The Other Side of the Night by Daniel Allen Butler
Authors: Daniel Allen Butler
Tags: Bisac Code 1: TRA006010
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Caledon Shipbuilding, and a milestone in the firm’s effort to grow into a genuine competitor to the large Clydeside shipyards, as she was the largest ship yet ordered from the yard.
The new vessel would have a displacement of 6,223 gross registered tons, with a length of 447 feet, a beam of 52 feet and a designed draft of 30 feet. She would be powered by a single reciprocating engine, turning a single screw, with a designed speed of 13½ knots. While typical of hundreds of British merchant ships that traversed the world’s sealanes, these were not particularly impressive figures when compared to the later behemoths that would take to the North Atlantic, or even by the standards of the day. (The largest ship in the world in 1901 was White Star’s Celtic with a length of 700 feet, and a displacement of 21,035 tons.)
In appearance, too, No. 159 would be much like a thousand other freighters already crisscrossing the North Atlantic, her aesthetics dictated by function. Beginning at her old-fashioned up-and-down stem, she was built with a steep-sided, almost sheerless hull, her flush weather-deck running unbroken from bow to stern. Her superstructure sat squarely amidships, taking up barely a quarter of her length. Atop it sat a quartet of spindly ventilators, above them looming a single funnel, painted in the salmon-pink and black of the Leyland Line. There were four masts, which also doubled as kingposts for handling cargo. Altogether an unremarkable ship, Hull No. 159 would be almost stereotypical of the ocean-going freighter of the early 20th century.
The stereotype would extend to more than just her size, configuration, and purpose. As designed, she would require a crew of roughly fifty stokers, trimmers, assistant engineers, and deckhands. With more than half the space within her hull given over to cargo, and nearly a third taken up by her boilers and engine room, there would be precious little space in which her crewmen would live. The crew was “comfortably housed below the shelter deck forward,” as the builders euphemistically described what was nothing more than the traditional forecastle, or “fo’c’s’le.”
There lurks beneath that somewhat romantic sounding bit of nautical tradition one of the darkest yet best concealed secrets of the British Empire. A realm flung to the four corners of the world, the Empire was maintained by the sinews of Great Britain’s sealanes and the ships which plied them; it was carried on the backs of British merchant seamen. In return they were fed, clothed, quartered, and payed to such a pitiful standard that such conditions would never have been tolerated in the foulest tenement slums of smoky, soot-covered, industrial Sheffield, Manchester, Birmingham, or Glasgow.
Poorly lit, inadequately ventilated, badly heated, the crew’s quarters would consist of cramped rooms where four, six, sometimes eight men would bunk. The prevailing impression was one of almost continuous dampness–-often in rough or stormy weather, despite the best efforts to secure it, the forecastle would be awash, the crewmen donning sodden clothing at the beginning of their watches, and returning to damp bunks at the end, with little chance to ever get completely dry before the ship made port. Their diet was dull and monotonous, a mess of bully beef, porridge, beans, and tea. Lime or lemon juice was mandatory, of course, to prevent scurvy (despite its association with the long-past days of sail, scurvy remains a threat to the health of sailors even in the 21st century), but this was about the only concession the shipping lines made to the men’s health. Alcohol was forbidden below decks, but this was a prohibition honored more in the breach than in the observance, as seeking solace in rum or gin was sometimes the only recourse many of the men had to endure their work and their lot; inevitably, alcoholism was rife among seamen in those decades.
So was tuberculosis, although it would not be recognized
The new vessel would have a displacement of 6,223 gross registered tons, with a length of 447 feet, a beam of 52 feet and a designed draft of 30 feet. She would be powered by a single reciprocating engine, turning a single screw, with a designed speed of 13½ knots. While typical of hundreds of British merchant ships that traversed the world’s sealanes, these were not particularly impressive figures when compared to the later behemoths that would take to the North Atlantic, or even by the standards of the day. (The largest ship in the world in 1901 was White Star’s Celtic with a length of 700 feet, and a displacement of 21,035 tons.)
In appearance, too, No. 159 would be much like a thousand other freighters already crisscrossing the North Atlantic, her aesthetics dictated by function. Beginning at her old-fashioned up-and-down stem, she was built with a steep-sided, almost sheerless hull, her flush weather-deck running unbroken from bow to stern. Her superstructure sat squarely amidships, taking up barely a quarter of her length. Atop it sat a quartet of spindly ventilators, above them looming a single funnel, painted in the salmon-pink and black of the Leyland Line. There were four masts, which also doubled as kingposts for handling cargo. Altogether an unremarkable ship, Hull No. 159 would be almost stereotypical of the ocean-going freighter of the early 20th century.
The stereotype would extend to more than just her size, configuration, and purpose. As designed, she would require a crew of roughly fifty stokers, trimmers, assistant engineers, and deckhands. With more than half the space within her hull given over to cargo, and nearly a third taken up by her boilers and engine room, there would be precious little space in which her crewmen would live. The crew was “comfortably housed below the shelter deck forward,” as the builders euphemistically described what was nothing more than the traditional forecastle, or “fo’c’s’le.”
There lurks beneath that somewhat romantic sounding bit of nautical tradition one of the darkest yet best concealed secrets of the British Empire. A realm flung to the four corners of the world, the Empire was maintained by the sinews of Great Britain’s sealanes and the ships which plied them; it was carried on the backs of British merchant seamen. In return they were fed, clothed, quartered, and payed to such a pitiful standard that such conditions would never have been tolerated in the foulest tenement slums of smoky, soot-covered, industrial Sheffield, Manchester, Birmingham, or Glasgow.
Poorly lit, inadequately ventilated, badly heated, the crew’s quarters would consist of cramped rooms where four, six, sometimes eight men would bunk. The prevailing impression was one of almost continuous dampness–-often in rough or stormy weather, despite the best efforts to secure it, the forecastle would be awash, the crewmen donning sodden clothing at the beginning of their watches, and returning to damp bunks at the end, with little chance to ever get completely dry before the ship made port. Their diet was dull and monotonous, a mess of bully beef, porridge, beans, and tea. Lime or lemon juice was mandatory, of course, to prevent scurvy (despite its association with the long-past days of sail, scurvy remains a threat to the health of sailors even in the 21st century), but this was about the only concession the shipping lines made to the men’s health. Alcohol was forbidden below decks, but this was a prohibition honored more in the breach than in the observance, as seeking solace in rum or gin was sometimes the only recourse many of the men had to endure their work and their lot; inevitably, alcoholism was rife among seamen in those decades.
So was tuberculosis, although it would not be recognized
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