Willow Wren

[moggyjo]

What a sad sight

[Chris-B]

What a sad sight

 

But most of those boats are now out and about again ( afaik)

Chris

[alan_fincher]

In the second picture is the "motor" on the left hand side "Aldgate" ?

No idea, I'm afraid. I can't recall Aldgate being there, but it certainly doesn't mean it was not. (It is a very long time ago.

 

Why do you think it might be Aldgate ?

 

With my failing eyesight, Satellite is the only one I can pick out for certain.

 

 

What a sad sight

Yes indeed,

 

But I suppose the very good news is just how many have survived, lots of them unconverted.

 

The only one I know that definitely got cut down was the one BW hung on to. (Sudbury).

 

Obviously some have been given full cabins, like the two that ended up as community boats.

 

I'm not up to speed enough to know the fate of all the butties, but am I right in thinking that despite being "saved" by the Narrow Boat Trust, Satellite may have ended up motorised with a counter conversion. Or am I imagining that ?

[Chris J W]

Alan

 

In the second picture is the "motor" on the left hand side "Aldgate" ?

 

Chris

 

Wasn't she with "Angel" at Denham Deep a while back?

[Chris-B]

Wasn't she with "Angel" at Denham Deep a while back?

 

Yes Chris, Paul sold the pair to Nick Woolfe of NBT..

 

Alan

 

Ahh Satellite..failing eyesight here too and a cr*p monitor...

 

Chris

[carlt]

What a sad sight

True, but an abandoned boat has restoration potential. At least they didn't destroy them all!

[alan_fincher]

Wasn't she with "Angel" at Denham Deep a while back?

 

 

Yes Chris, Paul sold the pair to Nick Woolfe of NBT..

 

I suspect Angel went for rather more money than my brother actually bought or sold her for in the early '70s.

 

I'm amazed how many unconverted boats, often in pairs have survived until now, to be honest.

 

A while ago at least you could use them as camping boats in the summer months, and get some return on them.

 

Now people are regularly paying for the costs of 140 feet of boat, and living in less than 20 of those feet. I know a few still carry in as much as they are floating fuel supplies, but it seems the vast majority now have any way of recouping their cost of ownership.

 

My hat is off to all those of you who have the time and money to keep ex working boats the way they were built to be.

 

I still get a special tingle when I see a proper uncoverted pair - I just don't feel the same when I see a £150K gin palace with £20K of highly polished, highly restored engine, but which would never have been fitted to any actual working boat.

 

Alan

Edited April 18, 2008 by alan_fincher

[Max Sinclair]

Town Class Baildon is owned by the same bloke who owns Pavo. Pavo has been converted to a motor but I think this was done years ago.

 

Edited to add - Pavo is now based on the T&M at Anderton for the past couple of years, after moving over off the Macc.

A memory for me. I bought Pavo from BW for £84 in the 1960's and Willow Wren towed it from Brentwood to Les Allens Oldbury yard where they gave it a motor counter.Happy days.

[Liam]

Max,

 

The current owner bought the boat for £18k about four years ago IIRC in a derelect state

 

It's 60ft, I don't know when it was cut down but it's got a full length conversion, bow cabin and Lister JP2 industrial unit with a PRM box. It's a lovely boat.

[alan_fincher]

A memory for me. I bought Pavo from BW for £84 in the 1960's and Willow Wren towed it from Brentwood to Les Allens Oldbury yard where they gave it a motor counter.Happy days.

£84 - now we are talking affordable boating!

 

When I worked as a Saturday job at Wyvern Shipping (Leighton Buzzard) around 1970-ish, they were operating several converted working boats in their hire fleet.

 

Amongst these were the Middle Northwich boats Theophilus & Sextans, which had been bought by tender. (They were amongst those that had been cut to 40 feet, and given an icebreaker nose).

 

I was told that a "sensible" few hundred quid had been bid for one, but out of interest a token fiver had been bid for the other.

 

Interest was so great that they got both.

 

Super little boats, would turn on a postage stamp, but boy did they roll. If conversations about gimballed cookers have relevance on canals, these would have been the boats to put them in!

 

Whilst Wyvern owned it Sextans got renamed to Hesperus.

