoog on the Kiel Canal.
I?d never been to Sunderland and our bosun hailed from that port and he had told us how lively it was so we were quite looking forward to tasting it?s nightlife,we would only be there for a night ,the tanks were going to be cleaned and the ConOco people were going to inspect us ,it was a Saturday ,sunny and we were free to spend the rest of the day as we wished.Ray and I favoured going to one of the bars the bosun had told us about. It was?,nt on the dockside but in one of the many little streets of terraced houses that line the dock road. It was only about 6?0 clock when we got there and there seemed to be no one about. Just as we were going to go into the bar we heard a girls voice cry ?Hod on there!? We looked round to see two very nice girls running toward us. ?Can ye tek us in hinny?? one asked. I did?nt understand what she meant ,she then explained that women were not allowed to go in unaccompanied. So in the four of us went. We asked if they were meeting somebody and one said ?Nar,there?s nabuddy eyah? We found out that it was the Sunderland fortnight and nearly everyone was away on holiday. ?What about you two ?? I asked ,? we canna afford it marrer? was the answer. ?So ,d?you want to stick with us ?? I said.
?aye man ,ye?ll do,is yer casin tight?? We were in another world here, they were lovely girls though. We stayed until closing time and they came back on board with us, Ray and his lady and me and mine went off to our cabins. I can remember feeling happier than I had for a long time ,we took honest to god enjoyment in our every movement and loved each other until sleep took us into our dreams. I was awakened by the sound of our engines and gentle motion of the ship as moved with the waves. We were at Sea!!!! Germany was next stop and we were in deep doodah. I woke my girl up and told her to be quiet ,stay in the cabin and I would go and see how Ray was. They were both still fast asleep when I got to their cabin, I shook them awake and made them aware of the situation. We decided to hide the
girls in our cabins and sneak them food ,it was breakfast time ,you could smell the bacon and eggs down in our alleyway. So I went back to my cabin ,tried to put my girl in the picture without frightening her and then went with Ray to the messroom. I was filling my plate with double rations and getting ready to go back down to my cabin when I heard the clatter of two pairs of high heeled shoes coming up the companionway. Sid ,the cook ,and the rest of the lads present ran to the alleyway just as one of the girls said ?This must be the caf?? Ooooh Sheeit!

Assurity 2
Our Antipodean cook was not feeling particularly friendly toward me ,had?nt been the same since I had to settle his hash some two weeks previous to this particular morning.
Just three weeks ago we had a young Irish boy join us as a galley boy,young Joe was now a full steward and young Paddy was his replacement in the kitchen. He was a nice enough kid but his speech was somewhat lacking in the English department. His every other word was ?feck? and sometimes worse. The cook, who was ex army, was?nt much taken with the kid and was forever clipping his ears. But Paddy was harmless enough and had suffered some bad times in his young life. Being small he was bullied quite a lot on some of the ships he had been on, being slow on the uptake he was constantly being told off for being stupid. The worse thing he had been experiencing was just plain maliciousness. He was illiterate ,he could?nt read a word ,Ihad?nt heard of dyslexia then but young Paddy seemed to have it. I tried to teach the basics but there was simply no recognition of the letters or words. The trouble was ,Paddy needed someone to write his letters home to his mammy. I wrote his first letter on the Assurity, he sat with me in my cabin and told me what he would like his mammy to hear. It ended up as a three page letter and he put his own kisses on the bottom and sent it off. About a week later he came to my cabin with a letter from home; he was excited to hear what he letter contained. What I read made me feel so sorry for the poor kid, for months his family had been receiving letters written for him by former shipmates and they contained streams of pure filth. What might have seemed funny in the mess room when written by some ?prankster? was heartbreaking for his family. His mother wrote that things had got to such a stage that they destroyed the letters as soon as they saw the handwriting on the envelope. She thanked for writing on her sons behalf and then gave him al the news from home. I was quite moved by her letter and began to take young Paddy under my wing. The first thing I had to do was to try and extend his vocabulary, it consisted mostly of Anglo Saxon oaths ,he could fit a feck into the most unlikely situations ,split infinitives like ?hufeckinllo? The boy had a genius for swearing. But not everyone saw it that way ,especially the cook.
I was doing first spell at the wheel on the 12 to 4 watch, it was just coming up to my break at one o?clock in the morning when Little Paddy slid quietly into the wheel house. His body was wracked with sobs and I quietly asked him what he was doing up at this hour. ?De cooks jest feckin beat me ? he sobbed. I saw his face by the glow of the compass, his left eye was bloody and bruised. I asked him if he had been cheeky to the cook and he nodded. 6 foot 4 against five foot nothing , I was bloody angry. As soon as Ray came in to spell me I shot down to the messroom and found the cook puffing on a fag a bottle of bitter in his hand.
?What did you smack Paddy for ?I asked ?Cos I bleedin wanted to ;why?? I am not a fighting man but something in me snapped and I swung my fist at his jaw with all my might. It connected and I was shocked to see his teeth come shooting out his mouth. He looked dazed and dropped his beer .I fetched his teeth,I never knew he wore dentures until that moment and I was shocked at the sight of them flying across the messroom. I handed them to him and he shuffled off to his bunk.
When the 4 to 8 men came on I told Johnny Young ,a lad from Kirkdale,what had happened and he said he would keep an eye things in case Sid did something daft in the night.
I awoke next morning to see Sid sitting on my day bed, he was rubbing a swollen jaw ?Did you do this ?he asked. I was in a pretty precarious position ,still half asleep and flat on my back .?Yeah? I croaked. ?Did I deserve it ? He asked. ? You beat Paddy up ? He stood up slowly, nodded and left the cabin.
Today was payback time.
Sid went up the companion like an Olympic athlete, he could?nt wait to break the news of my exploit to Captain Fane. Meanwhile the girls settled down to hearty breakfast in the messroom ,surrounded by all and sundry. Work was forgotten and even the bosun came in and paid court to the girls. Ray and I waited for the captains reaction. It was?nt long in coming ,just as we were finishing the remains of our breakfast ,the mate came into the messroom. He nodded to me not Ray, ?Skipper wants to see you? he grimaced. There was no conversation on our way to the captains cabin. He ushered me in and left me with a very,very angry man. Captain Fane looked at me and let forth an explosion of sailors oaths. He told me that I was to consider myself discharged from the merchant navy ,he would make sure that I never set foot aboard another ship as long as I lived. I had brought disgrace upon him, the company and the British Merchant Service in general. If ConoCo found out about this the contract would be lost and we would all be out of work. ?You and that little Facker of a mate will be sorry you ever saw me ? he roared. I left his cabin with my tail firmly between my legs. One of the lads had a Philips short wave radio and had been listening to the radio messages from head Office to our ship, he could?nt hear both sides of the conversation ,just the shore to ship side. He came and told Ray and me of what he had heard, we were to be discharged as soon as we got to the Kiel canal. He knew nothing more than that. We still had a day to go before we got there and Ray and were definitely not the flavour of the month with the lads. Some of them had been on the Assurity for a long time were happy to be there. Ray and I went to the lad with the radio and sat in his cabin to listen out for furthewr news. It was?nt long in coming. Head office called back and asked Captain Fane to see if he could settle the matter quietly, no publicity etc .etc.
I was summoned back up to the captains cabin , he was honest with me,what he was telling me was what we had heard on the radio. He told me that he was heading back to the UK and was going to see if he could contact a fishing boat to take the girls ashore; he would keep me if I paid for the fishing boat. I asked him why he had?nt mentioned Ray and he said that he did?nt want him aboard his ship. I had nothing to lose ,I was without any ties now and did?nt have a home to go so I told the skipper that if Ray went then I was going too. He told me to fack orf out of it and Iwent back down to Ray. While all this was going on,one of my so called mates,a guy from Hull was moving his kit into my cabin
?Ye don?t mind Briaaan ? he said with that flat inflexion on the A. I was too busy with what was going to happen next to get involved with that stuff. The girls meanwhile had discovered the attraction at being at the centre of a sailors world. ,they saw more deckheads (ceilings) that day than they would see in a long time. .
We heard a fishing boat talking to our skipper, again it was only one side of the conversation but it was enough to know that a settlement was being reached. It was still only early morning ,there was a thick sea mist but the sea was flat and we were heading west ,toward the coast. Captain Fane called me up to the bridge again. We were heading to a point off Bridlington and we would be meeting a fishing smack that would take the girls off. It would cost Ray and I forty pounds between us, if we agreed ,we could keep our jobs and there would no more action taken .I shook hands with Captain Fane and hastened below to tell Ray. I never ,ever told him of the captains wish to get rid of him, in fact ,if he ever reads this story it will be the first time he has heard it.
I then went to my cabin and threw out the guy from Hulls kit ,he left when we got back to England.
It was about an hour later when we heard the sound of a little diesel engine coming through the,now, thinning mist. The sun was burning off the last of the fog and we could begin to make out the coast, by heck we were close!
There was a promenade crowded with people ,holiday makers ,and the were more than a few launches cruising out toward us. The little fishing smack was making her way alongside and our pilot ladder was lowered. Two of the launches were crowded with cameramen. Some one else was listening in to radio traffic that morning. As the smack took our line and secured herself beneth the ladder,the girls began to clamber over the side to make their way down the ladder, all the crewmen crowded at the top of the ladder waving the girls goodbye,Ray and I stayed firmly in the background ,the launches closed in and the cameras were flashing away. When the girls were safely down ,we went to the ladder and waved a last goodbye,the cameras were focussed on the fishing boat now and we were on our way east.

Nice one Brian.

Wonder what became of Paddy?

Quote:

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?What did you smack Paddy for ?I asked ?Cos I bleedin wanted to ;why?? I am not a fighting man but something in me snapped and I swung my fist at his jaw with all my might. It connected and I was shocked to see his teeth come shooting out his mouth. He looked dazed and dropped his beer .I fetched his teeth,I never knew he wore dentures until that moment and I was shocked at the sight of them flying across the messroom. I handed them to him and he shuffled off to his bunk.

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Class. :PDT11

Assurity 3

Brunsbuttel ,a little port, lies at the western end of the Kiel canal. It is a neat little town built with that orderly style that the good burghers of Schleswig Holstein used throughout their chequered history . Not quite Prussian and almost Danish. The people were like their town ,open and friendly.
We selected our bar that would act as our local ,for we would be regular visitors to this place. It was a pleasant venue , 50?s modern large clear glass windows that afforded views of the shipping traffic ,a sun deck outside and wonderful Holstein beer. The landlady was like a Wagnerian opera singer, she was large and had a chest that was like the forepart of the Bismark. Many a sailor had been crushed by them. She made us feel very much at home and we would have our lunches there if we were in on a Saturday or Sunday . What most of us agreed about what we had seen of this part of Germany was how much of a recovery it had made since the war. In 1963 Liverpool ,and other British cities were making piecemeal recoveries, our town centres were still full of holes where buildings had been. In the 5 years I had been coming to Germany I had been witness to non stop renovation. Hamburg ,which had been full of bomb sites in ?58 was now a very smart town and so it was with Brunsbuttel. The new building was done in harmony with the old, so good was it that it was hard to tell which buildings were post war and which were original. The other nice thing about our local in Brunsbuttel was that it was a family bar, we never saw another ships crowd in there. Everyone knew that we were the new contractors to carry the Jet petrol to England and we were soon treated like regulars.
After a nice weekend we set sail back to Immingham, some of the lads lived locally to there ,Hull ,Goole etc. so they were looking forward to getting back to their wives and families. A lot of them were in for a shock when we got back , we had mail ,bags of it! There were copies of every red topped Sunday newspaper stacked on the mess room table, this was part of the mail.. The only two people not to get a Sunday newspaper in the post were Ray and I..
On the front pages of all of them were photographs of the girls climbing down the pilot ladder to the fishing boat, banner headlines proclaimed ?SEXY SAILORS STOW AWAY SWEETHEARTS? ?SCANDAL AT SEA!!!? ? ALL ABOARD THE SS LOVENEST? etc,etc ,etc.
All of the lads were shown waving and winking at the girls, when we read the stories in the papers the girls never gave our names, they were in enough trouble with their families and acted very gracefully. They were photogenic and the papers had them pictured ashore as they got into their taxis.
Ray and I stayed aboard that night, lack of money was one reason, threat of death by murder was another. The married men were murderous, all their wives believed it was them who stowed the girls away ,suspicion never pointed toward we two.
Mid Sunday morning ,the day after we arrived in Immingham, one of the deck crew came aboard ,his shore leave cut short by the news story, he was expecting to have Sunday night in bed with his wife. Jock came straight from the gangway to me and smashed me in the face ,he was crying, ?She?s thrown me oot; she knows it was me? I felt so ashamed for the trouble I had caused and could only say I was sorry. I deserved that smack in the mouth. When the time came to leave Immingham the captain sent the mate to inspect Rays? and my cabin. ?No Ladies here Daley?? he laughed. Every port thereafter that became the routine ,check their cabins.!!
We did?nt just run between Brunsbuttell and Keil, sometimes we would run to South Wales ,sometimes Eastham or Irlham and now and then back to Donge. One of our runs took us to Cardiff, I was greatly surprised how nice the town centre was , the civic Buildings and the Castle gave it special look and I enjoyed my stay,though short very much. I met an specially pretty young girl while out shopping one Saturday with Ray. I wanted to buy a soft toy for my nieces birthday and I just did?nt know where to start. The pavcements were thronged with Saturday shoppers and it was?nt the nicest place to be. Two lovely young girls were steaming toward us and I caught hold of the blonde ones hand. And pulled her gently to me,? I?m looking for a teddy bear ? I said into her startled face, ?Ray here,? I said pointing to him,?has led me on a wild goose chase so far? She was now smiling, ?I?ll bet you know where the best cuddly in Cardiff are ? She had a quick confab with her friend and said ?We?ll show you ,follow us?
I said ?Give me your hand so I won?t lose you? and she slipped her hand into mine. We arrived at a department store and they showed us the toy department, they were about to leave and I asked her to help me pick the teddy . It was lovely ,she was so innocent, up at university, and a whole world of adventure in front of her. I asked her if she had to rush back or would she like some dinner and to go out to the fair. She went and made a phone call and then the four of us went back to our ship. Ray and I got freshened up and then we went off to the fair. We saw them to their bus stop at the end of what had been a lovely ,innocent evening..
We had saw more new crew members now ,Jimmy had left and we had a new kid join us , I forget his name, I forget him,he was?nt with us long. On the Manchester Ship canal we picked up another newbie. His name was Johnnie Young, my age, different world. He was an ex Army man , SAS he said ,he looked fit enough and was as mad as a march hare and seemed to fit the profile. I liked him. When were in Eastham he asked me to over to Liverpool with him ,he lived in Kirkdale ,not far from the Garrick. When we were walking past Kirkdale Baths I mentioned that I knew someone who worked there. ?I do too? he said and went further? Crackin? bit ?o stuff, well stacked, she?s an instructor an? she loves rough sex? My face must have looked incredulous. ? She?s married a guy 30 years older than ?er?. Little alarm bells sounded in my head.. ??E can?t get it up so she get?s her fill down here, she?s bloody wonderful?
He had just described M.s beautiful young cousin, a girl who was considered a saint by all her family and idolised by her husband. I never told him I knew her.

