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Category Archives: ships
Floating cows and snarling dogs: William Mitchell of Maryport
There is a self-portrait of William Mitchell (1823–1900) in Maryport’s Maritime Museum [1], painted in 1899. Most of Mitchell’s other portraits are rather lacking in life, but he clearly knew himself better than his other subjects: the lower part of … Continue reading
Posted in art and science, coastal heritage, ports, ships
Tagged Collingwood, Maryport Maritime Museum
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The African Steam Ship Company, and the story of a piece of china
The shore at Parton, just North of Whitehaven, is a good place to find tiny sherds of pottery and china. Many of the fragments are of ‘blue and white’, of which some are willow-pattern – lucky finds are glimpses of … Continue reading
Posted in coastal heritage, Found Objects, industrial heritage, ports, ships
Tagged china, Macgregor Laird, pottery sherds, transfer-ware, West Africa trade
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The vanishing keel on Ship’s-keel Scaur
Back in 2015 near Dubmill Point on Allonby Bay I finally found what I’d been searching for: the ‘ship’s keel’ for which Ship’s-Keel Scaur is named. Its timbers were as hard as iron, the keel (if that is what it … Continue reading
Posted in Allonby, coastal heritage, industrial archaeology, ships
Tagged shifting sand, shipwrecks
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Where ships meet …
Goldilocks would have liked the tanker Zapadnyy’s cargo: molasses, at just the right temperature, not too hot and not too cold. Transporting molasses is tricky – it must be kept fairly fluid, so heating coils warm it to 24oC in … Continue reading
Posted in coastal heritage, ports, ships
Tagged molasses, piloting, sandbanks, Silloth, Workington, Zapadnyy
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Port Carlisle: canals and ships and trains
(September 2020: you can now also view two videos about Port Carlisle, made for the launch of my book The Fresh and the Salt. The Story of the Solway: links are on the website.) When the tide is out, Port … Continue reading
Posted in coastal heritage, industrial heritage, ports, ships
Tagged canals, emigration, memories, railway, steamers, wharf
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The ‘Sir John Fisher’: a trip in a lifeboat from Workington to Whitehaven
“Ann? Come and stand here.” You don’t argue with John Stobbart, Coxwain of the Sir John Fisher. He’s a tall, imposing man with a gruff voice, and he’s standing at the wheel of Workington’s lifeboat – which is currently suspended … Continue reading
Posted in ports, RNLI, ships
Tagged lifeboats, Whitehaven, Workington
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Piloting a ship up the Firth to Silloth
You have probably never thought what it would be like to pilot a ship: to be in charge of, say, a cargo vessel with a hold-full of sticky molasses, that is about to enter the narrow dock gates of a … Continue reading
Posted in ports, sea-bed & undersea, ships
Tagged buoys, cargo vessels, ship's pilots, ships, Silloth, Solway
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Snippets 2: A chance encounter, as lifeboat ’47-024′ leaves the sea
The man with the camera seemed to know a bit about lifeboats. We were standing on the dock at Whitehaven harbour, watching as a lifeboat was hoisted out of the water. I hadn’t known that was due to happen: I’d … Continue reading
Posted in ports, RNLI, ships, Snippets
Tagged Port of Workington, ports, RNLI, ships, Whitehaven
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Solway Shore-walker 