Category: Barges and wherries

Barges and wherries and other working boats originally for carrying cargoes

Barge skipper calls for positive view of sailing barges and supporting facilities

The relaunching of Bob Roberts’ barge Cambria at Standard Quay following repairs

Skipper of sailing barge Wyvenhoe Martin Phillips has called for a more positive view of sailing barges and the yards and skills that maintain them.

His comments appear on a weblog published by the Society for Sailing Barge Research, and follow wide publicity surrounding the loss of Faversham’s Standard Quay as a centre for the work. This includes the powerful film The Quay about the issue, made by Richard Fleury and Simon Clay.

(See the Comments link below for Richard’s response to Martin Phillips remarks.)

Campaigners have seen the loss of Standard Quay as a centre for barges as part of a wider trend, in which water-front areas have been developed for housing, restuarants and other non-maritime businesses, and so are no longer available for maintaining traditional craft.

However, Mr Phillips says we should not forget that barges and the yards that maintain them are thriving in Essex and Suffolk.

‘It is very sad that the landowner’s wish to develop the site has destroyed what had been developed at Standard Quay; however I feel that the coverage of this to date rather ignores reality of what has been achieved by the Thames barge and traditional boat community in East Anglia.’

‘Why can’t someone make an optimistic film publicising the achievements of the Thames Sailing Barge Trust (formerly the Barge Club) in keeping its barges sailing over the last 64 years, rebuilding two (Pudge and Centaur) without National Lottery support, and taking thousands of people sailing?

‘The trust’s training has produced about eight of the current sailing barge masters, including myself. It has done so much good to preserve barges and helped to bring people into the barge scene who go on to work on barges. Let’s celebrate this success please!’

Mr Phillips said Maldon and the Blackwater are home to a very active fleet of barges and two yards (Cook’s and Blackwater Marina) capable of working on barges, with blocks and two dry docks operating, and that there is also Andy Harman’s yard at St Osyth.

Topsail Charters has built a successful business over a quarter of a century preserving a fleet of active barges carrying thousands of passengers a year and employing a group of skippers and mates.

‘There is a host of evidence that the area is a hotbed of traditional skills and specialist shipwrights, riggers, metal workers, a blacksmith and much much more all based around the rich maritime heritage of the area. Traditional skills are actually thriving in East Anglia and the fleet of barges and smacks is a gem. Where else in the UK has a fleet of traditional craft in their home waters preserved and transformed from cargo carriers and fishing boats to working and pleasure vessels?’

Herefordshire builds a new River Wye trow for the Queen’s Jubilee

Wye trow being built at boat builders T Neilsen of Gloucester Docks for the Royal Jubilee

We’ve just heard the exciting news that the folks of Herefordshire are building a new Wye trow to represent the county during the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee celebrations in June 2012.

My thanks to Intheboatshed.net regular Chris Perkins for alerting me to this story. As he says, the new Wye trow will make great company at the Queen’s rowing event for the St Ayles skiff Ulla, which is also taking part.

Not that Ulla will be short of company: the boating pageant will involve some 1,000 boats led by the Queen in a Royal Barge passing from Battersea Bridge to Tower Bridge on the 3rd June. As many as a million spectators are expected to turn out to watch.

When Herefordshire was asked if it would like to take part, Deputy Lord Lieutenant Bob Tabor recruited four retired naval personnel living in the county  together with the rowing director of Ross Rowing Club to work with him and embarked on the project to build a new Wye Trow. It will no doubt be the first such vessel to be built for more than a century, if not a century and a half.

The building work, which is being paid for by private sponsorship, is being carried out buy boat builders T Neilsen & Co at Gloucester Docks. ) Larch trees for planking, some oak for the frames and a Douglas fir for the mast were donated by Major David Davenport from the Foxley Estate, while the rest of the oak was been provided by Sir John Cotterell of Garnons Estate and Michael Stern of Ty Olchon Timber. The timber was transported by local company ABE (Ledbury).

(Sam Llewellyn author and publisher of the beautifully made Marine Quarterly has been in touch to say that much of the timber for the Wye trow was chosen and sawn by Willy Bullough of Whitney Sawmill. Thanks Sam! I’ll be reporting on the latest MQ when I’ve finished enjoying it!)

Following lofting the new boat began to take shape during December 2011. Some 36ft long and with a 9ft beam, it will have eight oars. Following the Jubilee, it will be fitted with a mast for sailing.

Trows were used to transport freight on the Rivers Wye and Severn in the 18th and 19th centuries: they were flat-bottomed barges with shallow draught, and were powered by sail, or drawn by horses or men. The River Wye trows were built at Hereford and at other places along the river used to move general cargoes including coal and wood, cider and wool up river as far as Leominster on the River Lugg. Their heyday ended with the coming of the railway. Only one complete trow still exists, a River Severn trow that is kept at the Ironbridge Museum in Shropshire.

The story of the trows is described in this interesting Village News article. I was particularly struck by the reference to the Purton hulks: a particular point on the river became a graveyard for unwanted vessels starting from an exercise in 1909 in which a series of redundant craft were placed there to stop the river bank from eroding. More and more craft, including trows, were placed there over the years and it became a tremendous repository of historic craft – and has now been recognised by British Waterways, which now owns the site. Read about the Purton hulks here, here and here.

Robin Craig’s wonderful photo collection

Be warned – this could take some time, and it may be a moment to draw up a chair, and sit down with a cup of tea and a favourite biscuit or two…

If’ you’re sitting comfortably, these few thumbnails link to photographs in the huge and wonderful Robin Craig collection of photos of ships and boats – there are three directories containing hundreds of photos from the 1930s to the 1970s on line here.

PS – I’m sorry to report that I completely forgot to thank Jay Cresswell (see comment below and various earlier posts and comments) for leading me to this website. Thanks Jay! intheboatshed.net is always grateful for a good tipoff!