That mad side of Johnny ? We got back to Eastham and decided to go to the nearest pub to the dock for a quiet drink, there were two hulking big skandihoovians at the bar, they were chatting quietly among themselves and I went up to the counter to order a round. As I was negotiating the booze I heard two reports, like meat slapping a cold slab. I turned around with the beer in my hand to see Johhny stood over the supine forms of the Skandihoovians .?What the F**k ???? I spluttered. Johnny ,stepping over them, said ?It?ll save any trouble later on ?. I said ?Just drink up in case any of their mates come? He never turned a hair. I was to see how good he was in a ruck when we were back in Brunsbuttel.
The Mate had his wife aboard, she was a nice Geordie lady , well in her sixties and ,like our German barmaid ,matronly. She had started to come down to the Sailors quarters for a can and ,as she said it ?a bit chat? It put the mate in an awkward position , there were class lines then and she had certainly crossed them, but she used to tell him ?It?s only a bit chat?
Those chats became longer and they took place behind the locked door of the bosuns cabin. One night ,shortly before we got to Brunsbuttel ,we could hear the old mate ,sobbing outside the bosuns door . ? Cum back bonny lass, I know Ah?m old ,but ah love ya girl? I have never felt so sorry for a man as I felt sorry for him. Abject humiliation in front of the entire crew. If the captain had known he would have shipped them all out.
The mates wife was the cause of a bust up at our local in Brunnsbuttel. Because it was Sunday all of the crew who were off duty went down to the local for our Sunday lunch,the place was quite crowded, some German sailors were there as were a lot of the regular customers.
The mates wife had made eye contact with one of the German sailors and they were billing and cooing across the tables,the mate was?nt there to see this and that lessened the impact of it ,but the German sailor decided to come over and claim his prize. One of the engineers told him to go back to his table and received a smack for his trouble. Johnny told me to get the ladies to the back of the room and he sorted them all out. I had never seen anything so balletic, he twisted and turned ,delivering kicks to that one rabbit chops to this one, the ones who were standing fled ,he was a killing machine. Our land lady thanked him for stopping what could have been a horrible mess. He was some kid that Johnny.

There's a book here Brian. Good stories, love 'em.

Assurity 4

I had spent so much time on the Assurity, it was near three months now since we had boarded her and it was fast becoming my home.
My cabin was comfortable, it had a bunk ,daybed, writing desk ,wardrobe and a nice wing chair. The bulkhead between the bunk and daybed had a washbasin and the mirror above it had a nice oil lamp that was on a gimble. The brasswork on the porthole and lamp I kept polished to a nice sparkle and I mounted a few prints to give the place some colour. An officer on a pre war ship would have been proud of such a berth,to me it was like a sanctuary from the problems ashore.
We were running around the coast of Europe and Britain ,never touched Ireland or Scotland ; Immingham, Brunnsbuttel, Irlam and ports along the Bristol channel and the Severn were our main ports of call ,with the occasional trip to Donge in France .We were on foreign going articles and so were entitled to our duty frees ,which we took up to our allotted amount. We did?nt have to pay for our food ,as you would on coasting articles, and we had fairly good cooks. I say cooks , because since that unfortunate incident with the cook over little Paddy ,the cook from Down Under got another ship. We had another guy from Hull as cook this time, he was a good humoured guy,not as short tempered with the kids as his predecessor was and he had been deep sea for years.
Someone told him about the ship being haunted and he was very sceptical , he did?nt believe in ghosts and raised the issue of his disbelief more than a few times. He was shown the Roneo?d copies of Dennis Wheatleys letters and said that anybody who believed in that ****e ought to be haunted. Oxymoron or what?
Well one bright and sunny Sunday morning we were steaming down toward the River Loire,the sea was as flat as a pancake and all those off watch were free to make and mend, or just laze about. Our cook chose to have a few moments on his daybed reading his novel. All was quiet save for the steady heartbeat of the engine, some of us were sitting in the mess having a refreshing cup of tea when we heard a crash and a scream. It sounded like something had fallen on someone ,but we were a tanker ,not a cargo boat. We got up to see what had happened when up the companionway came the cook. He looked like he had seen a ghost, and he had ! Or rather he had seen the actions of a poltergeist. He said he was enjoying his book on his daybed and was having a smoke when he noticed the jar of Brylcreem float up off the shelf beneath his mirror ,he thought he was imaging it and then it came flying toward his head. He managed to dive to the deck and the jar smashed against the bulkhead where his head had just been resting. It shook most of us up because up until that moment we had only thought of the ghost as being another sailors yarn.
Before I leave the subject of ghosts I must tell you this tale. The wings of the bridge on the Assurity were different from most ships I had been on, the dodger, that part that curves around from the forepart to the after end of the bridge ,was about 18 inches short of the side ,the navigation lights were set back at the after end of each side.and there was a scupper that ran to the forepart. . We were able to stand outside of the bridgedeck to polish the lamps and do the varnish work. One of the young EDH?s must have studied this and played a near fatal prank on the mate. He was due to relieve his pal on the wheel midwatch on the 4 to 8 in the morning , he got a pair of tights from the ragbag and made his way to the bridge .He did?nt go right up to the bridge deck, he climbed the bridge ladder and clambered over the afterpart by the starboard light and edged his way along below the dodger, until he was level with wheel house . He was five minutes early for his turn at the wheel so no one was expecting him at that moment. He pulled the tights over his head and then raised it above the dodger. He groaned loudly and the mate, who was walking across the wheelhouse ,turned and saw this green apparition moaning like one of the undead. The guy who was waiting at the wheel said he was frightened but the mate, he made a croaking sound and collapsed, one hand clutching his chest and the other pointing to starboard. The relief whipped of the tights and ran to help the mate who slowly came around. The man at the wheel was relieved and got the mate a strong hot cup of coffee. They never ever told that tale until the mate left the ship when he was replaced by the Geordie with the wandering wife.

One run took us to Rays home town and he invited me home to meet his family, they lived in one of those terraced streets that surround the docklands in Tiger Bay. His Dad had been a seafarer, a Yemeni fireman with Smiths of Cardiff,now retired he was the centre of his family and was clearly adored. His mum was one of those indomitable Welsh ladies who could cope with anything ,as we used to say ,she was as sound as a pound. I think he had some brothers but time has erased them from my memory, but he had a sister and she was a beautiful mixture of east and west, her skin was a slight olive colour and her tight black curly hair was as black as midnight. They all made me very welcome and ,as it was Saturday ,insisted I stay for tea before Ray and I went on the town. The atmosphere around the table was lovely ,father sat at the head and his children and wife ministered to his every need .It was like table at Grandmas when I was a boy , good natured and polite. We watched a bit of T.V. and then went to see what Tiger Bay had to delight us with, we got merry and Ray went home and I went back aboard. I was still quite wakeful and so poured myself some duty free and got down to reading my book. About two in the morning Ray came aboard, I saw him as I was on my way to the messroom for a cup of cocoa. He looked distraught and his eyes were red, he had been crying. I asked what the matter was and he said that he had had a row with his mum and dad??..over me. I had mentioned to his mum that I was married but separated, although she never said ought to me then ,she expressed her unhappiness to Ray when he got home. He stood my corner and his dad stood by his mother. It led to an unpleasant row and it near broke Rays heart. That would not be the last time that my marital status would come up against me. I had?nt told my parents or sisters, I was too shamefaced to admit that they had been right in their warnings; but life goes on.

Being mostly in home waters we had a steady to and froing with the crew, a lot of the guys were with us a week or two some like Ray, Big Mick from Lisburn and myself were stayers. Little Paddy ,he di?dnt last very long after an incident in the Bay of St. Brides ,south west Wales . We had hove to there because of a spot of engine trouble and we anchored in mid bay, it was a breezy Sunday morning and was ideal weather for messing about in sailing dinghys. One little two hander hove to under our stern and the man at the tiller called up and asked if we would like a Sunday newspaper from the shop , I was quite pleased and asked if he could get the Observer and Sunday Express, little Paddy came out of the galley and called out ?An? if yer kin ger some of dem feckin Mars bars it?d be feckin great? The mans daughter ,or friend , was shocked by this verbal outrage and the dinghy took off and was never seen again.
Paddy compounded this felony in Lowestoft when he got horribly drunk with one of the JOS.s, I was watchman that night and I heard the racket as the pair of them made their way down the quay to our ship. Paddy was so drunk that his balance was terribly awry, it might look funny in the movies ,but being that drunk near water is fraught with danger. I stood at the top of the gangway to watch as they staggered their way aboard. I stepped down away from the gangway to to let them pass ,the JOS almost fell on the deck as Jimmy made it to the top step of the gangway. His eyes were near closed and he was swaying badly, like a puppet whose strings have been cut ,he collapsed and slid through the gangway chains between the ship and the gangway. We were light ship and were high out of the water, I dived across the gangway and managed to grasp Paddys wrist. He was totally unconscious and was deadweight in my hand , I managed to raise myself to my knees and cried out for help. Paddy was slowly slipping from my grasp. Big Mick appeared behind me and was able to grip Paddys hand, we thus hauled him back on board,dead drunk and out of it. The whole episode had been viewed from amidships and young Paddy was given his marching orders when we got back to Immingham.
We hauled up at Felixstowe a short while after that incident and Big Mick said he would show me his old hunting grounds in Ipswich from when he was stationed in East Anglia with the US Airforce,it proved to be an interesting night out ,but I?ll save that for next time.

Nice one Brian.