 

Alan

[JohnO]

Satellite may have ended up motorised with a counter conversion. Or am I imagining that ?

 

Malcolm Braine chopped Satellite in 1974 added counter and cabin conversion. Satellite still attends rallies. The 14ft left became the front end of a steel new build and was named Ganymede now called Adrastea.

[debbifiggy]

Liam,

 

Don't forget that many of the GUCCCo boats that were operated by Willow Wren got renamed - another complication.

 

As to the livery being standard Dulux colours, don't forget that a lot of the boats leased by Willow Wren towards the end never even got repainted out of British Waterways blue and yellow colours.

 

From memory perhaps half of the boats dumped by British Waterways at the end of the Wendover Arm at the time Willow Wren ceased trading were in BW colours. I don't know if all had been leased to Willow Wren, but I think they probably had.

 

Boats I saw dumped at Tringford at the (then) end of the Wendover Arm in the early 1970s included...

 

Motors

 

Alton

Belfast

 

 

 

 

We can help you with info on Belfast. That's how my better half got into boating, he helped restore Belfast in the 70's. The rest as they say is history. D

[AMModels]

Yes Chris, Paul sold the pair to Nick Woolfe of NBT..

 

Alan

 

Ahh Satellite..failing eyesight here too and a cr*p monitor...

 

Chris

 

Is that the same Nick from the working boats project BW runs? He was a lorry driver by trade if I remember correctly.

[alan_fincher]

We can help you with info on Belfast. That's how my better half got into boating, he helped restore Belfast in the 70's. The rest as they say is history. D

I know Belfast.

 

In fact my family put in a fairly naive tender for her, but as you of course know the Dacorum Narrow Boat Project won that one.

 

Probably just as well, I don't think we were ready to deal with a derelict 70 footer at that stage!

 

Alan.

[Chertsey]

I'm wondering if anybody has a list of boat's names which worked for Willow Wren and what years? Would be interesting to do some looking up..

 

There's a list in the back of David Blagrove's Bread upon the Waters of the boats that were renamed by Willow Wren and what they were previously - 18 motors and 18 butties. He doesn't list ones that worked for the company but weren't renamed though. Am I right in thinking that some were purchased and some were leased, and not all were put in WW livery?

[Hairy-Neil]

But most of those boats are now out and about again ( afaik)

Chris

 

I don't believe any have been 'lost' that came through there, albeit at least one butty, 'Satelite', has been cut and made into two boats, 'Satelite' and 'Ganymede', after being 'rescued' by the Narrow Boat Trust.

 

The lost boats have mostly, if not all, been on the BW maintenance fleet and were cut up for scrap when they deemed them beyond ecconomic repair. Those in private hands have always found a benevolent benefactor no matter what state they got into.

[Timleech]

There's a list in the back of David Blagrove's Bread upon the Waters of the boats that were renamed by Willow Wren and what they were previously - 18 motors and 18 butties. He doesn't list ones that worked for the company but weren't renamed though. Am I right in thinking that some were purchased and some were leased, and not all were put in WW livery?

 

I don't think that any of the North-West Fleet were renamed. Not even sure whether any were even signwritten as Willow Wrens?

 

Tim

[alan_fincher]

There's a list in the back of David Blagrove's Bread upon the Waters of the boats that were renamed by Willow Wren and what they were previously - 18 motors and 18 butties. He doesn't list ones that worked for the company but weren't renamed though. Am I right in thinking that some were purchased and some were leased, and not all were put in WW livery?

I'm not familiar with that book. The lists would be interesting, as I've often wondered which were which.

 

I can't answer the 'lease' / 'purchase' thing, other than I believe many of those carrying at the end were leased.

 

If all those dumped at Wendover had see Willow Wren service, (and I think they probably had), then only around 50% had made it out of BW and into WW colours.

 

There are lots of pictures before that that feature pairs where one boat is green and red, and the other blue and yellow.

 

I don't recall many of the Wendover ones being signwritten, either.

 

Does anybody have a definitive list of the Wendover boats, please ?

 

Alan

[Paul H]

Does anybody have a definitive list of the Wendover boats, please ?

