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RECOLLECTIONS OF AN IRISH SHIPPING APPRENTICE – PART 1

 By ©Tony Clements 2007

The dictionary defines to recollect as “to recall to memory” and this is what I have tried to do. Maybe you will have sailed with me and think: ‘I can’t remember that happening, where did he get that from?’ Maybe you are right and some facts may not be as you remember them but I am writing them down as I can recall them in my memory. And memory can at times err. As Mark Twain said: “When I was younger, I could remember anything, whether it happened or not”! But the voyages I have listed are accurate as I kept a record in a pocket atlas and still have it with me. So I trust that these recollections will be of interest to you who surf this site.  

 
This was the telegram that started me on my four years career with Irish Shipping.

IRISH POPLAR -A Summary of Voyages  
1957

Light ship from London to the US, loaded grain in Albany and New York for the UK : Hull .
Light ship from Hull to Canada , via Leith . Loaded grain in Halifax for the UK : Cardiff and Manchester .
Light ship from Manchester to the US , broke down off the Bahamas , repairs in Fort Lauderdale , Florida , then to Houston and loaded grain for East Pakistan .
Stopped at Gibraltar for bunkers, transited the Suez Canal , and a call at Aden for bunkers before arriving at Chittagong .
From Chittagong light ship to Albany , Western Australia and loaded grain for the UK : London and Newcastle .
Bunkering stops on the way were at Cape Town and Dakar .

Light ship from Newcastle to Norfolk , Virginia and loaded grain for India .
Called at Gibraltar for bunkers, transited the Suez Canal , a bunkering stop at Aden and finally India where discharged the grain at Madras and Calcutta . From India light ship to Geelong (south-east Australia ), where we loaded grain for Ireland .
Across the Great Australian Bight to Fremantle for bunkers, then across the southern Indian Ocean with a bunkering stop at Durban , up the South Atlantic and another bunkering stop at Dakar before reaching Ireland and discharging at Dublin and Waterford then to Cobh for dry-docking.

From Cobh light ship to the US : Mobile , Alabama , where we loaded grain for Japan .
From Mobile through the Panama Canal to Honolulu for bunkers then on to our Japanese discharge port, Shimizu .
On completion of discharge light ship to Australia with, on the way south, a bunkering stop at Balikpapan , Borneo . Loaded grain at Geraldton , Western Australia , for Ireland .
Across the Indian Ocean to Aden for bunkers before transiting the Suez Canal and finally arriving at Dublin where I paid off.

I and another junior apprentice, Jimmy Coady, joined the vessel in London . She was berthed at the Tate & Lyle berth at Silvertown (?), discharging a cargo of South African sugar. Part of the cargo was being discharged into barges – Thames barges with their brown sails. When full they would let go, loosen sail and if there was no wind they would drift with the tide until a breeze sprang up. Some days after we joined, one of the firemen came back with a few pints too many, slipped off the gangway and was drowned. The next day police with grapnels fished the body out. He was frozen in the act of trying to swim.  

My first Master was Capt. Woolfenden. He was everything I had imagined a ship’s captain to be – commanding and with a white beard. The story I was told about him was that he had previously been the Master of a crack Egyptian passenger liner but had been sacked, along with all the rest of the Brits, at the time of the Suez crisis. One grey, wet day in the North Atlantic , while I was holystoning the boat deck, he stopped and asked me “Have you got the time, Clements?” “Er, yes, sir.” I had a watch and was proud of it and while I fumbled with my oilskin sleeve to look at it he asked “And have you got a knife”. “Er, no, Sir.” “You useless object, no knife and you want to be a sailor…!” (or words to that effect). It was the last time I wore a watch at work.

At that time there existed in the States the famous “Short Arm Inspection”. It was meant to protect the women of America from hideous foreign diseases. The crew of foreign vessels arriving in the States had to line up, pull out their John Thomas, pull back the foreskin and have it inspected by a medical officer. So when we arrived in New York the ratings (I cannot remember if the officers were subject to this examination) were lined up for the inspection. “Do you want to see the apprentices” the Master asked. “No, they are too young” the medical officer replied “but one can give me a hand with the crew list.” So there I was holding the crew list and watching the medical officer carry out his inspection of Irish manhood. He stopped in front of one particularly dirty fireman, looked down, took his cigar out of his mouth and said “Goddam it, don’t you ever wash that thing!” I can never remember another such inspection so assume that 1957 was the last year.  

Once the entry formalities were completed, we steamed up the Hudson River to Albany . The scenery on the river was beautiful. Christmas in Albany and the Master invited myself and the other junior apprentice for a drink. “You need to learn to drink like gentlemen and this is the drink of gentlemen.” He handed us a gin and bitters. “Cheers and a Happy Christmas!” We had to drink it but that was the last time I ever touched the stuff – horrible taste! One evening we apprentices walked up town and the next day, mentioning this to a white docker he said “Why – you walked right through the negro part of town – that’s real dangerous for whites!” Well, they never bothered us. In Albany we loaded grain, but not a full cargo due to draft restrictions in the river. We topped up in New York where we junior apprentices were not allowed ashore as the Master said we were too young (we were seventeen).  