I've got a bit behind with 'Hullo Old Home' - - will take some catching up with :)

Time For a Change
And so we found ourselves in Felixstowe, I cannot recall much of the port ,there were s few little coasters and fishing boats in ,we were there with another cargo of Jet from Germany. Because we were going to be there overnight ,Big Mick suggested going with him to his old U.S. Airforce haunts in Ipswich. It was a place that I had never been to before and so I was happy to keep him company.
On the way up there he said he was going to see if he could pick some woman ,any woman ,up and see if she would go back to the Assurity with him ;so I was going to be a gooseberry.
It was mid evening by the time we got there , mid evening on a Saturday night and it looked like Ipswich was closed. But Mick knew where he was headed, in was in a shabby side street , must have been fruit and fish stalls there in the day time because the place was littered with all the detritus of a market. The bar we went into looked like it had seen better days, the walls were varnished with nicotine and the lighting was low and murky. There were very few customers in the bar. Looked like we were in for a wild night. Of the U.S Airforce there was nary a sign , had they flown the coop? A little way down the bar from us sat a young brunette who two young black men sat each side of her; both of them were making a play for her and it was interesting to watch.
They might have been twins , dressed identically it was hard to tell one from the other, Little Richard seemed to have been their model ,their luxuriant black hair was pomaded into a DA, and they had full drape jackets with velvet collars. Mick kept giving them withering looks, he did?nt like to black guys dating white girls and I kept trying to distract him. ? She should be feckin? ashamed of herself, she would?nt be doin? that in New Orleans? Just then a working girl came in the bar, thank god, if she had?nt arrived I?m sure Mick would have started a ruck with those kids.
The working girl was quite pretty and Mick made his move quite quick ,not that he had any competition, he was just eager for feminine company. He brought her back to where we were seated at the bar and made a quick intro duction. More drinks were bought and Mick started canoodling just like the black kids down the bar. I was bored witless, afraid of Mick starting a fight earlier , I was now on the outer edges of his chat with Miss Ipswich.
It was long coming but closing time finally arrived , Mick was in seventh heaven because his lady was happy to go home with him, home being the Assurity. We were walking three abreast down the pavement toward the station when a long and low American limo pulled up alongside us , it was moving at our pace and the front passenger window rolled down, a rock faced guy with a snappy panama jutted his head out of the window an said in a loud voice ?Where are you going Mary?? I was between her and the car and saw her tremble visibly. ?It?s none of your business ? Mick growled. She stood still, looking fearfully at the car, there were three heavies in it. Mary was mute with fear. ?Are you taking them to the flat? this was asked in a voice quiet and menacing .?Tell ?im to feck orf? thundered Mick. ? Your friend likes hospital food does he ? the thug hissed . Mary went to the car and the rear passenger door opened and in she went. Mick was apoplectic when the car glided away. The veins in his neck were corded and his face was thunderous. I said we should go and get a fish supper and get back aboard but Mick needed a lot of cooling down.
There did?nt seem to be a fish and chip shop open anywhere, we seemed to be going in circles and then we saw the two black guys and the girl, Mick?s dander was up . They were in a shop door way and were having a three way necking session, Mick wanted to go over and give them a smacking but I dragged him away. Just then we saw a fresh faced young policeman and I asked where we could get some chips. He gave us directions to a place just around the corner, we came back down the street with our fish suppers when we saw the young policeman in the shop door way ; he was getting the bejesus thumped out of him by the black boys?. And the young girl was giving him a kicking too.
?C?mon Brian, let?s give these feckers wot they?ve been needin? all night?
He roared across the street and grabbed one of them by the throat, that left the other guy and the girl. Being a noted coward I was faced with a dilemma , run and let the other chase me or take a chance and get marmalised. I still don?t know how it happened but I found myself alongside Mick and I had hold of the other by his wrists. I was?nt going to let go of them and hit him because it would me he wou;ld be free to hit me. So there we were ,me and the black doing a two step in the doorway with an unconscious copper beneath our feet . Mick was venting all of his fury on his guy and it was in my mind that he could have this guy in front of me when he was ready for him. Meanwhile, the girl jumps on Micks back and starts beating the crap out of him with her shoe, a stiletto heeled one at that. I don?t know how long we were jazzing about but all of a sudden I received a tremendous blow across the back of my head. The black guy in front of me literally blanched with fear and I swung around to see what was up when I received another whack. There was a van load of policemen and they were going to give us all a hiding, thankfully the young copper had come to his knees and called ?Not the white lads Sarge, they?re helping me? The black guys were beaten into the black maria, our fish suppers were squashed into the pavement and we were bruised and tired. The old police sergeant came over to us ,his eyes narrowed to two splits beneath his helmet. ? An? where did you two characters spring from ? he muttered grimly. ? We?re off a boat in Felixstowe ? ? Ye?d best get back there then, we don?t need your type here?
The battered young bobby looked at us ,he was sorry for us but could?nt say it.
One good thing about it all , it was good therapy for Mick.

We did another couple of North Sea runs but the Assurity?s engine was getting much the worse for wear, the captain told us we would have to got to the company?s H.Q. in Greenhithe on the Thames. Engineers from the Newbury company were coming down to see what the problem was ,we would be having at least a weekend in Greenhithe.
Geographically, Greenhithe is right by were the Dartford Bridge over the Thames is, but this was 1963 ,that bridge was still on the drawing board, back then the little port was a bustling place, Everards had nigh on a hundred or more vessels , deep sea ,coasters, sailing barges and sundry other vessels.
We got there early on a Saturday morning and were moored up to buoys just off the port. There about a half dozen vessels moored up and the jetty?s and wharves were humming with life. A mad cacophony chipping hammers ,drills ,klaxon yelling, steam whistles blowing. Liners ,great white castles of majesty, vied with bustling beaverish tugs, and grizzled old sailing barges pushed along by gusts of wind. I loved the place on sight. Right on the Thames, every ship headed for all the London docks passed this place and there were many ,many ships in those days. Going to Tilbury, East India docks , Surrey Commercial , to the wharves and reaches that stretched right up to the Pool of London. The air was alive with the sounds of trasde and commerce.
I had been suffering with a tropical ulcer on my neck, it was from a bite I had received somewhere on the west Coast of Africa. Captain Fane had made arrangements for me to go to a hospital in London which specialized in tropical diseases ,so, no sooner had we moored to the buoys I was put on train to London to have my treatment. Thinking back ,life was so much more orderly then, there were frequent trains along the river to the city, quicker than a bus and just as cheap. I was quickly seen to at the hospital and ,because it was a half day I spent a few hours up the West End just looking at the sites. I?d only seen a bit of London before ,when with the sea school, and that was Kensington and the bit between Whitehall and the Embankment. This time I looked around Trafalgar Square, walked up to Piccadilly Circus and had some pie and chips by Leicester Square. I went and had a look at the second hand bookshops in Charing Cross road. I was looking for a particular book, part of a series that I had been introduced to by the bosun on the Assurity. A week or two before we arrived at Grenhithe ,the bosun had loaned me a book called ?A
Fox Under My Cloak? . It was by Henry Williamson and was semi autobiographical. I had never read such a powerful book in my life; written as a novel ,it depicted life in the trenches in the first World War. Never before had I been so moved by a piece of literature, little did I know that it would take me all of eight year before I succeeded in reading all of the work, ?A Chronicle of Ancient Sunlight? By the time I turned the last page ,I found that my world and my way of thinking had been changed beyond my imagining.
The first steps in that change began when I returned to Greenhithe.

Great Brian, keep 'em comin'.

hi brian have just got upto date with your yarns keep them coming

Quote:

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Originally Posted by clancy

hi brian have just got upto date with your yarns keep them coming

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Hey Clancy, you've been quiet. Howya doing?

OLD FATHER THAMES
I got back from the West End about 8.30 in the evening, I hadn?t had time to take a good look at the place we were now moored up at, leaving for the City had been a hurried affair. The high street was very quiet, it was not yet dark and you could see the buildings that housed the various trade crafts, the sail loft ,the blacksmiths shop, the rigging stores chain locker and many ,many more little stores and workshops, There were two sailing barges laying alongside each other ,white with scarlet and gold taffrails, they looked like barges fit for a royal personage so graceful did they look. One was called Ethel and the other Fred, or was it Frederick? Whatever, it made me think of the neighbours in the ?I Love Lucy Show? on t.v.
For a little hamlet,the place was so small it could not be termed a village, there were plenty of pubs. The length of the high street would be no more than 500 yards, if that, but there were five alehosuses in there. I called in at the one nearest to where the Assurity was moored off by ,it was called the Brown Bear. Like the rest of hamlet ,it was old ,the sailors of a century ago would have felt at home there, electricity was all that was different . The pub was very quiet ,no conversation could be heard and I got the strangest feeling as I entered ; the place was quite full yet as silent as the grave. I turned and looked around the room I became aware of being the object of everyone?s gaze. The air was acrid, crackling with tension and about eight or nine faces were pointing towards me. I felt as awkward as could be , I had expected to see Ray ,Johnny ,Mick but here i was ,faced by a hostile bunch of strangers.
A huge guy uncoiled himself from his seat and walked toward me ,a look of recognition on his face, he turned to the rest of the crowd seated and said ? I know him !? and turned back to me saying ?Hiya Brian? i was stumped, i did?nt know him, he told me he?d been a deckboy with me on the Chuscal .
It had been his first trip and that was in the autumn of 1961, near two years had passed and that young stripling was now a full grown man. He was a good he ad higher than me and was very strong looking. He was very deferential to me and took me over to meet his shipmates. The atmosphere changed immediately he sat me down , I had?nt hazed him on his first trip and that counted for a lot now. He told the company about the Chuscal and how kind I had been to him. I still treated him as i had when we sailed together, I gave him a pound and told him to get the beer in ,the crowd looked on as he stood up and went to the bar. One lad said ?He would?nt do that or us? and I said ? Well he was?nt your peggy was he!?
When Alf came back with the beers I asked him if he had seen anyone off the Assurity, a hush came over them all , Alf asked ? Are you on her?? I replied that i was and he then told me that they had had a bit of a scrap with the lads off her and that they had all gone back aboard. I could?nt believe it , we had some pretty tough characters among our crew and Alf and his mates had given them a battering. I told Alf that he had been out of order and that we were going to be here for a few days so he should behave himself. He blushed and smiled ,?For you Brian, anything? I stayed until closing and had an enjoyable time with the crowd. Most of them were off the Allurity ,which only worked on the Thames, she bunkered the ocean going vessels along the river, a bit like a floating garage. They were in port every weekend and most of them spent their time in the Brown Bear.
The landlord and landlady of that establishment were a lovely couple called Jimmy and Effie Uglow. He had been a sailing barge skipper and she his lifelong love. I liked them on sight.
As I wandered toward the door to make my way back to my ship, Jimmy called me over and told me that they did a lovely Sunday roast if I wanted a proper meal tomorrow , I told him wild horses would?nt keep me away. One of the lads off the Allurity volunteered to scull me out to the Assurity, you could?nt row on the lower reaches of the river ,the flow was too fierce.
When I got back aboard everyone seemed to be abed ,the alleyway was eerily quiet. Iwent around to Ray?s cabin and found him with his arm in a sling. I knew what had happened to him, but I asked him anyway. He said that they had no sooner sat down for drink when insults began to fly back and forth between the river men and the deep sea men (our boys). One thing led to another and a full scale barney took place. I really felt sorry for Ray , was it my fault for not being there?
He said that there was a South African who had been the main man and that a big kid called Alf was providing the muscle. I had a smoke with Ray and then went to my bunk. It was beautifully peaceful, just the occasional sound of passing vessel.
I awoke on Sunday and was shocked to se that I had really over slept, it was nearly opening time and i was still abed. I got up and showered and sauntered down to the messroom to see if there was anyone about. The cooks were busy in the galley with Sunday lunch and i remembered invitation, hurried down to Ray ?s cabin to see if he fancied a trip shore but he shook his head wearily, I got the same reaction from the rest of the crew ,they had had their taste of Greenhithe and did?nt like it; the thought of that Sunday roast propelled me ashore. Our jolly boat was tied up amidships and I asked the mate if i could use it to get ashore, .he asked me if i could scull and I told I had learned to do it at the training school. He said he would give us a blast on the ship?s hooter if he wanted it back and I told him that I would be in the Brown Bear having lunch.
As I was sculling ashore I noted that there were a few jolly boats tied up at the jetty?s. Brown Bear was going to be busy then. I made the boat fast to the jetty and walked up to the high street, it was empty but there was music sounding out from the Prince of Wales. I looked over to the Brown Bear and there was a well set man leaning against the and doorway, unlike me, he was well dressed, I was in clean working gear, I did?nt want to ruin my shore clothes because our jolly boat was pretty mucky. The man stepped out of the doorway came toward me ,his face was weather beaten and bore a few light scars. ?You must be Brian then? he said as he neared me, he put his hand out ?I?m Percy..........are ye eatin?? we shook hands and entered the Brown Bear. Effie and Jim were behind the bar, they looked up as we came in ? Dinners not quite ready ? said Jim ?you?ll have a drink first eh?? I looked at Percy and he said he?d have a scotch ,i went up to the bar and asked Jim for a whisky for Percy and a ginger ale for myself ,in a whisky glass; I could?nt drink scotch before lunch and Percy would?nt see the difference if it was in a whisky glass( I did?nt want him to think I was a wimp!!) time for another drink I told Percy that I?d have a beer because it looked like dinner was coming up . This guy seemed to have the heeby jeeby?s ,he was sounding me out ,it was so obvious, ?did I know so and so? ? Did you ever sail with...............?? I suppose we were like two dogs sniffing each other out. Only i was one dog that was?nt looking for a scrap, fighting was?nt an art that i had ever cultivated. Lunch was wonderful, the meal was served up on a charger ,it was huge ,beef, lamb and pork. There was Yorkshire pudding and apple sauce ,mint sauce and gravy with pork crackling on the side . A meal for monarchs; pudding was a lovely too, a suetty spotted dick with rich vanilla custard, I can still taste that meal these near fifty years later.
After dining we had a smoke and then I got up to get another round in ?Make it scotch again ? said Percy. When I went to the bar Effie leaned across toward me ?He?s going to get you drunk, watch him? I got Percy a double scotch and a ginger ale for myself. We sat in satisfied silence, the meal had taken the edge off the tension and the whisky was beginning to mellow Percy. He told me he had been married in Liverpool but had?nt seen his family for awhile,?This is a good place to be? he said ?No one bothers you? I did?nt quite understand what he meant ,but kept nodding anyway. Time passed slowly ,with me having one glass of whisky to every three glasses that Percy had. He could sup some stuff but he could?nt stand thrice the amount I had. Come three o?clock he slumped forward unconscious and Jim said ?He won?t be pleased about that, ye?ve drunk him under the table!!? he laughed ,winking at me and tapping the side of his nose. ?Your secrets safe with me sunshine? I hefted Percy to my shoulder and carried him through the door ,which Jim held open for me ,as I left he told me to watch out for myself. The other pubs were disgorging their customers and there were a couple of the Allurity?s crowd amongst them. Word very quickly got around that a scouser had beaten Percy in a drinking competition. I called to one of the crewmen to ask if he could take Percy back on board and he said ?No problem? and walked down the jetty with me to his boat. We had been joined by a couple of more Allurity men and between us we negotiated Percys safe transfer to their jolly boat. I waved them off and took our boat back to the Assurity. I was met by a couple of our lads ,they expected me to have been beaten up. I guess I was lucky!