 

Alan

 

I did have but recently gave them away. I'll try and retrieve them and post the lists of the TWO (1968 and 1970) Wendoever sales here. They were prepared by the Canal transport Marketing Board which was similar to today's CBOA. Why is is you have absolutely no use for something until just after you get rid of it?

 

Paul H

Edited April 19, 2008 by Paul H

[Chertsey]

I'm not familiar with that book. The lists would be interesting, as I've often wondered which were which.

 

I did wonder if I should copy it out ... here are the basics if what was what (he also gives construction and engine)

 

It's an excellent book, highly recommended. (more of my views on it here)

 

Motors:

Avocet = FMC Raven

Bittern = FMC Lion

Crane = FMC Crane

Curlew = GU Seaford

Dipper = GU Bristol

Egret = GU Mimas

Flamingo = GU Letchworth

Grebe = FMC Antelope

Mallard = GU (Erewash) Elm

Moorhen = FMC Briar

Rail = GU Hadley

Redshank = GU Reading

Quail = FMC Quail

Swan = GU Dunstable

Warbler = GU Libra

Widgeon = GU Thaxted

Tern = FMC Emu

Sandpiper = FMC Falcon

 

Butties:

Bunting = GU Dudley

Coot = GU Ursa

Cygnet = unknown Saltley FMC

Dabchick = LMS railway boat

Drake = GU Taunton

Dunlin = GU Hadfield

Godswall = GU Denton

Greenshank = GU Bawtry

Heron = LMS railway Caleb

Kestrel = GU Triangulum

Kingfisher = FMC Florence

Smew = GU Norton

Snipe = FMC Kildare

Teal = FMC Minnie or Grimsby

Shoveller = FMC Bascote

Wagtail = FMC Freda

Elton = GU Elton

[alan_fincher]

Thanks,

 

Very interesting, and many of those I had no idea of.

 

In particular, I had no idea that any Middle Northwich boats were being used for carrying that late on. (I think it's TRIAGULUM, rather than TRIANGULAM, by the way, but am happy to be corrected, as I know several of the "Stars" were subject of suspect spelling).

 

No Wendover arm boats I know of amongst those 36, so they must have all been in addition to those.

 

Alan

Edited April 19, 2008 by alan_fincher

[Chertsey]

(I think it's TRIAGULUM, rather than TRIANGULAM, by the way, but am happy to be corrected, as I know several of the "Stars" were subject of suspect spelling).

 

No, that's my suspect spelling/crap typing. Some of the towns were subject to dodgy spelling too (Edgeware, Fulbourne, Bilster)

[alan_fincher]

No, that's my suspect spelling/crap typing. Some of the towns were subject to dodgy spelling too (Edgeware, Fulbourne, Bilster)

Yep my brother used to own Bilster. I'm not sure anyone was ever quite sure where they actually intended. Bilston ? or is there a better suggestion ?

[Paul H]

Thanks,

 

Very interesting, and many of those I had no idea of.

 

In particular, I had no idea that any Middle Northwich boats were being used for carrying that late on. (I think it's TRIAGULUM, rather than TRIANGULAM, by the way, but am happy to be corrected, as I know several of the "Stars" were subject of suspect spelling).

 

No Wendover arm boats I know of amongst those 36, so they must have all been in addition to those.

 

Alan

 

The Wendover boats were owned by BW not Willow Wren and had been on hire for something like £2 a week to WW. Not surprisingly given regular financial crises WW had preferred to sell off their own boats to raise cash and the BW boats were all Town Class which the boaters prefered and could carry more. Crane, Sandpiper, Tern and Warbler had all beeen transfered to WW Hire Cruisers at Rugby to be used as camping boats.

 

Paul H

[alan_fincher]

.....and the BW boats were all Town Class which the boaters prefered and could carry more.

Thanks Paul.

 

It was my understanding they had been leased from BW at a nominal amount, so thanks for confirming that.

 

Being pedantic, the exception to the "all Town class", seems to have been Satellite.

 

I have a magazine article that shows Satellite paired with Quail in 1963. Presumably, with less deep hull sides, a Star class boat is a better match ith an FMC boat than a Town class would be ?

 

It seems ironic that one that went to an outfit set up solely to preserve them, (the Narrow Boat Trust), was one of the few I know of to end up being changed to something quite different.