 
Mobile, Alabama, February 1959. (l to r): Andy Dunne (Apprentice), unknown, Tony “Clem” Clements, unknown.

Then back across the North Atlantic to our discharge port of Hull . While discharging in Hull, all Irish seamen went on strike and our crew paid off. Once discharge was completed, after some time at a lay-by berth, we went to anchor in the River Humber, only officers and apprentices left on board. I can’t remember who did the cooking. One foggy afternoon, as per the International Rules for the Prevention of Collisions at Sea, I was ringing the foc’sle bell when I heard the sound of an approaching engine from dead ahead. I rang the bell again then leaned over and had a look. Coming out of the fog was an Icelandic trawler, at full speed. The skipper was leaning out of the wheelhouse, chatting to a couple of hands on deck who were coiling ropes. “Oi!” I shouted. They all looked up in amazement. I took to my heels and ran towards the bridge. I heard and felt the trawler hitting our bows then it was scraping along our hull, keeping time with me as I ran down the fore deck. As it disappeared into the fog I could see it settling in the water. I ran up to the bridge and woke the 2^nd. Mate who was dozing in the bridge chair. We heard later that the trawler sank but that all the crew were rescued. There was hardly any damage to the Poplar. I just had to sign a statement for a lawyer.

We eventually sailed from Hull , still with only officers and apprentices, and anchored off Leith . There the Master went ashore that evening and late at night returned with a crowd of mostly very drunken Scotsmen. As soon as they were on board we weighed anchor and sailed. The next morning a crowd of very bedraggled and hung-over sailors complained about being shanghaied but they were soon brought to order by the Master and a very efficient Herbridiean Bosun. They settled down soon enough. The Master ordered the Bosun to break the tips on their knives. We sailed at extra full speed to Halifax as we had to make it by a certain date or lose the charter. We battered our way across the North Atlantic and made it in time to load our cargo of grain. It was very cold in Halifax . Then back across to discharge at Cardiff and Manchester.

The Manchester Canal was always an interesting transit as usually the top of the funnel and anything else tall, like topmasts or radar mast, had to be removed so as to pass under the bridges. On the berth where this operation was carried out one could see what ships had already passed up by the collection of funnel tops on the quayside. After this berth one steamed under a test wire; if you snagged it was back to the berth to remove the offending piece of equipment. We were in Manchester for the Grand National. In those days bookie shops were illegal but if you knew where to go, and the dockers told us, there were plenty of very scruffy illegal bookie shops in the back streets waiting to take our money

.  
Fort Lauderdale daily news. 2nd. April 1958

Having left Manchester and on our way to the States, we broke down off the Bahamas . After drifting round a bit and indulging in some shark fishing, a tug appeared and we were towed into Fort Lauderdale . There we spent many weeks while the boilers were cleaned. Rumour had it that salt water had been let into them. We used to swim in the late evenings, just as it got dark, off the beach at the back of the hotels. This was mainly because there was a plentiful supply of hotel towels that had been left out to dry. One evening on the way back to the ship, a police car stopped us on, I assume, the assumption that anyone walking in the States is a suspicious character. “Where are you boys from?” “We’re from the Irish ship.” “OK, what have you been doing?” “Swimming at the beach” “Swimming at the beach at night time! Don’t you know that’s when the sharks come in to the shallows!” End of our evening swims.  

 
Drifting off the Bahamas, (bound Houston), and waiting for a tow into Fort Lauderdale, Florida for repairs (seawater in boilers?), April 1958.  
(back row, l to r): unknown, unknown, Willie Cummins (Apprentice), unknown. (front row, l to r): Tony “Clem” Clements (Apprentice), unknown, unknown, Jimmy Coady (Apprentice).

Were we the first Irish ship to visit Houston? It seemed so from our welcome. Irish-Americans came to visit the ship and invite us to their homes. Some even lent us a car. None of us apprentices knew how to drive, let alone have a licence, but we figured out the automatic gears and didn’t run anyone over. One evening we took the bus to go downtown. The bus was waiting at the docks, empty. We entered and settled down at the back. The driver came and when he saw us insisted we come and sit in the front. Why? We had been sitting in the “Coloureds Only” section.

When we bunkered in Gibraltar it was for fuel oil. But at this period there were still coal burners around and Gibraltar held stocks of coal for them. The coal was stocked in the hulls of old sailing ships, anchored in the bay. Most had been cut down but you could still see the fine lines of their hulls and the bows with the remains of bowsprit and figurehead. Some even had the remains of masts.