Half way through Monday morning Captain Fane summoned me to the bridge, when I got there he asked to come into the chartroom. I wondered what kind of trouble I was in now. There was a large man in there ,he was wearing a beret,which was pulled down to his ears like Benny Hill used to wear his in comedy sketches, he was wearing a voluminous navy blue raincoat. Captain Fane introduced us ? Brian this is Captain Duncan Brown of the Allurity ,he?s got a proposition for you? I wondered what the hell was going to come next; I was?nt long in finding out, Duncan Brown spoke, ?Brian ? he said, ?your boat is going to be here for a little while, I?ve spoken with Captain Fane and he would be quite willing ,with your agreement, for you to swap articles and work on the Allurity while they get this one ready for sea again? he could see my puzzlement and added, ?it will be for no more than a fortnight and I am one man short..................? I felt torn at leaving my mates, especially Ray. Captain Fane clinched it ?Better?n ?anging round here doin? nothin?? I nodded my assent and went down to the messroom to see the lads, I told them what was happening and some of them wished me luck; Ray gave me look that made me feel guilty; I was joining a ship whose crew had given our lads a tanning. I don?t think I fully understood it myself. I went below and packed up my stuff ,a launch was coming for me and I got dressed in my go ashores ,crombie overcoat and snap brimmed trilby topped out my outfit. I climbed down into the launch and stood on the afterdeck waving goodbye to the crew, a sudden gust of wind caught my hat and it went flying away towards the estuary. This was a portent for the future.

The Allurity,or, A Comedy of Errors

The Allurity was moored up to buoys just a stones throw from the Assurity. She was lying fore and aft on the buoys ,providing the staff at head office with a perfect profile of her. Miss Ethel ,the owners daughter like to look out upon the river and see the various ships tied up in the Greenithe reach of the Thames.
She was a small ex Royal Navy tanker and her Captain had kept her in excellent trim. You could see the polished brasswork of the whistle on the funnel from a good way off.
I was unsure of what kind of welcome to expect when I stepped aboard,she was tiny and had a small crew. Captain Brown was first to greet me and took me up to his cabin to sign articles. On our way up to his cabin I met a man who looked like an illustration for a buccaneer, he had a Van Dyke beard and a wolfish grin ,which betrayed a terrible lack of teeth ,on his head he had a paisley square ,tied just like a pirates. This was 1963 , only bohemians ,or pirates, wore such things then. He wore an officers blouson with chief officers epaulettes. This apparition was the Mate. Duncan Brown introduced me to him and he said ?Welcome aboard matey ,ahaar? in pure stage pirate.
After I signed on I went down to the cabin ,not ,you notice ,my cabin ,but the cabin. This was where the deck crowd lived . All four of us, there was Alf , Percy and a guy just known as Canada. Never found out his real name,he was never willing to divulge it.
I did?nt have to pick a bunk ,there was only one spare and I had that.
After unpacking and stowing away my gear I went up to the mess room to see if I could rustle up a cup of tea; the cook was in there picking out his winners for tomorrows racing at Goodwood. He looked up from the paper and welcomed me with the words ? And you?re the man whose goin? to keep things in order here eh?? I did?nt answer that but asked him what the score was with the crew, they seemed happy enough . The cook replied that Alf had a fearsome temper and had once given Percy a trimming. He said the captain had heard how I had taken control of things in the Brown Bear and had Alf eating out of the palm of my hand. Sunday?s do with Percy had confirmed my status as a hard man and the captain could?nt wait to get me on board. My stomach did a back flip, I am the opposite of hard , a was comfortable with my cowardice ,what the hell was I doing here ?
It was near dinner time and the lads came in off deck and we sat down to plates of burnt offerings from the cook, he was?nt just a bad cook ,he was a LOUSY cook..And we had to pay him to do it ! So there we were ,the four of us pushing whatever it was around the plate and wondering what was going to happen next.
The next thing that happened that Alf was called to the captains cabin ,he was told that his Nan was gravely ill and his mum wanted him at home. He was signed off and on his way home before afternoon smoko. No need to be confronted with Alf then!
A young kid from Dagenham was sent aboard to replace Alf, no problem there then.
We were going to be in Greenhithe overnight and at 5.00 p.m. sharp the captain would be going home to spend the night by the fireside . It would be our job to unship the jolly boat ,which was now stowed aboard, and put it in the water so that Duncan could be ferried ashore. I have mentioned that this was a ?micro? ship compared to the ones that I had previously sailed on , it is important to bear that in mind when I relate what happened next.
There was no bosun on the Allurity , the mate did that job, he put me on the falls of the derrick. For those of you who are shore wallahs I will explain this as clearly as I can. The derrick is a boom,this is raised by hauling on it?s falls ,previous to the Allurity ,all the falls had been wire rope ,this one was rope ,two inch. You raise the derrick and there is a runner that goes from the top of the derrick through a block and goes down to a second block by the bottom of the derrick and a rope or, wire , is fed through those blocks to a winch . The other end of the runner has a hook on it and this is attached to a sling with four hooks on it , these hooks go through iron hoops on the side of the jolly boat. So the lads first raise the Derrick ,my job, then they lifted the boat . Two wires ,called guys, are attached to the top of the derrick so that when it is raised it can be pulled over the ships side. It was my job to lower the boat when it was over the water. I had the rope fall wound round a cleat, that bore the weight instead of me .It was a procedure I had carried out many ,many times. On a bigger ship!. I had three turns of rope around the cleat and Canada told me to start lowering away. I fed the rope into the cleat but was looking at Canada for guidance ,never noticing that three turns was two too many. I looked just in time to see the loose turns jump clear of the cleats and the Derrick plummeted down ,hitting the rails and smashing the jolly boat to matchwood. There was the total silence of disbelief as we ,all of us , watched the wreckage float away on the ebbtide. Just then ,the bereted figure of Duncan Brown stepped through the accommodation door. He looked as though he was struggling to understand what was happening.
?Where?s the boat ?? he asked . The mate was speechless ; I started to try explaining what had happened. When he realised that I was the cause of this catastrophe he said ? It was an understandable mistake , you?re not used to us little ?uns ? The lads were stunned, and so was I ; it appeared that this man wanted me at any cost.
The whole episode had been viewed quite clearly from the windows of head office. It was a spectacular start to a star crossed sojourn.
The next day we went to a little jetty in Swanscombe where we loaded some fuel for a ship in the West India dock , the man on the jetty was Quasimodo?s younger and uglier, brother. He was as ugly in his habits as he was in his looks,but more of him later. We tootled off to the West India dock and our bunkering was going to take all night so Canada took the first watch on the pump, an old donkey engine, and Percy invited me and the New Kid ashore for a swift one. There was a pub in the docks but I have long forgotten it?s name but it was what was in the pub that made me take the next step in compounding the image of me being hard. There was an ?Test your strength? machine by the bar counter. A simple old fashioned affair, there was a pistol grip handle which you squeezed,after putting your threepenny bit in the slot. You squeezed the grip and a finger went around a dial ,telling you if you were a weakling or a Hercules,with all the gradations in between. Percy stuffed a threepenny bit in and the needle went three quarters of the way around the clock. It was pointing at strong He shoved another coin in and said ?Here?ya Brian ,you have a go? I did?nt want to because I knew it would show ?Wimp?. He pushed me to the machine and said ? Go on boy ,do it!!? I gripped it and the needle went right around the clock and Percy?s eyes near started out of his head. ?What the f??!!? he exclaimed staring at the needle now pointing toward ?Superman?
I was dumbfounded and refused Percy?s kind offer to pay for another go , if I did?nt know anything else ,I knew you should always quit while you are ahead. After that silly little incident Percy became very deferential to me . Looked like Duncans plan was working out.
The engine room crew on the Allurity we all from the Yemen, they never had a messroom of their own and used to eat on the poop ,the back end of the ship. They cooked their own meals ,which used to smell delicious , but there was no fraternising with them . They were a real crafty crowd of so and so?s and the cause of the trouble between the deck crew and them was water. The Allurity had a very primitive system of plumbing ,if you wanted a shower ,you had to go on to the fiddley (the top deck above the engine room) where there was a hand pump. If you pumped the handle for about 450 times it would give you enough water in the tank for a good shower. Trouble was old Abdul and his friends used to watch you do the pumping and then all jump in the shower together. You could only be sure of a shower if it was very late and they were in their bunks.
We used to get our own back on them in a very crude manner, pleas and entreaties had no effect on them. We used to save up a good gutful of wind and when they were sat at their meal we would walk by and let it rip. They used to tip the remains of the meal into the river, silly I know ,but it was war.

The chap in charge of the Arabs was on old Irishman called Tommy, he was very evenly tempered, I never heard a cross word pass from his lips. Like Canada ,he was another man with a secret, he was on the run from a very angry ex wife. He would never be traced here because ,as I learned during my time aboard her, there a system ,for those who wanted it, of no names ,no pack drill. All these guys were sailing under false colours.
I found out Tommy?s little secret one Saturday afternoon , the cook used to go home from Saturday lunchtime until Sunday lunch time and so we had to shift for ourselves for the evening meal Saturday and Breakfast Sunday. Percy and I used to have Sunday lunch at the Brown Bear so that was no problem.
One Saturday ,after the cook had departed for home ,I smelled the most glorious aromas wafting from the galley. I went up top to have a look at who was creating this gastronomic delight and found Tommy in the act of extracting the most beautiful looking pie from the oven. The crust was embellished with pastry cows and oak leaves. I had never seen ,or smelled, anything so delightful.
?Where on earth did you get such a wonderful pie?? I asked him .? Would ya like some?? he replied . I nodded and he plunged his knife into the golden crust ,releasing yet more meaty aromas. He just split the pie between the two of us and my portion filled a dinner plate. There were chunks of beefsteak, meltingly tender kidney and caramelised potatoes and carrots. I sat and savoured every last forkful. I asked him where he had learnt to bake so well and he told me that he had served his time as a chief pastryman on the P&O and Cunard line. He had packed up the sea when he married a Londoner and got a job as head pastry cook at the Caf? De Paris. When his marriage hit the rocks he took a powder and found his way down to Greenhithe, where he ended up on the Allurity , this was now his home. I was finding out that Greenhithe was like a creek where the flotsam and jetsam of the merchant navy got caught up for a while???like I was.

