Tam & Di

I suspect knots and locks have been discussed to death already, but "search" did not come up with anything. This is a good basic technique for going uphill one handed. We ran the Leeds & Liverpool shortboat Farnworth as a tripboat from Uxbridge on the southern GU one handed (it was long before Health & Safety mantras, but don't let your children do this). Denham Deep is much too deep to be able to get off once you're in the lock. I would leave her in head gear and step off with a stern line as she came in and strap her to a halt on the big wooden strapping post just next to the bottom gates. I couldn't let her come up against the cill as water would be on the decks then. However the main reason for posting is to query the use of a clove hitch. A very useful knot for tying to a mooring stake - if the stake gets pulled out by a passing boat the stake is not lost. Other than that it is a liability. It can easily seize so tight the only way to get it off is to get the knife out, and so too if it is used in winter and the line freezes. The hitch invariably used by boatmen and Thames lightermen is far safer. It can be put on very quickly, and is simply an extension of strapping the boat to a halt. It won't slip, but can be "unfolded" even with extreme tension on the other end or when the line is frozen solid. The picture may give better explanation for those who don't use this hitch. (edited to say I've now found a discussion May 2005 in "Boat Handling" where it is referred to as a "tugman's hitch")

I've just been looking at some old topics and came across some discussion of the ex-GUCCC wideboat Progress. When we first moved from the river onto the canal it was with a lifeboat conversion at Cowley Peachey. We then discovered the 74' x 12'6" wideboat Progress lying sunk on the Cowley dredging tip at the Slough cut end. We bought it in 1961 and converted it for living, and in the 8-10 years we had it we cruised a couple of times to Birmingham (I have a photo of us pretending to come out of the narrow lock at Camp Hill), more frequently to Braunston, to Slough, on the Lee and the Stort to Hertford and Bishops Stortford, and well up the Thames. The main reason it was not successful for carrying was not simply the tunnels, where traffic coming the other way had to wait for Progress to come through, but all bridge holes as well. One maintenance nightmare now must be the bottom boards, given the difficulty getting elm. They are about 3' wide, and although the boat has a slightly rounded chine they are still about 10'6" long. We never had to replace any, though we did replank most of the waterline. We sold her in 1971 to fund the purchase of our first narrow boat Towcester and as we immediately started getting carrying work we shortly also bought the butty Bingley. I've appended a couple of photos. They're rubbishy, but perhaps of interest. Unfortunately photography was not my forte - also the great majority of stuff I took was on colour slide, which I've never got around to converting to digital images (assuming it is possible)