One Master’s favourite literature was the “Reader’s Digest”. Having read the latest copy from cover to cover, he would then pontificate on the articles he had read. One time we were transiting the Suez Canal , not long after it had reopened following the Suez crisis. The British pilots had all been sacked by Nasser and an international collection brought in to replace them. Our pilot was a German and the Master started discussing U-boats with him, this being no doubt the latest article he had read in the “Reader’s Digest”. “Well, of course, Pilot, that type of U-boat was never fitted with a snorkel.” “ Oh, yes captain it was”, replied the pilot. “Pilot”, said the Master, “ I am afraid you are wrong there – I know for a fact they were never fitted.” “And I, Captain, know that they were as I commanded one during the war!” Silence and exit the Master from the bridge until change of pilots!  

On arrival off Chittagong , which at that time was part of Eastern Pakistan , we had to anchor offshore to discharge half the cargo to reduce the draught so we could cross the river bar. We anchored in muddy water with no land in sight. Eventually the agent came and said the barges were on their way out. A few were towed out by ancient steam tugs, the rest came under sail. When the wind dropped they drifted to and fro with the currents and tides. But eventually they got alongside. The grain was shovelled into burlap sacks, sewn by hand, then heaved overside into the barges, which, when full, commenced their long and uncertain journey back to the port. After many weeks the draft had been sufficiently reduced and we were able to cross the bar and enter the port of Chittagong . There, one Sunday, Mass was celebrated on board by the Bishop of Chittagong (maybe he was Irish?). An altar, decorated with flags, was set up on the boat deck. Hardly any western type stores were available there. The only butter was cows’ ghee, a rancid yellow mixture made from I don’t know what. So when we sailed for Australia , there wasn’t much to eat on board.  

We eventually arrived at Albany , in Western Australia , and made fast to a lay-by berth at the end of a long wooden jetty, not in very good condition. The Master had radioed ahead for provisions to be ready on our arrival and, sure enough, a pickup from the chandler hove into sight and commenced slowly driving down the rickety jetty. But, having nearly reached us, he was stopped by loose or missing planks. When the crew saw he wasn’t advancing they ran out on the jetty and literally carried the pickup to the gangway! Notwithstanding stuffing ourselves on board, in the evenings we would go ashore to feast on huge steaks with fried eggs in the local cafés.

 Geraldton, Western Australia, April 1959.  
(l to r): Steve Dallaghan (apprentice), Paddy Crane (AB).

 At Sea, bound Suez Canal from Geraldton, Western Australia, April 1959.  
The four apprentices (l to r): Andy Dunne, Tony “Clem” Clements (with ship’s cat), Steve Dallaghan and Jimmy Coady.

Cape Town was a short bunker stop but the Mate very kindly allowed the apprentices the time off so we could be taken on a tour of the Cape and surroundings by an Irish priest.

In Madras we were invited to tea at a convent run by Irish nuns. Tea was taken in a room with a high ceiling and open windows at the top. Through these open windows vegetation had come in and through this vegetation ran animals that looked like a cross between a monkey and a squirrel. We were fascinated and kept gaping upwards whereas the nuns, who had seen it all before, were trying to engage us in conversation. When the morning came to sail, some of the crew were found to be missing. The 2^nd Mate was assigned by the Master to search the local brothels for our missing seamen and I was taken along as assistant. In each brothel we visited we got permission to check each room (about the size of cupboards), much to the surprise of the occupants therein - an interesting introduction to the varieties of life (or should I say positions?) for a young apprentice!

Leaving the grain berth at Geelong (a rather rickety old pier), the bridge forgot to tell the 2^nd Mate to let go the last stern line. Consequently when “Ahead” was rung on the telegraph we took a portion of the rotten wooden quay with us.

 At Sea, bound from Geelong to Dublin, Christmas Day 1958.  
The four apprentices (l to r): Andy Dunne, unknown, Jimmy Coady, Tony “Clem” Clements.

Honolulu was only a one day bunkering stop on our long trip across the Pacific, but a very welcome one. We had chipped decks all the way across so the Mate, in the kindness of his heart, let us apprentices ashore so it was off to Waikiki beach for a swim!

Shimizu , our port of discharge, was a small port with the town consisting mainly of wooden houses and the women still in their traditional dress. Japan was so cheap in those days that even we apprentices could afford to go ashore and enjoy ourselves!

In those days radar was still something of a novelty and to be approached and used with awe. On the Poplar, with one Master, it could not be used without his permission and had to be switched on and tuned up by the Radio Officer. The Poplar was not fitted with an autopilot but was fitted with a course recorder which, on a sheet of paper like a barograph, traced the course steered. So when you finished your trick at the wheel, first thing you did was have a quick look at what kind of course you had steered. The officer of the watch also checked it and quickly let you know if you were wandering all over the ocean!

 ©Tony Clements 2007

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