Allurity 2

So there we were ,four pieces of driftwood who had ended up ,for four different reasons on the good ship Allurity. Percy and Canada had been on her a good while, I was yet to see how long I would be there. The fourth man? The fourth guy never lasted more than a few days, we three were odd you see, keeping dark secrets and never opening up to strangers.
Canada was the deepest, we knew nothing about him, he was laconic, his conversations consisted of ?Yup? and ?Nope? unless he was talking about deckwork ,then he could string a word or three together. He was?nt a miserable man ,far from it ,he would sit and listen in on conversations ,laugh at your jokes, but he never, ever ,talked about home or his past. Old Tommy reckoned he?d killed his wife back in Vancouver and was on the run ,said he?d told him when he was drunk . But that was just scuttlebutt . He seemed a steady kind of a guy.
At weekends he was a little bit different from your average Joe though; he would buy a half litre bottle of Queen Anne whiskey and a bottle of Codeine and hide himself in the rope locker and not come out until Monday morning.
Percy and I settled into an easy relationship, he realised that I was?nt going to be a hell raiser and we became shipmates. He liked a drink and a good time and like me , was on the verge of a matrimonial split. We did?nt talk about the why?s and wherefor?s it just was and was tacitly accepted as such.
A couple of day?s after the jolly boat fiasco ,we headed down to Thames Haven ,near the estuary ,that was where we filled up. We tied up alongside a wooden jetty on top of which there was a little fuelling station. I went on to the jetty and spoke to the pump attendant there. The fuel pipe was exactly the same as at any garage,a pistol grip with trigger feed. I stuck the nozzle into our tank on the fiddley and the pump man said he would start up after his lunch .? Get dahn ta yer messroom mate ,ah?ll give yer a whistle when ahm ready ? I nodded and went below for a smoke. I sat in the messroom doing the Daily Mirror crossword .I was having a good run ,got most of the answers and then everything went dark ! I looked at the portholes and they were black. ?F**k!!!? It was oil ! I streaked up to the fiddley and stepped out on to a sea of thick black oil. I looked at our tank and saw the oil gushing out. I shouted up to the pump attendant and he came scuttling to the edge of the jetty. Eyeing the scene he groaned ?Aw fack me mate ?..? Behind me I heard the door to the bridge open and turned ,just in time to see all 18 stone of Duncan Brown go arse over tip as he stepped into the oil. I squelched toward him and helped him to his feet. He looked frantic ,not comprehending what had happened to his lovely little vessel. The whitework was now black , he shook his fist at the pumpman and muttered an expletive. I was amazed ,he did?nt blame me!
It took some time to get the Allurity back to her pristine condition, Percy and Canada ribbed me unmercifully and the mate was furious that Duncan had?nt sacked me. When he asked what relation I was to the captain I just winked and came out with a cod Roman proverb ? The less you know the wiser a man you will be , Marcus Plautus A.D.43? He looked quizzically and cackled ,repeating what I had said ,?Arr I likes that ,Marcus oo? ? I used to feed him these little proverbs whenever the need arose and he would store them in his memory ,reciting them in the pub when in his cups.
In the big world out side the Thames ,Britain was moving into the sixties with great gusto, those kids in Liverpool were still making records and they were even appearing in the papers advertising those naffest of naff jeans.?The Beatles wear Lee Cooper Jeans? boasted the ad. Showing four very slim young guys with their backsides posed so that the label showed up prominent . It was an artists impression, those jeans were so limp that they would never look smart on anyone. There were new cars ,radical designs ,the Ford Corsair looked very American ,We had only seen artists impressions of that too ,but ladies fashions was where the real differences were seen. The skirts were becoming shorter and the colours brighter ,the mini skirt had?nt yet arrived but the 50?s look was well and truly dead.
The cook had a little transistor radio and he used to hang it by the galley door so that we could hear it in the messroom . The pirate radio stations were starting up , one of them was on one of the old Martello towers down at the mouth of the Thames, but our favourite was Radio Caroline. This station had the Kenny and Cash show, Kenny Everett and Dave Cash, it was like listening to Jack Jackson on speed( remember him ,one of the greatest) .This was so different from the BBC with Godfrey Winn and Victor Sylvester.
One of the fourth men we had was a kid from Dagenham, he was a breath of fresh air ,he was the sixties, he knew who was who and what was what. ? Them Beatles mate, great, but wait ?til ya hear the Stones? he was talking another language. He knew about Carnaby Street and disco?s wore his hair long(collar length) and winklepicker shoes with skintight trousers ,old Tommy thought he was ?bent? ,old Tommy was wrong ,he was the future.
Another fourth man was a wrestler ,I won?t mention his name ,he seemed a fairly o.k. person ;one Saturday we went to Gravesend together to see the latest film smash ?Dr No? with Sean Connery . It was brilliant to see a British film that was not about kitchen sinks and abortions. That film was sheer elegant fantasy and the public loved it. However, when we were on our way to the movies, we were looking at some shoes in a shop window when the 4th gave a little groan ?Phhwoar ,Look a that scouse? he said. I turned to look and could?nt see anything but a little pigtailed girl wearing patent leather shoes and a polka dot dress. ?what am I supposed to be looking at?? I queried . ? Her ,her over there ? he muttered, his eyes shining and a leery grin on his face. It was the little girl.
I burst out laughing ,thinking it was a joke. The look on his face told me different. He was a paedophile. My skin crawled . Thankfully he left very shortly after that incident. His replacement was not much better.
Sundays would , invariably ,find us moored up outside head office. If we had got there late on Saturday night ,Canada would forgo the Rope Locker and go to the Brown Bear with us. This was one such a weekend, we had met the new 4th man ,again a young local ,he had a few drinks with us on Saturday night and departed our company at closing time .We thought he had gone to spend the night at home. So there were just the three of us in our bunks when we got our heads down, I had the bunk above Canada and Percy had the bunk below the 4th man. After a heavy booze induced sleep ,we awoke to the sound of music, music? In our cabin ?. Music and newspapers , the Sunday Times ,The News of the World , People ,Express etc ,etc. What was going on? It was the new kid , he brought a radio and the papers, made us all tea and toast and we lay in bunks ,luxuriating with breakfast in bunk and music too.!
Time passed peacefully as we scanned our Sunday papers, the sounds of a launch came close, next thing we felt the bump as it came alongside . Percy looked up at me ,his face a question mark. I shrugged, had no idea. Heavy footsteps echoed through the steelwork ,a lot of them. We sat up ,Percy ,the 4th man and me ,I could?nt see Canada. The door burst open and a load of helmeted policemen came in ;they raced across the cabin and dragged the 4th man off his bunk. He was handcuffed and led away, Percy asked a policeman what was happening and the policeman replied that the kid was known villain who had broken into an old ladies house last night and stole her purse and radio. He took the radio from the bunk shelf and ,when the launch had departed, the cabin returned to silence . About twenty minutes after this Canada gave an enormous sigh of relief. Was old Tommys story true?
A few days later we were bunkering one of the Indian JAT liners up in Surrey Commercial, I relieved the new 4th man on the pumpwatch, we had to keep the donkey engines piston greased and watch out for the ladder. This we would prop against the side of the ship we were bunkering, we usually propped it so that it could ride up the other ships side as we emptied and grew lighter and the ship we were fuelling got heavier and sunk lower in the water. You had to be on the ball to keep on top of things. You made the ladder fast to the other ship with gantlines ,you never, ever stuck it through the other ships railings . I had just taken my turn and was greasing a very dry piston when I heard an almighty crack ,followed by a splash. I ran out of the pump room and saw the broken stump of the ladder laying on our deck and the top half was nowhere to be seen. The 4th man had stuck it through the rails of the JAT boat. Duncan had come out on deck after hearing the crack , he looked at me ,his face bore the look of someone cursed. He shook his head sadly and went back in to his cabin. After my spell at the pump , I got dressed and Percy and I went to a dockside pub and got well lashed. How long could my luck hold out?
Picture below are the Allurity ,and then a picture of me a pianist and Percy on the "lash" outside Surrey Commercial docks.

Great story Brian.

Interlude
Whilst I was working on the Thames we used to weekend in Greenhithe, as the cook went home for the time we were there ,we had to find somewhere to eat. The Brown Bear was our choice, it was friendly, the ale was excellent and the food was English cooking at its best.
The Landlord and his wife were Jimmy and Effie Uglow, their son Alan was an Oxbridge graduate :I?ve forgotten which one he went to. They had a dog,a collie, and it was very friendly. They used to get plenty of visitors to the pub and they had a bar card upon which there was a photo of Jim and Effie with the dog sat between them. It bore the legend ?Welcome to the Brown Bear ,the pub that is so friendly even the dog says hello? Jim ,or Effie would give newcomers to the pub a doggie chocolate drop and tell them to put it on the back of their hand. The dog would then come over to them and whine and sound that really sounded like ?hello? It was wonderful to see the faces of the foreigners when the dog did its party piece.
Jimmy spent the bulk of his life as a barge captain working for F.T Everard and sons. In the early 30?s he became skipper of the Will Everard and sailed on her right through the Second World War up until his retirement which, I think , took place in the late 50?s . It was then he became the licensee of the Brown Bear.
Jim was a marvellous mine host, as well as keeping a fine cellar and kitchen ,he was a marvellous raconteur. I think he looked a lot like Billy Cotton ,.the old band leader, and his wife Effie was very gracious; Alan ,the son cared not for his appearance but was very erudite and could always offer a good conversation. He had a mind like a steel trap and could knock off the Times crossword whilst serving at the bar.
Friday nights would see Jim taking his lady up to the West End, without fail he would come around to the customer side in his night out suit and titfer, always had a nice silk handkerchief in his top pocket. A very dapper man. He would call whoever was serving at the time and told them it was ?drinks on the house?. I enjoyed that treat quite a few times.
The thing I remember most about that little pub was Jim?s tales, time has eroded the memory of a lot of them so I?d like to share with you the few that I do recall.
The Thames sailing barges were hard working boats that plied up and down the east side ,going as far as Norfolk and to parts of the Channel. They always sailed close inshore and were worked by a skipper ,a mate and, sometimes , a third hand. Mostly a boy.
Jim said that he was carrying an assorted cargo from the Medway up to the Pool and was asked by the agent if he would take two ladies who going to work in a Christian mission in the Polar area . Jim only had a boy with him on this trip, boy with the foulest mouth in Christendom. His every other word was fack, he could even do split infinitves like ? O fackin K!? Jim was worried about Gingers language upsetting the good ladies and so he spent the hours preceding their boarding teaching him the proper words to use in front of the ladie. Ginger had to show them where they could spend their time as they went up to the Pool. He was to start off by showing them the messroom and then show them what they had in the way of toilet facilities. Jim stressed that the proper word for peeing was ?Urinate? and the proper word for a number two was evacuate. Delivering a stern warning about using any foul language , Jim left the welcoming to Ginger while he and the mate got ?Will Everard? ready for the trip up river. She was?nt a massive craft, nearly everywhere aboard was in earshot and ,when the ladies arrived ,Jim heard Ginger welcome them .?Welcome aboard the Will ladies, I?d like to show yer where yer kin park yerselves as we go up upriver? Ginger took their bags and took them to the mess ? Thi ?ere?s called the mess ,yer kin kip ?ere if yiz need 40 winks? He put their bags down there and led them to the stern. Pointing to the galvanised bucket with a half inch rope attached ,he said ? Now if yers need a tinkle, yer kin uranimate in the bucket , but ,if yers need to evacurate ,ye?ll a?ve to sh*t over the side like the rest of us?
Jim said he near ruptured himself trying not to laugh out loud.
The bargemen carried lots of unusual cargoe?s, those of you who read Dickens ?Our Mutual Friend ? will know that there was great trade in human excreta. Dried out in the sewage works of the Thameside towns ,this was carried to some place down river where it was stored and sold to farmers for spreading on their fields. This trade was still in existence when Jim was sailing on the Will and told me this sad story, he was just going into Rochester and he was passing another Everards barge making her way out of Rochester. He hailed her ? Where r?yer bound ?? back came the reply ? Upriver? Jim then noticed quite a few people on deck, ? Wot?r yer carryin??
He queried , back came the reply ? A cargo o? sh*t an? a bunch o? Shakespearean Hactors!!?
Jim said he met the other barge captain a week or so later and the captain told Jim that as soon as he had called out his cargo ,one of the old Thespians turned to another and said ?We?ll make the top of the bill yet old boy ?
Another of Jims stories concerned one of the last true barge skippers ,the legendary Bob Roberts of the Cambria,the last working barge on the Thames. I never had the pleasure of meeting Bob , if I had I think he would have been contemptuous of me. He was a true sailor man, no power winches or steam engines for him. Anyway ,Bob was carrying a party of trainees from a sailing club/ school(I forget which) .Bob was scathing about them, they knew it all from books, however, during one such session a lady asked what they would do if the barge sank, Bob replied ?Swim for the shore? she answered ?but I can?t swim? Bob said ?Well ,wait ?til she touches bottom and then run like hell!?
Sadly ,that world is gone now, most old barges have gone for scrap and the few that are left are owned by clubs or individuals. I feel privileged to have spent a short time on their river and to have had a glimpse of how things used to be. I?ll be back aboard the Allurity soon.

Nice one Brian. Keep 'em comin'.

From Bad to Worse
I had been on the Allurity for over three weeks now and things seemed to be settling down,I had?nt killed anyone yet and that was some kind of bonus.
Whenever we were moored at Greenhithe ,Big Mick of the Assurity always seemed to be at the bar ,Ray and the other lads had left to go to their home ports, Mick was standby man.. His standing by place was at the bar of the Brown Bear. One night , when I was on boat duty (this meant staying sober and you had to fetch and carry the lads from whatever ships were moored up in Greenhithe) I took Percy and some lads from the Allurity and then went out to the Assurity to collect Mick and the 2nd mate. After a couple more trips I joined Percy and Mick in the Brown Bear. They were just getting a full head of steam on and the jokes were flying thick and fast. Before we knew it time was being called and I had to go around the pubs digging out the lads who had to get ferried back to their boats. They were always three sheets to the wind and it was my responsibility to make sure they got back aboard their ships safely. This usually involved at least two trips, I would fill the boat to its maximum load and then scull out to the moorings. You have to stand in the stern when sculling, you hold the oar in your right hand and manipulate it so that it moves through the water like a propeller. Easy enough, but when you have a boatloads of tosspots you have to keep a watchful eye out for the drunken ?comedian?. This is the guy who will start to make the boat roll , hoping to give some one a ducking. The Thames has no mercy with revellers,you don?t reason with comedians, you just flick the oar up and out of the water and smack them on the head, it usually knocks?em cold ; I only had to do it twice in 2 months. Word soon gets around. Another difficult job was getting the dead drunk back aboard his ship. I had to make my jolly boat fast to the drunks vessel and then sling him over my shoulder and climb the ladder. It was a good job I was fit and that most of the ships were low in the water but there was one time when I was moored up to a ?foreigner? she was empty and the was about a fifteen foot climb to do with a drunken cook. I was half way up the Jacobs ladder and he comes to,wanting a fight. I was sorely tempted to let the bleeder fall ,but we made it to the deck somehow.
I made my last ferry run out of the Brown Bear, I?d take Percy back and then get my head down. Mick was sleeping the night at the pub, he could drink all night if wanted. Percy was flaked out on the bar. Jimmy said he had really lost his crown now, Mick had matched him glass for glass and Mick was still game for another pint or three. I asked him if he would give me a hand back to the boat with Percy and he said he?d be delighted. I took Percys? ankles and Mick took his shoulders and we carried him down the slipway .When we got to the edge of the jetty I turned around ,this time holding Percy by his calves and stepped down backwards into the boat. We were in a little tidal creek and it was fairly low water. Mick had Percy beneath the shoulders and was about to step in to the boat when Percy came awake with a roaring yell , he flexed himself with such force that Mick was pulled through the air,went over Percys head,Percy crashed down on top of me and Mick went head first into the creek. Percy was unconscious again and Mick came to the surface, his head crowned with spent condoms and other unsavoury items. I said goodnight to Mick and ferried Us back to the Allurity????.I had the giggles all the way back, still get them now when I think of it.
I joined Mick for Sunday dinner at the Brown Bear and asked what he was going to do ,wait for the Assurity to be repaired or get a berth on the river. I had been thinking of leaving the Allurity, I was bored as well as jinxed. A couple of brothers from Rochester ran another of the Everard boats on the river ,she had single berth cabins and a smaller crew than the Allurity. Mick said he was?nt sure, he was a thinker,not like me ,impulsive.
Sometimes though, life makes up your mind for you.
We were in St Katherines, bunkering a Baltic trader , I had just relieved the duty pumpman , I checked the ladder,O.K., checked the donkey engine, running like a train O.K.
Gonna be a good watch. The ships engineer signalled that we were finished ,I called the mate and we started to draw our equipment back,the last two items to come back aboard were the horrendously expensive manganese bronze clamps. We used a gantline to lower them to the deck . I made the clamps fast and started to lower them to our deck.When they were halfway toward our deck the gantline started to part, it seemed to happen ever so slowly, the clamps were spinning and the gantline was unravelling, the Irish kid who was supposed to receive them jumped back clear as they hit the deck ?????.and slithered into the dock. Duncan Brown was on the bridge looking at the bubbles rising to the surface . I looked at him and said ?Just drop me off at Greenhithe would you??