I'll try to keep it simple, but you'll have to excuse the length of reply Yes, with the invention of railways canals did face stiff competition, especially once rail companies bought up various canals. But up to and including the second world war there was still a fairly healthy industry. But where on the continent canals and rivers were (and still are) constantly upgraded to take larger craft, this never happened in the UK. It means the present generation has pretty little canals and romantic narrow boats, but effectively no real commercial traffic. As soon as motorways were developed there was no future for canal carriage - when the major north road from London was the A1 and lorries were restricted to 15 tons, a pair carrying max 50 tons still had a bit of a chance, as long as the freight was required somewhere that had waterside premises. Even then, if it had to be trans-shipped onto lorries for any part of the journey it was cheaper and easier to take it by road all the way. As lorry sizes moved up to 17 and 20 tons and motorways linked most major cities canal carriage became less and less competitive. Another nail in the coffin was the "invention" of containers. They made goods handling so much easier, but they did not fit a 7' wide boat and could not go under most canal bridges. Another strand is that to WW2 dockers were treated appallingly. They did not have regular employment - they turned up for a call twice a day, and employers' agents would choose just the number they needed for that morning or afternoon to load or unload the ships in the port, and the rest were sent back home workless and penniless. In WW2 dock work was made a reserved occupation and the Dock Labour Scheme was set up. As so often, the pendulum then swung wildly the other way, and eventually anything classed as "dockwork" and done within the area of each port could only be done by registered workers. The definition of the Port of London was stretched to 15 miles within any waterway, and in practice you could only become registered if your family were already dockers. You were guaranteed a substantial wage whether or not there was work, and could never be sacked. The scheme got its money from firms operating within the dock area, and as the amount of work steadily declined firms were rapidly going bust. The artificially maintained number of dockers was spread over progressively fewer and fewer companies. When we started carrying freight on canals about 1970 it was already all a-finished really. The severe winters of 1962 with canals frozen for several weeks had led most of the remaining places which had been using canals to switch to road transport, and there was no getting it back. Limejuice was almost unique in that it arrived by ship to the London docks, came up to Brentford by lighter for storage at Brentford, and was required for processing beside the canal at Boxmoor at about 100 tons a week, which was two trips a week by boat. So the requirements suited very well, but as it took 12 hours up loaded and 10 hours back empty, 2-3 hours to load and the same to unload that's about 56 hours a week if nothing went wrong and given the carriage rate you could not say it was an upwardly mobile business! L. Rose was now part of the Cadbury-Schweppes group and when the lease at Boxmoor ran out and the Boxmoor Trust wanted a very heavy increase to renew, Cadbury-Schweppes simply moved the whole operation to their St. Albans plant and the barrels went direct from Tilbury by lorry. We had no other income - we had two children and this is what we were doing for our living. That was a major factor leading us to find whatever freights we could - we did not set out to expand and own a fleet of boats, but had to keep running in order to stay still. We were finding freights of perhaps 10 tons or 500 tons - the chance of convenient 50 tons each time was remote. We had come onto the canals off the Thames and initially lived on and cruised the wideboat Progress. We really loved narrowboats and being (albeit very peripherally) part of the working narrowboat community, but our main drive was the carriage of freight. When any regular freight was under discussion we were willing to get whatever craft it needed to make it work. Got to go a long way back now ...... During the plague of London West Country barges brought grain down the Thames to London, and were consequently granted rights in perpetuity to trade "East-about, West-about" into and out of the Port free of Let or Hindrance (whew!!). Until the 60s William Stevens who owned the river Wey delivered grain ex Tilbury to Coxes Mill by water. Ownership transferred to the National Trust and Allied Mills had a rail track installed. However grain could take weeks to arrive as it was shunted around the country before getting to them, and they were persuaded to try motor barges. The original machinery was all in situ so there was no capital expenditure required, and we carried out successful trials. The country's financial situation then became pretty grim and steel mills in Corby closed en masse. Mrs Thatcher (although stating she was firmly against social engineering) offered firms financial incentives to relocate there, and Allied Mills did so. So that trade finished - again the freight now went direct by road from Tilbury. There was at that time no M25, but there was an M4. If goods were unloaded from ships in London onto the dockside for eventual trans-shipment by lorry to the west and Wales it incurred substantial charges. If it was trans-shipped to lighter it did not. We met the owner of Beckett's Wharf at Kingston who was going to build flats on the site, but was also a waterway enthusiast. Again the cranes were still on site, and he agreed to reserve some part of the wharf as a trans-shipment depot. We were to bring goods up from Tilbury, through Teddington Lock and therefore out of the Port of London, for unloading at Kingston. It meant lorries avoided the slow journey through London, and it made financial sense at each stage, even for us as carriers. Although legally any dock work carried on within the port had to be done by Dock Workers, freights into or out of the port obviously did not. However the London Dock Labour Board took the view that although that applied to the seaward limits, it did not apply to the landward limit. Kingston is outside the limits of the Port, they had no member that wanted to do the Kingston job, nor had the craft to do so. But they blacked our craft in Tilbury. They would still load us to go downriver and around to Colchester, but not for upriver destinations. We took them to court and after about two years won our case. We sent De Hoop back into the docks and got a two-finger salute from the dockers who said "So what! You're still blacked". We had made a lot of useful contacts during our fight with the LDLB, which led to us into carriage of sea-dredged aggregates up the Thames and around the Kentish coast with three little coasters, but I would much rather have been involved in a revival of up-river work. As I warned, a rather long and sad tale, but you are right - a lot of the problem ultimately was down to intransigence by Unions - difficult for me to say, as by upbringing I am more in sympathy with the worker than the big boss. But it was lack of development that brought it to its knees before that. Here endeth the first lesson.

