Tag: restoration

The Rhoda Mary Project

Original-Rhoda-Mary-entering-Carrick-Roads-1200x600

Pilot cutter exponent Luke Powell is getting together a project to rescue and rebuild the 1868 109ft merchant schooner Rhoda Mary, which has lain on mud at Hoo on the Medway for many decades.

She was financed by the old 64-share system in which communities shared in the profits of building a ship, and built near Falmouth in Cornwall by a shipyard owned by John Stephens of Devoran, and designed by William Foreman Ferris.

The plan is to salvage the vessel this spring and move her to Cornwall, where the work will begin.

Author, researchwer and director of the National Maritime Museum Basil Greenhill said that: ‘This vessel, a relatively large schooner of 130 tons gross, was to be famous for her speed along all the west coast of England as long as she remained afloat. Her speed came from her narrow beam, for she was less than twenty-two feet wide, from her fine run and her raked and flaring clipper bow. She had a rake on her stem of over twenty degrees. The Rhoda Mary was a work of some genius.’

I think it sounds like a great idea. Read more here, here and here.

Henry Blogg’s boat arrives at the Museum of the Broads for restoration

The hoveller fishing boat used by Cromer’s legendary lifeboat coxswain Henry Blogg this week arrived at Stalham for restoration by volunteers working with the Museum of the Broads, Stalham.

Old Henry was heavily decorated by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, and like all RNLI lifeboatman was a volunteer – he made his living catching the famous Cromer crabs.

The hoveller fishing boat differs from other fishing boats as it had a small deck at the bows enabling the fishermen to carry a small stove to boil water and make tea – which is of course essential for any boat belonging to Englishman, particularly if they’re working on the cold North Sea.

The boat is named the QJ&J – Queenie, Jack and Jim – and was named after Henry’s family members.

There have been a number of attempts over the years to save the historically important boat made from ash, larch and oak. Sadly, by the time it reached the museum, the stern was too bad to restore.

The plan is to restore the bow and return her to her Cromer home for exhibition next year.

Westmoreland Trust publishes North Kent brickmaking booklet online

Bricks Brickmen & Barges

Bricks Brickmen & Barges tells the story the brick-making industry of the Faversham, Conyer and Lower Halstow area of North Kent, and of how barges carried the bricks up-river, where they were used to build Victorian London.

It is published by the Westmoreland Trust, which aims to restore the last remaining Kent brick barge, Thames sailing barge Westmoreland, as a training vessel and working exhibit of the age when the brickfields and barges of North Kent ranked alongside Chatham Dockyard as the leading local employer.

In particular the Trust focuses on Westmoreland’s links with Lower Halstow – for her entire working life she was owned and operated by Eastwoods Brickmakers, which had works in the village.

For more information, see the Westmoreland Trust website.