Recollections of an Unsuccessful Seaman. Dave Creamer
when I tell you that whilst ashore one evening I slip over on the confounded slippery streets and break a good bottle of whisky. I am glad to be departing from this port after we have loaded a cargo of ammunition, oats, and hay. The ship – her decks piled high with a solid frozen mass of rubbish and coal dust – looks wretched under the clear moonlit skies that accompany these intensely cold nights. It is really beyond a joke to come off watch from the bridge and to see one’s frozen oilskin standing upright on its own after taking it off.
Three days later it becomes comparatively mild and the ice starts to melt. We have one bit of trouble on the homeward passage when a Spanish fireman hit a Russian over the head with a fire axe; caught up in the resulting melee were a Mexican, a Swede, a Greek, and a Malay. This cosmopolitan collection is typical of the British mercantile marine in the time of war. These so-called seamen are paid £8 per month, which is exactly the same as a certified and experienced British third officer, but the officers don’t have a trade union!
The daily press is quite concerned about the ruinously high rate of wages being paid. One newspaper actually stated that a ship’s crew had recently signed on with the enormous wages of £8 and ten shillings per month, the highest wages ever given to seamen in the history of the British mercantile marine. It thus raises the question as to how the company can possibly continue to reward its shareholders with their 100% dividend. No mention is ever made of the vastly increased cost of living, or the wretched position of the poor ship’s third officer, who has little choice but to continue working for the same wages as the seamen. Politicians talk of merchant seamen as being the ‘jugular vein’ of the nation, providing of course they keep on working properly and do not make too many wage demands.
By the beginning of 1916, ship owning had become a highly profitable business with generous dividends being paid to the shareholders. Mr Bonar Law,vi who was the Chancellor of the Exchequer at the time, had invested heavily in shipping and found his shipping dividends to be most gratifying. At least he had the courage to say so in his speech to the House on the subject. ‘I don’t like talking about my shipping investments,’ he said. ‘I am ashamed of them. My investments have been in ten different companies under different management. It is true they were all in tramp steamers, but I am not quite sure if they make more profit than the liners. The sum invested in these ships was £8,110. In 1915, the dividend was £3,624, and in 1916 I received £3,874.’
He continued his speech by telling the House that when one of the tramp steamers in which he had invested £200 had been sunk or sold, although he couldn’t remember which, he had received a payment of £1,000, despite having been previously paid a very handsome dividend. He also mentioned ‘a division of surplus capital’ from a shipping company that earned him £1,050 from an initial £350 investment.
Freight rates were tremendously high in 1916. In one instance, the value of cargo being shipped from England to the States was $1,050 yet the freight charge was $2,500. The shipowners netted between 100% to 400% return on their capital at the expense of the sea staff, who took most of the risks for wages that were insignificant when compared with the huge profits being made. When taking the cost of living into account, the wages from the captain down to the lowest paid seaman were not one penny more than in pre-war times. The men of the mercantile marine will receive no pension for war disablements because we are civilians and not soldiers, but a certified officer is of far more importance to the country than a soldier. The alternative would be to recognise the mercantile marine as a fighting force and then we would have the benefits of gratuities and pensions.
During this profitable yet dangerous period of the war, an appeal was sent out by the Merchant Service Guildvii to every shipowner in the country to raise a fund for their employees interned in Germany. The result of this appeal revealed the true generosity of these prosperous war profiteers towards their seagoing employees; the sum of £471 and eight shillings was collected, a miserly three pence per each dependent. The shipowner chose not to play the game then, has not done so before, and has not done so since, and that is the end of it. I apologise for having broken out with this tirade against the shipowner, for it may not interest you in the slightest and it does little good. A certain type of shipowner will only laugh at what I have said, suggest that I am a crazy fool, and go on overloading his ships and underpaying his employees just the same.
There being 40 steamers at anchor in Le Havre roads upon our arrival, we receive orders to proceed to Dungeness West roads through the Folkestone Gate, a narrow wartime channel through which all ships must pass to enter or leave the Dover Straits. It is surprising how many vessels can accumulate when the traffic is held up for a few hours. I have seen 150 merchant ships collected together in Yarmouth roads due to delays. We don’t stay long before crossing the Channel again to Boulogne and anchoring in the outer harbour where, with a valuable cargo, we will be safe once more. Unfortunately, this harbour is also full, so despite it being a dirty winter night with heavy snow, we are soon ordered back out to sea again.
When I come off watch at midnight, our baker is moaning that his bread won’t rise. I haven’t been in my bunk for more than ten minutes when a sharp metallic noise similar to that of a telephone can be heard followed by a huge explosion as we are hit by torpedoes from both sides. The shock throws me from my bunk onto the deck. My porthole is blown in, but the cabin lamp still burns with the glass intact. The pasty face of the baker shows up through the opening where my heavy teak cabin door should have been.
‘Well,’ I say, ‘did you get your bread to rise?’
‘Bread,’ he says, ‘yes, it’s risen alright, through the galley skylight. What’s wrong?’
‘What’s wrong? By the sound of the water coming in I should say she’s sinking fast. You had better hop it for your boat.’
I must say I am a bit confused; there can be no other reason for putting on my bowler hat and leaving my camera on the settee. I have planned for such an emergency by packing all my papers, a few treasured relics, a clean collar and tie, some tobacco, and shoe polish into a small attaché case. With this slung over one shoulder and my sea boots clutched in one hand, I run along the smoke-filled alleyway. A sixth sense warns me of imminent danger and I stop to strike a match. A yawning chasm is right at my feet; I catch a glimpse of a body floating on the coal-scummed water far below. The low side bunker hatches and coamings have been blown up and the deck split wide open. Nothing can be done, so I cautiously reach around the corner for the short iron ladder leading to the boat deck.
The stokehold watch below have all been killed instantly except for one poor chap who has dragged himself up the fiddleyviii ladder with his thigh bone protruding through his trousers. Some of the crew in running from forward to the boat deck have fallen headlong into the bunkers to be drowned like rats in a trap. The wooden Marconi house on the bridge has collapsed inwards leaving the radio operators to climb through the deckhead. There is no time left but to make for the boats. Only a Swede and the two wireless men are standing by my boat, which we quickly lower with the two operators sitting inside. The senior radio operator has the seat of his striped pyjamas missing; the junior operator is so nervous that he cut the boat’s painter as soon as it hit the water, allowing them to drift off, gesticulating wildly, into the snow and the darkness beyond.
‘Where’s the captain? Where’s the captain?’ I hear the old mate yell.
‘In the bloody boat, and waiting to shove off!’ someone answers.
There is no time to dawdle, for the ship’s decks are awash. I jump off into the pitch black and land on somebody’s foot to the sound of some horrible language. We shove off hurriedly, knowing that from this very moment our pay will stop until we get another job. It does seem a bit mean, but those dividends must be paid. The hard case second engineer, who had tried to be paid off in Le Havre, appears to be the only person happy to be getting off the ship. I get quite friendly with him because he is the only one in the crowd with any money.
Eventually we get picked up by a tugboat and taken into Boulogne, where the captain lines us up on the quayside for a roll call. We’re as cheerful as cold boiled rice on a winter’s morning, and