The very next day I signed on the Adroity, she looked a lovely little ship, built in Holland and full of mod coms.
She was a river runner ,she was no where near as busy as the Allurity but there never seemed to be any pressure. Her captain was Alan Tremayne, a more nautical name I have yet to hear; his younger brother Peter was his mate. For a couple of days that completed the deck crew.
The Adroity?s jolly boat was a sadly neglected affair. The varnish long gone leaving her teak open to the elements . I suggested to Peter that it might be a good idea if we refurbished the boat.,he was all for it. So I set myself to ,scraping and sanding until we got rid of the dead grey wood. Then I applied the primers, it was lovely to see the old mud coloured boat spring back to life. I painted the stern white and drew a couple of scrolls on either side of the tiller ,the portside scroll bore her name and the starboard side her pot of registry. I did some skull and crossbones on either side of the bow as well as her name. All of the lettering was done in gothic and the taffrail was done in white picked out with gold. I loved that old boat.

The Adroity

Looking out my window I am reminded of that long ago late autumn, the sky is a watery blue and the ragged white clouds are scudding past ,blown by the northern winds.
I really enjoyed sailing up and down the Thames on days like this, the scenery was unmatched, you pass town and country as you go from the Estuary up to the Pool, the river meanders and each bend brings a new vista. And the river was so busy, you could not relax your vigilance ,nor could you trust other ships to do the right thing. The captain ,Alan Tremayne was a very clever man , I never understood why was master of a little Dutch clog, he was a Fellow of the Royal Society and he was a mathematics Don. I was in awe of the man ,the conversations we had when we were wending our way up, or down, river were fascinating. He was the first person to impress on me how much mathematics mattered, he talked and I listened and asked questions. I learned of how the Royal Society came about during the period called the Enlightenment and how this led to many great discoveries that made Britain a leader in the world. His brother Peter was the complete opposite, he was tall and blonde haired, looked like a young Mick Jagger and had a really ?goonish? sense of humour , being a long time fan of the Goons I got along just fine with him.
With Adroity being idle most of the time I was used to do a lot of ferrying and one day I was asked to pick up young man who had been involved in a shipwreck in the Channel. It was one of Everards that had sunk and he had been picked up by another coaster which was headed for London. I was to meet her mid river opposite our offices in Greenhithe.
The operation went like clockwork, the coaster gently slowed to a halt and the ladder was lowered and down it came our young shipwreck survivor. I was to take him ashore and that would be my job for the day. Now our jolly boat leaked like a sieve but it was manageable,I only used to do short runs but this run to mid river had made her leak more than somewhat and, as soon as he had sat down ,I gave young Jonah the baler and told him to start getting rid of the water while I sculled to shore. I was just turning her head to toward the shore when I heard an ?Oooh sheet? I looked and saw that the young prat had pulled the plug out???..he thought the water would run out,instead we had our very own fountain shooting up amidships. I dived forward and bunged the plug back in and told him ?F**ckin? bale before I made him swim for it? The rest of our journey passed in silence ,save for the slurp and splash as he baled away.
No wonder he was shipwrecked ,most probably scuttled that one.
Mick was still around and the Assurity had departed for blue waters once more, I asked him if he fancied joining the Adroity and he said yes he would give it a go. I took him along to the Tremaynes and they signed him on immediately. They also made him bosun, well, he was older than me and had been around a bit, so what the heck. We were not a liner there was no room for bullshine.
We started to get busy again and were running up and down the Thames every day, in and out of the Pool, KG 5 ,East India, Grays, Dagenham, Surrey Commercial ,Gravesend Swanscombe,Cliffe, the list was endless and I am sure that we bunkered a lot of vessels but, unlike the Allurity , there was no jinx on me here. Met some odd people though, like Quasimodos relative in Swanscombe. When I had been there a few times he invited me into his ?office? on the jetty . ?Ereyar Scarse? he said ? ?ave a look at these then? he showed me some pornographic photo?s of him and a very good looking lady,she was wearing a basque and fishnet stocking while he was shown in various positions. She must have been very poor to let herself be photographed like that , I felt like having a shower after seeing them.
We overnighted at Swanscombe and Mick and I went up to the nearest pub to taste the local brew. I cannot remember the pub or the beer ,but I have a vivid recollection of the journey back to our ship. We must have been a bit like the Walrus and the Carpenter out of ?Alice Through the Looking Glass? We were engrossed in drunken conversation about sailing ships and sealing wax , and cabbages and kings. We must have been on automatic pilot, it was a clear moonlit night and there was a slight breeze riffling the surface of the Thames, we were walking along the jetty ,deep in philosophical discussion ,when I felt the decking move beneath my feet. I looked at Mick and he was swaying too. Was I that drunk! I looked down and saw the river beneath my feet ,I could hardly speak ?Mick , this is?nt the jetty we?re tied up on look down?
The planks were rotten and there were a lot missing ,the pilings were swaying with rivers movements and we were in deep doodah. We looked back at the way we had come and we could see the jetty had more holes in it than string vest. We tiptoed back to the quay,each step taken with the greatest of care. We could hear the planks which had been standing plunge into the waters twenty foot below. When we made it back to hard ground we saw that we had passed through warning barriers and some coils of barbed wire. The Lord surely does look after fools and drunkards.
I was now sleeping at the Brown Bear of a weekend, Mick had talked me into it and ,of a truth ,I quite enjoyed it . No more supping up at 10-30p.m. ,we could sit chatting to Jim and Effie and it was more like a family . There was an incident that unnerved me though. I had gone to bed not, I hasten to add , in drunken stupor. The bed was a lovely old iron framed affair with springs between the frame and a great overstuffed mattress. It did;nt take much rocking to slumber off. I was shaken awake by a lady who was dressed in crinoline and her hair coiled atop her head like a regency lady. I rubbed my eyes thinking it was Effie and the room was filled with an eau de nil glow. As I was about to say something she faded from view and the room returned to darkness. I never discussed the matter with anyone ,they might have thought me mad.
My relationship with Mick was becoming strained by his attitude, I had got him the job and he did?nt want to spend to much time with now that he was my ?boss? I started to think about leaving for pastures new, the decision was made for me by the following incident.
It was the middle weekend in November, I had been ashore for a few drinks and Mick and I needed a ride out to the Adroity. I had met a young man from West Vale in Kirkby and he was really nice, we got on fine and I asked him if he had a jolly boat, he replied yes and we asked him f he could take us out to our mooring . No problem he said . The tide was ebbing and the current was strong so I said that I would scull us ti our ship and then he could take her back. The passage out went smoothly ,Mick jumped aboard and made her fast to the Adroity while I changed places with young scouse. I gave him the oar and then jumped aboard ,Mick set her loose and young scouse cried plaintively that he could?nt scull. The tide had a grip on the jolly boat and it was swept away from us. Mick ran to the bridge and grabbed the Aldis lamp and shone it on him , he was swinging the oar wildly and we could hear him shouting for help . And then he was gone, he fell over the side and that was the last we saw of him. A PLA launch passed near us and Mick flashed her but got no response. We had no radio, no boat, I felt helpless. I could?nt sleep that night knowing I had caused a young mans death. Next morning when the Tremaynes came aboard I told them I was leaving, I blamed myself for what had happened and did?nt want to spend another minute in that god blasted place. When I said goodbye to Jim and Effie they told me that the whole village was upset. I caught the train to London and began a new chapter of my life.

The World Turned Upside Down
I made my way to Leman Street in dockside area, the Red Ensign seamans hostel was there and it was quite close to Dock Street Pool where I hoped to get a deepwater ship.
Aldgate East was the nearest Tube station to my new address, I was hoping that it was going to be very temporary, M. was still being paid an allotment by me and my funds were limited.
I emerged from Aldgate East station into a murky London day ,it was?nt called the Smoke for nothing, the air was smutty, wear a white shirt and you would?nt walk a hundred yards before little black flecks would appear on your cuffs,collar and shirt front.. You dare?snt rub them off ,they would smear and when you washed your shirt a rust spot would appear.. It was best not to wear white in London then.
I booked into the Red Ensign and got the keys to my room. When I went to unpack I found a clean square rig had been left in one of the drawers, I tried it for size and it fitted me ,I let the guy at the reception desk know of my find and he told me to keep it.
I had a look around the hostel, it was adequate, clean ,good rooms ,a t.v. lounge and a good canteen. I had enough cash to stay for a fortnight or more. I was?nt going to take the first ship I was offered.
Mick had warned of some of the characters who used to frequent these places , they could spot an easy roll a mile off ,don?t flash your cash was his last words to me. When I went into the T.V. lounge I could see what he meant. The place was full, it was near tea time on a Saturday and the betting men were huddled near the t.v. awaiting the results. Grim faced,papers and football coupons in hands,hoping their teams, or horses had done as they wanted . The atmosphere was quite fraught ,I was reminded of the many Saturday nights at home when my sisters and I had to keep absolutely silent as the clipped tones of the newsreader read out the results. It was thus here, only a hundred times more tense. Just as the music that announced the beginning of the results programme ended ,a big fat bearded man entered the lounge and headed straight for the t.v. ? Heyyy!?he cried in squeaky Kiwi accent
?Don?t yer know the Goons are on the other side? switching the set over as he said so.
There was the puppet of Colonel Bloodnock berating Bluebottle when a hundred anguished howls of rage erupted in the lounge. The air was blue and Kiwi departed , his back full of invisible daggers. He was a genuine character and I saw him many years later on a question time programme talking about transcendental meditation. He was a hippy ahead of his time.

I had a shower and headed up to the West End, it was Saturday and I was in the mood for a good night. I gravitated around Piccadilly Circus ,Leicester Square and Soho. I quickly realised that London nightlife would best be savoured in company. Maybe it was just the way I was feeling ,but all those bright lights and the hustle and bustle of tourists and night outers just served to underline how lonely a person could be. And the place was full of hustlers and cottagers. I took a slow walk back to Aldgate passing through the City and Fleet Street.
The early editions of the Sunday papers could be bought from the newspaper offices around about midnight and I got an armful as I strolled back .
I had an enjoyable Sunday morning, breakfasted in the canteen and then just lay back in my room catching up with current events.
I met a couple of guys down in the lounge that night , one was a local , well he lived in Ealing, and the other was from Newcastle. The Ealing man was called George and the other ,well,I only remember him as Geordie. George was living in the Red Ensign because he was leaving his wife, Geordie was there because he had just come out of hospital after breaking his arm on a Norwegian tramp steamer. He was destitute and was hoping he could get back to sea.
I spent quite some time with them and George asked me if I would like to go home with him and make love to his wife, as desperate as I was ,I was?nt stupid.
I got a ship, the Athelcrest and I would be going out to join her in Rotterdam at the weekend so, on Friday night I invited George and Geordie to go up the West End .
After a few drinks we went to the Lyceum and had a great evening, company always makes things better. Geordie disappeared,we thought he had pulled and as midnight approached we made our way out of the dance hall. Outside was chaotic , people were clustered in groups and I began to hear snatches of conversation, John Kennedy had been assassinated. It is difficult to convey the scenes I witnessed then ,men and women clutching each other for comfort ,groups of young girls openly weeping. It was like a prelude to some great disaster and in a way it was. I was leaving in the morning and would witness more scenes of sadness before the week was out .
When we got back to the Red Ensign we found Geordie there , with his arm in a sling again.
He had fallen in the dance hall and refractured his arm, he was in a desperate state. I gave him the money for his fare home and went upstairs to pack.