Yes, I have fond memories of Andy and Liz. Another ex-UCC boatman Geoff Mason is also over here - though "here" in this context is Belgium rather than France. He owns "The English Bookshop" on the quayside near the centre of Gent. Anny was (and I believe still is) a houseboat in the Paddington basin. A lot of the working automoteurs (motor barges) here have GMs. They're not too bad when heard from inside the wheelhouse, but make a noise like a lawnmower trying to cut a wheatfield when heard from outside. Although I really liked the Lister JP we had in Towcester, my favourites are Gardners. We had an LW5 in Clinton, and an LX6 in De Hoop. This was our first Continental barge, built by Hellemans of Boom in Belgium in 1937 and 35.6m x 5.06m. Here she is unloading general cargo at Beckett's Wharf in Kingston shortly before we were blacked by the London Dock Labour Board. Our son Jason was master, and is just visible with the black bobble hat. Various canal people were with him as mate from time to time. We run aggregates in her from the Essex Colne up the Thames and around the Kent coast, but she was too "delicate" to put up with the constant knocks from unloading grabs and taking the ground and we reluctantly sold her and bought the first of our three small coasters.

John Duddington and his then wife Sue worked Bexhill & Brighton as you say. He subsequently worked for us, principally on our Trent barge "Clinton" on the Tilbury-Weybridge grain job that I mentioned in a previous posting. That finished when Allied Mills took advantage of Margaret Thatcher's tax incentives to get companies to move to Corby, and John and his partner Ellie moved to France where they bought/worked a 38m péniche for several years. He is now dead. I mentioned earlier in a posting about the postcard showing butty "Moon" you put up that George & Helen Smith who also worked for UCC still work their 38m "Floan" here. They frequently take on the longer runs from Belgium to the Rhône and Midi, as do Roy and Carole Sycamore with "Pedro" - another English couple. This view is Clinton (and Anny) on the hard at Isleworth in 1981

I have this feeling Ted Ward went on to work at Union Canal Carriers at Braunston - or am I imagining it ? I bet David Schweitzer would know!.....

Thanks for that Alan - I've not seen it before. I've mislaid my Towcester log and can't remember exactly when I changed the colours, but it was shortly after we were done out as "Venus" & "Ariadne" in GUCCC colours for the Verity Lambert TV film of Emma Smith's "Maidens' Trip". I did try a few years back to see if that was still in the BBC archives, but with no luck. Anyway, here are the colours we eventually used for all our boats - I used a darker blue from Tekaloid and cream instead of GUCCC's white. I adapted the scheme to suit variously the style of Leeds and Liverpool boats (we had Farnworth, Ribble, Mersey and Ironclad), barges used commercially on the Thames, and ultimately even the three little coasters we ran around the south east and across to the continent. Here in August 1978 it is Towcester and Bude with grain at Coxes Mill on the river Wey at Weybridge. Once we established the feasibility of the job we bought a small Trent barge "Clinton" that was better suited to loading at the Tilbury grain terminal, and used Argo Carrying's small dutch barge "Anny" as well. I saw in passing someone on another topic asking how butty hatches were drained. The answer of course is "cloths and maybe a dustpan", as they would be below water level when you are loaded so drain holes à la modern cruiser were not an option. When we took Bude down to the Thames for the first trial to Weybridge we found a small pinhole quite high up that would let water in when we loaded. I did an emergency plug with chewing gum which did the job so well it was three or four years before we had anything more serious done to repair it. Tam Murrell

T & D. Murrell’s “Boating for Enthusiasts” http://www.bargehandling.com Having given up the struggle to run a fleet of cargo and passenger carrying narrowboats, barges and small ships we now cruise our 24m motor barge on the continent and offer barge handling training courses for the RYA Inland Waters Helmsman’s Certificate, and with a test of CEVNI rules the International Certificate of Competence. To steer your boat on the continent you have to hold a licence - the ICC is accepted. Even if this is not your ambition why not include a couple of days with us learning how to boat in company with commercial vessels on the canals of northern France in a short break looking around the region’s waterways. After a working life on the UK canals we are acknowledged as leaders in our field. The food and wine’s good here too. Tam Murrell

Sorry - was trying to follow how to put photos on but I've obviously got it wrong

[quote name='Chris J W' date='Nov 6 2008, 08:38 PM' As for language ... people could ask why we insist on saying "WYN-DING" rather than "WINED-ING" when referring to winding. Because that is exactly where it originated - making the use of the wind to help manœuvre. Essential with an unpowered craft and very sensible even with a motorised one. Motor boat people will also talk of swinging or chucking round though.

I'm not sure how these things work, but I guess I might be changing the thread. Also I was going to add a couple of photies but couldn't work out how to do that. Anyway - forgive if I'm not doing things right ............. Most little basin were called "holes" (or in reality 'oles), so yes Jam 'Ole, Stink 'Ole etc. The jam factory was Curlers and Tongs, and when we were first on the canal in 1960 with the ex-GUCCC wooden wideboat "Progress" it was more commonly referred to by boatmen as “The Old Process", while Betelgeuse was Beetle Juice. I think it is right that much of the current terminology was devised by people trying to write about things in retrospect. No boatman ever talked about a “boatman’s hitch”, nor a “boatman’s cabin” - why would he? We might talk of being “on the barrels” or “doing limejuice”, but as someone suggests, the word “run” was added after it was all a-finished. As mentioned in the thread about mast lines etc BW finally had three pairs of boats working to Rose’s and they were getting very tired. About 1971 they put the job out on contract and Ashby Canal Transport were taking it over from (I think) late 1973. Ashby had no boats of their own and were going to use Three Fellows boats to do it. About a year before the contract was taken up BW's Arcas & Actis had to be taken out of service as they were in too bad a condition, and we were taken on directly by BWB, initially with the single motor Towcester and then with butty Hyades that we hired from Martin & Chris Toms. When the 3 BWB pairs were put out for tender we fetched up with Tom Humphries’ pair Stamford and Bude. Three Fellows were not able to start when Ashby took over the job, and we did it for another year with Towcester & Bude. Rose’s sales had dropped off, and one pair doing two 50 ton loads a week was all they needed. 3 Fellows then came onto the job for a few years and we did work like deliveries of bulk coal to all the Thames lock keepers. In the mid 70s BWB initiated the very first ‘winter stoppages’ on the Tring summit (before that stoppages were in the summer when work could more easily be done!). 3 Fellows could not get back down, and we took the barrels back on until the factory relocated to St. Albans in 1981. Tam Murrell tamanddi@bargehandling.com

In fact when BW still operated a substantial fleet couples where the wife was pregnant were often assigned the barrel job. I guess though it was because it only took about 12 hours up loaded and 10 hours back MT, so it made it easier to cope if the wife suddenly went into labour. Which points up the reason for techniques such as using a mastline to open gates. That run is about 30 miles and 36 locks - we would load first thing in the morning at Brentford and be expected for unloading first thing the following morning at Boxmoor. So you got away about 10.00-10.30 and just kept a-going until you got there. With a loaded pair it took us 4 minutes for each lock, and if we were to lose even just one minute at each one that would add 36 minutes to our working day, and the chippy would be shut by the time we arrived. The only times we could not always do the run in one day was when the ice got so thick that the motor would have to go up the pound single and then reverse back to pick up the butty, and you had to put the boats through the locks one at a time so they did not jam. When you are a mode of transport rather than doing boating as a hooby you don't get the option of staying in bed for a few hours because you are tired or because it is blowing a blizzard. Tam Murrell www.bargehandling.com