We had an early start ,the new crew had to muster in Dock Street and we would be taking the boat train to Rotterdam ,in the care of a Pool official.
The mood of men who met next day was sombre, that shooting in Dallas echoed around the world. It certainly put my own problems in proportion, they were just a handful of dust compared to that which faced the world. I, like a lot of other young people around the world had so many hopes pinned on John Kennedy, he would lead us out of the Cold War, a war that had existed or the whole of my life thus far. There was so much speculation as to who were the real killers , the American Military /Industrial complex that Eisenhower had warned of in his resignation speech was thought to be the main suspect. We would learn more as time passed. For now we had a train and a boat to catch.
The Pool official in charge of our transport was a huge blonde man, a lot of the crew knew him and they shared some of their beers with him on the train. We were a disparate crowd, from every corner of the British Isles. One or two had been at the Red Ensign and I was on nodding acquaintance with them. There would be time enough to learn who was who as we journeyed eastwards.
By the time we boarded the ferry the Pool man was well in his cups, as we journeyed across the North Sea he got drunker still on the duty frees. By the time we reached the Hook of Holland he was as drunk as a lord .As we were passing through Customs and Immigration he lifted the Customs official by his shoulders and put him aside ?We did?nt need this malarkey last time I was here, you b*st*rds were waving Union Jacks then!!? We were very embarrassed, but the Dutchman was good humoured enough to let it lie.
On the train to Rotterdam he fell into a drunken stupor and we escorted him to our new ship.

The old crew were departing for their home leave when we arrived,they had been away for over twelve months and were looking forward to Christmas at home. Some of the old crew stayed on board for the next trip, the bosun ,lamptrimmer and carpenter remained . They were company men and would be there for the duration.; the chippy was a fellow townie and he seemed to be a very friendly , the bosun was from London and was so weatherbeaten that he looked like he had been made out of leather. The lamptrimmer ,the only one of the trio whose name I remember was a little Irishman called Willie Brennan. He was a nephew of Brendan Behan the author of the ?Quare Feller? and was very loquacious ,almost Dickensian,in his way of speaking.

Our cabins were twin berth ,but quite spacious, the doors were in little recesses and pairs of cabins faced each other, it made things a little more private than facing right out into a working alleyway. My cabin mate was a southerner, his name and town have been lost in the mists of time,but he was a nice guy. He was on the same watch as me and the guy in the cabin next door ,Tam Goldie , was also on our watch. Tams cabin mate was an odd one , a Creole form the Seychelles , his name was very Welsh,Mark Morgan ,and I will dilate upon him as my story unfolds.

We were still learning of events in Dallas through the BBC Overseas news, the assassin had himself been shot by a known criminal ,Jack Ruby, the waters were getting muddier and we had enough pundits amongst our deck crew to keep things stirred up.
We had a young JOS, Arthur was his name, he was from somewhere down the Estuary, this was his first trip as a JOS and he was feeling his way into the job. There was also an AB who had stayed over from the previous trip. Big Benjie was an ex Royal Navy man who looked like he had just stepped off a packet of Players cigarettes. He had a proper naval beard ,above which there were a pair of twinkling blue eyes. He looked every inch a Jolly Jack Tar, he was what was called canned goods and poor Arthur became his target. In fact we had a cook who was of the same persuasion and he had a ?best friend? ,who was a young man whose family had escaped from East Germany and was now a deckhand aboard the Athelcrest .
The second cook was a young guy of West Indian extraction who now lived in London and was a very friendly person.

We learned that we would be escaping the northern climes and would be setting off for Karachi in West Pakistan. That suited me down to the ground, escaping the winter in home waters. After rock dodging for the best part of the year, it was a treat to get out into blue waters again. The crew were mostly deep sea men ,and trampers at that, my cabinmate had just spent over twelve months away on a Royal Fleet Auxilliary , Mark had just done an around the world run on an old Bank liner and Tam had done a long run too. They were good watchmates, laid back and in no hurry to get anywhere ,being at sea was what suited them most,and, looking back, it began to suit me too.

The Athelcrest was a molasses tanker and there were hardly any derricks to overhaul , our main tasks were watch keeping and scraping and painting, which we did endless days of.
We did?nt drink much at sea , a couple of cans at most , our evenings and free time were spent chatting , playing board games , reading and making and mending. Mark was a wizard with scissors and needle and thread and it was he who taught me how to make my own clothes. He wore a beautiful white duck canvas seaman?s cap and I asked him where he got it.
He told me he made it and I asked him how ? Get some duck canvas and I will show you? I asked the bosun if he could let me have a piece of the treasured cloth and he told me to help myself. Mark traced the pattern on the cloth and I had to cut it ,following his instructions. He then showed me how to make the peak , which would be stiffened by an insert of thick cardboard. He taught me to have patience in doing the needlework, tiny stitches ,so small as to be barely discernable, it took nearly a week but the finished article was excellent and lasted me for many years. As soon as I finished my cap I commenced work on a pair of jeans; I unpicked a pair of Levis that were destined for the ragbag and used them as a template. Weeks later, and well into the tropics , I had a pair of duck canvas Levis .again ,they lasted a long time.
Mark was an incredible character, he owned a plantation in the Seychelles and was on the run from one of his many wives, he owed too much in alimony and could not face the prospect of going back. After we had been together for a few weeks he called me to his cabin to show me his ?little treasures? as he called them. I wondered what his little treasures could be.
When I got sat down in his cabin, he pulled out a butter fly collectors case, a wonderfully veneered piece of work which opened out into two sections. It was about 3 foot wide and 2 foot long and had about 30 ,or 40 , little glass compartments either side. At first glance I thought I was looking at some brightly coloured insects and then Mark lifted the case closer to my gaze. What I was looking at at was little tufts of pubic hair tied with different coloured silk ribbons ,and beneath each little exhibit was the name of the owner of the tuft???and the date that hair ,and the virginity was taken. I sat gawking at the exhibits, there were at least sixty of them and each one represented a deflowering. I thought ? what a dirty old man? but reality proved to be a different case as I found out later.
Gradually relations become settled , shipmates become friends and you ease into a a kind of routine. Mark was a ship board friend but not someone I would choose to go ashore with,he was at least 30 years older than me and was interested in different things. My cabinmate, Tam and a chap called Harry Gambie ,became go ashore mates. Tam liked a good argument and I was?nt averse to the cut and thrust of a good debate, Harry and my cabin mate ,being of more equable dispositions acted as counterbalances to our fiery northern characters,we were perfect foils for each other.

It was Christmas when we arrived in Karachi, and not a joyous time at that, there was a famine there and starvation was to be seen everywhere you looked , sometimes it looked at you.!
We were sat down to dinner on Christmas Day; somehow ,some starving children appeared at our portholes looking in to the messroom. Gaunt faced and silent, they looked at us as we prepared to start our dinner. Not a bite passed our lips, we gave it all to the kids,there was no way we could have eaten while they hungered.
I went ashore on my own that night , it was too claustrophobic on board but no one fancied a shore run. The quay we were on was a long way from the dock gate and half way down it, there was a tea room, the night was quite humid so I thought I would stop and have a lemonade. An old gent dressed in American summer clothes came in and sat at my table.
?Are you off that limey tanker ?? he asked. I told him I was and he asked if I was on my way ashore,again I replied yes. ?Don?t go, if you value your sanity go back on board now? I must have looked puzzled, ?Son ,there are things outside that gate that defy human comprehension, children maimed so that they can beg; you will see untold suffering and now there is starvation as well? He asked me where I was from and I told him Liverpool,?That?s where I was born son, in Kirkdale? When I told him that I was also born there he smiled and asked if I liked curry . I?d gotten a taste for it in Blueys and answered yes. ?Well if I don?t do anything else ,I?ll treat you to a curry like you would?nt believe.? So saying he led me out into Karachi and down some narrow alleys until we came to a tiny little curry house. It was plain and sparsely furnished but the staff there knew him, a gingham cloth was put over our table and the little Bengali waiters began serving a meal from heaven. Old Scouse lived in Boston now and was an American citizen, he was on a Yankee boat that was on a regular run here and he had been coming for many years. We passed an enjoyable couple of hours before departing to our own ships, I was glad that I had met him and did?nt fel the need to go and look at the misery that lay in those streets, we would be gone tomorrow, but to where we did not yet know

Goodbye Karachi
I remembered an incident that occurred as we were docking in Karachi. Small boats swarmed around us like flies around something rotten. These were the ?bum? boat men. They were not in the same class as those in Aden, or Port Said, these people hustled junk and low quality junk at that. Amongst them were barbers ,booksellers, boil suckers (true),fortune tellers and fakirs. They swarmed up ropes with grappling hooks and were pretty soon in everyone?s way, they were impervious to threats and imprecations ,the word No was not in their lexicon. One quiet and unassuming little man came to me as I was warping the stern rope on the drum end of a winch. ?Saab, I tell you future ,pliss? I gave him the sailors farewell but he took no notice. ?Pliss, no interfere with work? I swore at him and he said something that pierced me to the core.?Your face look very happy Saab but your heart is full of tears? I was hauling on the stern rope, this guy had just appeared over the stern railings, what could he know? He proffered a copper bangle which had little brass nuts on it. I noticed that each facet of the nuts had markings on them. ? hold in hand I minute and roll nuts? he said ? I go away and read future. Well he got this far, and it would?nt take much. I rolled the bangle in my hand and gave it back to him. ?You finish work Saab, I come see you ? I finished showering and went up on the after deck to look at Karachi, the little fortune teller sat on the taffrail. ?Saab, come I tell you? I had told no one of my marital situation, not even my cabin mate, so I was shocked when he consulted his chart. ? You are sad because your marriage is broken, soon men from your legal services will seek for you. Do not be unhappy. Allah is caring for his children and you my friend will be looked after. You will wander without aim and you will love many times. But your true love is out there, roads you travel will sometimes lead to nowhere , do not despair. I see a lady , younger than you but wiser too. Two children are shown , a boy and then a girl. You will be happy and you will die away from where you were born.? There was more and I thanked him and gave him some money.
I have never forgotten that little man in Karachi, most of what he said has come true , do we humans have our destinies mapped out for us?
We left Karachi under the cover of night, we did not know where we were bound, tankers were subject to spot markets and not manifest destiny.

We headed for the Red Sea and Suez ,whoever bought our cargo would determine our destination, it was still early January and winter would be making itself felt as we sailed toward the western end of the Mediterranean .We were hoping we were headed somewhere warm.
The news of our destination arrived as we left Port Said, we were going to Oslo in Norway. A mood of panic gripped most of us, we would bloody freeze to death, none of us had really heavy weather gear, not for Winter in Norway .
The cold weather hit us as we cleared the Bay of Biscay, I was wearing as much gear as I could get on and was still feeling the cold. I had?nt any gloves and so wore socks on my hands, it lessened the effects of the cold but not as much as gloves would. As we headed up the English Channel the engine started to play up. We had to reduce speed and the problem worsened , the Mate told us we would be going into Rotterdam for repairs. THANK YOU GOD!!
Shortly after we berthed in the repair yard the men from Sarnecki?s came aboard. Sarnecki?s was the finest duty free store in the world. You could buy anything from a tooth brush to the finest heavy duty winter clothing in the world. They had the answer to all our prayers. I bought a big fur hunters cap, Khaki drill trousers, lined lumberjack overshirts, a fur lined Khaki drill weather proof hunting coat, hip length, and fur lined jack boots ,plus gloves, woollen and leather ,for work and for watchkeeping. Winter could throw at us whatever she chose ,we were ready. The chief steward replenished the slop chest while we were in Rotterdam, he had a wagon load of stuff delivered. Two days were all we spent in Rotterdam , none of us went ashore ,the weather was atrocious. As we sailed to Norway the chief steward made a startling discovery. The men who had been working on the repair of the engine had brought aboard with them some very enterprising thieves. They had an oxy acetylene burner ,with which they had cut a hole into the slop chest. They had helped themselves to tens of thousands of cigarettes and some fine rums and whisky. I never found out what happened after that but the chief?s takings were hit,massively They had welded the plate back on to the hole but the scorch marks were visible
.
Our visit to Norway was, thankfully, very short. We sailed empty to the warmer climes of the West Indies, the wind slackened and the fierceness of the North Atlantic winter soon abated as we reached the Tropic of Cancer. Kingston ,Jamaica was to be our first port of call.
We were just a day away from Kingston and I was on watch below, Mark was sat at his writing table playing , what I thought was, patience. ?Trying to beat the Chinaman Mark? I called across to him ? No my friend , just looking at the future? he replied. I thought he was making a reference to the little fortune teller in Karachi. ?Are those Tarot cards Mark? I queried. ? Non, just ordinary playing cards? He looked at me ? Come ,I show you? I stepped across to his cabin and there were the cards laid out as though for patience. He gathered them up and passed them to me. ?Shuffle zem ? he said. His Creole accent was a rich as plum pudding, a bit like Charles Boyer. I shuffled them and Mark laid down a line of 8 cards.face down. He motioned me to sit and turned over the cards. Mark never knew about my situation, I had?nt told a soul ,and I certainly had?nt mentioned the fortune tellers forecast.
He turned the cards over, one by one, he kept checking and musing. ?Brian ,are you in trouble?? ?Not that I know of Mark, why do you ask?? He pointed to the two Kings that lay there, ?These represent Judges ,or the Law. The knave here is someone who means you harm and the Queen of Spades ??.are you ,perhaps married?? I said nothing .?The cards say that the Queen of Spades is using these men..? he pointed to the Kings ? to make some action against you . This will happen soon? I stole from his cabin, what could he know, a rambling old Creole.