Strapping in using the top gate end post i'm having a low success rate with - somehow you need to start the gate moving and get a turn on the maybe three inches of post... On the subject of thumblining, I didn't bother this time since everything was wet and slippery, instead i took a shaft with me to punt open the other side gate and then drop onto the roof and motor out. I stumbled into this discussion by accident when I Googled “canal” and found my name jumping out of the computer at me. I started a response but the computer froze - hence the preceding non-message. There were so many things deserving comment in the discussion, but her are a few: The boat people on Stamford and Bude at the end were Tom (Oxford Tommy) and Ellen Humphries. They were no relation to Ernie and his aunt on Arcas and Actis, but this could explain any confusion about the women on the two butties. Towing bottom gates open was general more or less throughout the system, but the handrails on the ‘wide’ locks of the GU were specifically designed to facilitate it. I’ve never come across the term ‘thumblining by the way, and we used the term thumb line for a different purpose, as below. With a pair of boats mastlines are taken from the boat and butty and fed through the gap between the two handrails. A half hitch is then made on the top of each rail immediately beyond the first upright support on each side, and pulled to make sure it is holding tight. The tail is then twisted a couple of times round the upright stanchion to make sure the hitch held in place. We generally used cable-spun cotton line, which was still readily available at the time. For a pair about to single out. when the lock is empty the motor steerer reverses, with a short strap still attached to the butty stern, and tows both gates open. This stern strap is then dropped off and the motor leaves the lock. The butty steerer has a thumb string with an eye on the small pin which is (was?) on the lockside more or less under the balance beam next to the pivot point of the top gates and takes a turn around the tee stud, otherwise the butty will usually try to come out alongside the motor from the thrust of the propellor washing back onto the top cill.The mastlines are of a length that prevents boat or butty coming back against the cill. As the motor stern comes alongside the butty fore end the steer picks up the cross straps if empty, or the snatcher or snubber if loaded, and the boats go on their merry way. Mastlines very seldom jam, but they are anyway only attached to the top looby on the mast with a small eye splice. This looby (simply a small hinged pin) is upright when there is tension pulling it forward, but folds back allowing the mastline to come off if the pull is backwards. If anything I would reckon that wet and miserable weather would be even more reason to use the lines rather than the risky operation of jumping down on the boat’s cabin described. I cannot understand the comment about opening both gates to keep the boat in the middle - a single boat leaving via one open gate from a GU lock will force the other gate to open with the back pressure. Gates would normally be left open and paddles up, unless the other gates or paddles were leaking. Small leaks were not serious on river pounds, but we would otherwise try to shut gates behind us and report the leakage to the lengthsman (remember them?). With gates left open as a norm there was at least a 50% chance of having a lock in your favour, and if paddles were left up at least it was then clearly the responsibility of the current user to make sure they were closed properly for his passage of the lock, not to rely on the previous user who may wind them down so gently they continue to leak while seeming closed. I don’t know of top gates on the GU being towed closed as they are not set up to do that. On the Worcester-Birmingham narrow locks for instance the mitre post on the top gate protrudes about a foot above the top beam and is bound in iron so a line can be taken around it as the boat comes in, shutting the gate and bringing the boat to a halt in one fell swoop. Yes, we used rain sheds. They were seldom if ever photographed, but I guess photographers prefer sunny days. They were three squarish panels which clipped together round the steering hatches, with a fourth one as a roof. You looked through a small ‘letterbox’ slot to see where you were going, and hoped the dog did not chose to pear back through at you on the roof when you came to a crucial turn. We inherited ours from Fred Dell - captain of the third pair Tadworth and Bakewell operating for BW out of Brentford. Even born and bred boatpeople did not necessarily think it ethnic or virtuous to stand 12-15 hours a day in rain, hail and snow getting cold and wet at the tiller! Peter Thompson (now King Lister-Petter) came with us on a complete round trip Brentford-Boxmoor and filmed it. The film stock was then lost but has now turned up again, and one project we have for this winter is to turn it into a DVD. This should show clearly how lines were used and various other small tricks of the trade. In the mean time Di & I have left UK canals and swan about on our 80’ motorbarge, mostly in France where commercial boating and professionalism still exists, running a part time barge handling school to keep ourselves on our toes. Tam Murrell - www.bargehandling.com