Entering Kingston for the first time is a marvellous experience ,there were no high buildings then, the tallest was about 4 storeys high. It was a typical British colony , red roofed verandahed buildings with wrought iron balconies and white washed walls. The town was situated amongst lush green trees and the harbour waters were blue . We were berthed not far from the Myrtle Bank Hotel and you could hear the sounds of steel bands drifting across the water. Arthur the JOS damaged his foot when we were tying up and an ambulance was ordered to take him to hospital When it arrived ,my cabinmate and I were detailed to carry Arthur to the ambulance on a stretcher. I was wearing flip flops and was at the back of the stretcher. When we reached the ambulance ,the big Jamaican ambulance driver showed us where to stow Arthur. As I put my foot on the ambulance step ,it slipped and my toes were wrenched as they caught the edge of the step. I did?nt drop Arthur ,gave him a nasty turn though. When I had lain the stretcher down I saw that the toe next to the big one was upside down. It was sticking straight up in the air, I showed it to the ambulance driver and asked him to take me to hospital as well . He shrieked with laughter ? Aiee Man ,you sailors is always jokin?me.? He pulled away and left me standing there with my broken toe. I showed it to the Captain and he said ?Ye?ll ?ave to get used to it lad, keep wearin? the flip flops? And I did too!
About smoko time next day one of the midshipmen told me that the captain wanted to see me. I hobbled up to his cabin and knocked and entered. He had a big buff envelope on his desk. ?Daley, this is a notice of a court action to be taken against you in the matter of desertion, I think you should get some help? He passed the envelope across and it contained a summons for me to appear in the courts at Brownlow Hill. I was quite dazed, I would be hung drawn and quartered if I was?nt there to defend myself. While I was pondering, the captain was taking action. He made an appointment for us to see the British Consul. That afternoon I saw how efficient our crown officers can be when they put their minds to it. In that one afternoon our Man in Jamaica got me a lawyer in Liverpool and had the court case delayed until my arrival back home. How could Mark have seen these things in his cards? Let alone that little man in Karachi.
Knowing that some action was at last taking place I started to feel a little easier about life, I was only twenty one and had a whole life in front of me. Perhaps I should enjoy it more. That evening I went to the Myrtle Bank hotel .It was a fairly genteel place, very Victorian in ambience and the only black faces were those of the staff. Not a place to have a rip roaring time. Next day we left for New Orleans, now there was a place to have a good time.

Nice one Brian. Keep 'em coming.

still watching and waiting brian

New Orleans

We sailed from Kingston and headed North to Yucatan Channel , as we neared Cuba we were continually buzzed by United States Aircraft fighters, they suspected anyone in Cuban waters.
Soon we were off the Mississippi Delta and were taking aboard our pilot for the trip up to New Orleans. Old Muddy they call that river and it is easy to see why, after the azure blue of the Caribbean you come upon the brown of the Mississippi.
Our pilot had that lovely soft accent that makes New Orleans so different from the rest of Louisiana, not the nasal whine that you get in Baton Rouge or Pascagoula.
I was on the wheel during part of our passage up river and was treated to tales of the river, I was much taken with the idea that this man was very like Mark Twain. Given to hyperbole and ironic observation. Our captain was entering the river for the first time and was very interested in what the pilot had to say. He was an expert, entertaining and very alert to the matter in hand, getting the ship up that river safely against a very fast flowing river.
By the time we reached the port ,I was back on deck taking my place in the mooring party.
The docks were right at the end of Canal Street, moored just further down river from us was one of those big old stern wheelers that I had seen only in the cinema or magazines. It was huge.
I later learned that she was?nt old but had been built in the 50?s for the tourist trade.
My appearance was causing quite a stir here, I had a full beard and was wearing a K.D outfit topped by my K.D. cap and bottomed by my jackboots. I was smoking a King Edward cigar when I heard a voice call out ,?It?s Castro!!? I looked around to see who was doing the shouting and saw a burly policeman on the quayside. ? Jesus H Christ son, you look like a f*ck*n? commie? I just gave him a smile and carried on working.
As soon as we were able ,Tam and a Welsh guy, whose name I forget, went ashore to sample the delights of the old French town. It was late afternoon and not many of the clubs were open but we could see that there were lots of them, and almost 100% of them were strip joints. There was an old place called the Old Absinthe House where real New Orleans Jazz was played, and most of the players had been in the original Jazz bands. It was so different from the places that surrounded it , the building was done in old French colonial style and was bereft of any glitz. The people who frequented that place took their Jazz seriously.
I saw names on the different marquees that I had only seen on record sleeves before. Pete Fountain, Herb Alpert, Louis Armstrong, Sarah Vaughan, they were here at different venues at the same time. It seemed like a musical wonderland. We came across one club which featured the New Orleans Beatles, there was a photograph on the wall by the door showing four bewigged fellers in Beatle suits. Beatle mania was just staring in the States, they were due to fly over in a fortnight and radio stations across America were blasting out Beatles tunes all day and every day.
We were thrilled to think that four lads from Liverpool were making such waves. One DJ was broadcast nationally, his name was Murray the K and he was awesome. To those of us who were used to Pete Murray and Jack Jackson , this guy seemed like he was from another planet. Each day to him was Beatle Day minus ,however many days there were left before they were due to land at New York.
At the moment it was Beatle Day minus thirteen. Excerpts from Beatle interviews were played on the radio and the Scouse accent was beginning to be understood in the States as the Beatles accent. Those of us who spoke it naturally were beginning to find it was popular.
I went into a department store in the main shopping area and was buying a toy cowboy pistol and holster for my nephew, the counter clerk picked up on my accent and told me that she was from Liverpool, she had been a G.I. bride and was now in her forties . Twenty years of life in New Orleans had destroyed her Scouse accent and she was excited that she had met someone from her home town,she was even more excited when she found out that I had lived in Walton. She asked if I would mind if she took me upstairs to meet two other ladies who were ex Scousers. I was more than pleased to meet them and they squealed with delight when I spoke to them. My accent was overheard by a couple of shoppers who stopped to listen. They were young girls and they asked me if I knew the Beatles. An unscrupulous rogue could have made free amongst those Southern Belles by deploying a Scouse accent , I?m glad to say that I did?nt. My head was too mixed up already.
The three of us continued our way down to the old Fishermans Quay, there were tackle shops and old bars (they liked their booze there! ) and cheap clothing stores. We were looking in a window that had a display of jeans , Lees ,Levi?s ,Wranglers etc. There was a little fat guy in the doorway, he could have been from anywhere, he had men?s clothes shop almost stamped on his forehead. He was wearing a three piece mohair suit and Italian style winkle pickers, ?Where are you guys from ? he asked overhearing our accents. One Welsh ,One Scot and one Scouse,so I answered ? We?re British?
He looked puzzled and said ? Where the F*cks British ?? ?At one time , almost everywhere ? replied Tam.
We went to a hamburger bar ,the Mayflower, we got a bag of hamburgers between us and soon scoffed them They were mouth watering, unlike the double arches stuff that is sold today. It was still early so we went to a cinema, there was a British Hammer Horror on and we went in for a couple of hours entertainment. We got rather more than we had bargained for; anyone who has read Portnoy?s Complaint will be familiar with what I am about to impart. There was a double bill on, the first movie was a ?nudie? and the place was full of old men wearing hats. The cinema was not fully darkened and you could see the auditorium quite clearly, the action in the auditorium was more engrossing than the film.
The first screening was the ?nudie? ,this was an unintentionally funny film about a young man who wanted to commit suicide because he was tired of life and his lack of success with the fairer sex. He method of suicide was to fly his private airplane as far into the Pacific as he could and then jump into the sea. He was naked except for ??..a parachute. He jumped and the ?chute opened and he drifted down on to a desert island . He got stuck in a tree and was found by a female native ,blonde , starkers and silicone enhanced. She cut him down and took him to her village, which was full of nude ladies who were also well endowed.
The row of seats we were sitting in started to tremble and ,upon looking around ,we saw a lot of old men had removed their hats and were now engaged in five finger exercises whilst holding their hats over their whanger. We collapsed into laughter and received glares from the men engrossed in their activities. You could hear the sound of dozens of DOM?s whacking away and the usherettes threatened to throw us out because of our laughter!. When the Vincent Price film came on all the hats were back on their heads. The thought of all those old men walking around New Orleans with their hats glued to their heads still makes me laugh.
By the time the show was over the night life had started in Royal and Canal Streets. The place was heaving, live jazz bands were playing in all the bars as nude dancers paraded their loveliness on top of the bar counters. The bars were cheek by jowl all down the street and it had the sound of a funfair, the bars were open to the world so you did?nt have to enter to see what was on offer and there were hucksters outside each bar trying to drag you in. ? C?mon John, the best girls in the world, just for you? ?You like ladies? Try some of these ,all as nature intended? With my beard and KD.s I attracted a fair bit of attention ,? Hey Castro,. C?mon an see some Ladies from the good old? US of A?
We ended up back down on Fishermens Quay, it was quieter and the beer was cheaper.
Next night ,most of the lads elected to stay aboard, I went on my own to Fishermans Quay,I had to pass down Canal Street and was accosted at nearly every strip joint but I declined the invitations. I went back to the bar on Fishermens Quay, this night it was a little quieter and there were only a handful of people in there. There was a guy at the end of the bar who looked like he had stepped out of the pages of Uncle Tom?s Cabin. With his wide brimmed straw panama, pencil thin moustache and long cheroot ,he was a dead ringer for Simon Legree. With him sat a raven haired, brassy lady wearing an off the shoulder blouse which showed off her more than ample bosom. I took my eyes off her chest and saw him studying me. Afraid that he might take a notion against me I started to take a deep interest in the bottles behind the counter ,my head facing rigidly ahead. I could still feel those eyes boring into my skull. So I supped up and prepared to leave, ?Ah Know yew? his voiced boomed down the counter at me ?Er , you?ve got me mixed up mate? I stammered. ?Naw ,I know yew, the beard an? all?
? I?ve never been to New Orleans in me life mate ? I countered . ? Not Noo Orleans boy, Africa!!?
? Yew was on a lime juicer in Tema? he stated. I was , on the Sulima more than a year ago.
I was looking puzzled, ? Yew came aboard the African Pioneer swapping books? he said triumphantly. ? But I never met you ? I said. ? No ,but you did say hello? he said, ? Yew were bein? given a tour of our ship by that there officer yew was with? ?Yes ? I replied. ? Waal ,he took through the room where ah wuz working on a dynamo, laid right under it ?n yew walked by an? said hello?
I was amazed. ?Ah nevah fergits a face? He motioned to the stool beside his girl ?Yew gottah have a drunk with me now? Well I did have a drink or two and we were being joined by his red necked friends. He went through the whole story with each new arrival ,it was around about two hours later when he announced it ?Wuz time we shot us some ?coon? There were guffaws and back slapping ?Yew ever bin ?coon shootin??? he asked me . I shook my head ,?Well we got a gun you kin have? I slowly became aware that it was?nt raccoons they were after. I looked at my watch and told them that I was due on watch duty. I got out of there fast.
Back up the street of Boobs and, just as I was walking to the docks, I saw Mark Morgan making his way toward town. He waved me to him and asked if I would show him around ,so we wandered back down Boob street and Mark had to be dragged away from every window. He was like a kid in a sweet shop. We made it back down to the bar in Fishermans Quay which was now empty save for a couple of young students. They looked like a typical college romance, he in his alumni jacket and she in jumper and tweed skirt. We were standing at the bar and Mark was dilating on his marital problems when the young co-ed came and stood beside him.? Gee, you have a beautiful voice sir ? she said . Mark turned and smiled at her ?And you ,my young lady, are very beautiful? he said in that deep brown Creole accent. I could see how he had amassed that fantastic collection of beribboned tufts. She was drawn like a moth to his flame. The ex boyfriend and I left the bar at the same time, she had her tongue down Marks throat when I left. He was 57 to her 18, I could?nt fathom females ,still can?t ,so no changes there.
I had to walk back up Boob street and when I was half way up it, one of the door men came over to me and said ? Mister when you walk down this street you?re going somewhere ,when you walk back up this street ,you?ve been somewhere; but when you walk along a third time , you?re just a cheapskate freeloadin? S.O.B? I was too amused to be embarrassed.
We sailed back to Jamaica next day. New Orleans could be fun, if you had a big wallet.
Mark was fitting another little ?butterfly? into his display case the next morning.

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