THE HISTORY OF SHIPS AND SHIPPING INTERESTS (_continued_).
A Contrast—Floating Palaces and “Coffin-ships”—Mr. Plimsoll’s
Appeal—His Philanthropic Efforts—Use of Old Charts—Badly
Constructed Ships—A Doomed Ship—Owner’s Gains by her Loss—A
Sensible Deserter—Overloading—The Widows and Fatherless—Other
Risks of the Sailor’s Life—Scurvy—Improper Cargoes—“Unclassed
Vessels”—“Lloyd’s,” and its History.
Turning by way of that contrast which our subject so abundantly presents,
let us pass from the consideration of well-regulated, well-found
steam-ship lines, to a different class of vessels—those “coffin-ships” of
which we heard so much a few years since. As we all know, the term has
been lately used to signify unseaworthy ships of all kinds—such as that
mentioned by Mr. Plimsoll, which was loaded at Newcastle with nearly twice
her proper tonnage, and dispatched to the Baltic in mid-winter, _with her
main-deck two feet two inches below the level of the water_. She foundered
eighteen miles from the coast. We are told of one man who had in six years
lost twelve rotten ships, and 105 men; and of the _Elizabeth_, a vessel so
weak and leaky, that it was necessary to pump her every hour when floating
empty in harbour, but which was sent to sea with 180 tons of coal to
founder with three out of five hands. It was certainly time for
legislation when the statement could be made truly that a ship which had
been refused a class by Lloyd’s Committee, and had been declared utterly
unfit to go to sea by Lloyd’s surveyor, was dispatched across the
Atlantic, or rather to the bottom of the Atlantic, there to lie with one
crew, while another was safe in an English prison for refusing to proceed
in her.
In 1870, Mr. Samuel Plimsoll first commenced, so far as Parliament is
concerned, those benevolent efforts for the amelioration of the sailor’s
hard life, which must always place him among the highest ranks of
philanthropists. Moved evidently by the purest motives, there are one or
two mistakes to be recorded against him, but they were of the head, not of
the heart. Government was at the time endeavouring, as far as can be seen,
to accomplish nearly the same ends, but was hampered by the pressure of
Parliamentary business. Lindsay, who was somewhat opposed to the views
expressed by Plimsoll, and it is rather unfortunate that he was so, having
been so long a ship-owner himself, yet endorses the remarks of a friend—a
Vice-Admiral of Her Majesty’s service—who wrote to him: “Should there not
be some more stringent provisions with respect to the inspection of
sailing vessels? It is an old proverb, ‘Who ever saw a dead donkey?’ But
who ever saw an old sailing-ship broken up? I am inclined to think that it
is more to the interest of small owners to let an old tub go on shore than
to bring her safe into port. This works two evils:—1, the danger to human
life; 2, the greater rate of insurance on honest owners to make up an
average for the dishonest.” The evil had become a most terrible one, and,
in spite of some little reform, it is to be feared, goes on to-day with
only partially-abated vigour.
“Imperfect charts,” says Lindsay, “were often made to cover, as I fear may
be the case to some extent now, incompetency, drunkenness, or
carelessness. Indeed, about that period, they frequently served as excuses
when other objects were in view. I remember a ludicrous example of this.
When a boy at school at Ayr, I used to accompany my uncle to ‘the meeting
of owners’ of the brig _Eclipse_, in which he held some eight or ten 64th
shares. Every spring the owners met on board to discuss matters relating
to her affairs, and to dispose of what I recollect best, a round of salt
beef, sea-biscuits, and rum and water. The _Eclipse_ had hitherto been
invariably employed during the summer season in the conveyance of timber
from some one or other of the ports of New Brunswick for Ayr. On one
occasion, a tempting freight had been offered for her to proceed to
Quebec, and the owners in conclave assembled, had all but unanimously
decided to send her to that port. While, however, the discussion was going
on, her skipper, Garratt, or, ‘old Garratty,’ as he was called, seemed
very uneasy, and gulping down an extra tumbler of rum and water, he at
last said, ‘Weel, gentlemen, should you send the _Eclipse_ to Quebec, I’ll
not be answerable for her safety.’ ‘How so?’ asked one of the owners.
‘Ah,’ said Garratty, drawing his breath, ‘_the charts are a’wrang in the
St. Lawrence_. Ye’ll ne’er see the _Eclipse_ again gin ye send her to
Quebec.’ The skipper carried the day.
“It is much to be regretted that ship-owners, when they leave their
captains to provide their own charts (instead of supplying them) do not
stipulate that they are to be the best and the _latest_. I remember a ship
and cargo (numerous other instances could be produced), valued at £70,000,
lost near Boulogne from the master mistaking the two lights at Etaples for
the South Foreland lights; and this, as appeared from the Board of Trade
inquiry, because his Channel chart, which was thirty years old, had not
the Etaples lights marked on it.” The terrible wreck of the _Deutschland_
steam-ship, on the 30th December, 1875, was caused, with hardly the shadow
of a doubt, from the use of an old chart.
Mr. Plimsoll in a most remarkable and vigorous book,(35) published in
1873, puts the matter of “coffin-ships” forcibly before his readers. He
says, “No means are neglected by Parliament to provide for the safety of
life ashore; and yet, as I said before, you may build a ship in any way
you please, you may use timber utterly unfit, you may use it in quantity
utterly inadequate, but no one has any authority to interfere with you.
“You may even buy an old ship 250 tons burden by auction for £50, sold to
be broken up, because extremely old and rotten; she had had a narrow
escape on her last voyage, and had suffered so severely that she was quite
unfit to go to sea again without more being spent in repairs upon her than
she would be worth when done. Instead of breaking up this old ship, bought
for 4s. per ton (the cost of a new ship being from £10 to £14 per ton), as
was expected, you may give her a coat of paint—she is too rotten for
caulking—and to the dismay of her late owners, you may prepare to send her
to sea. You may be remonstrated with, in the strongest terms, against
doing so, even to being told that if you persist, and the men are lost,
you deserve to be tried for manslaughter.
“You may engage men in another port, and they, having signed articles
without seeing the ship, you may send them to the port where the ship lies
in the custody of a mariner. You may then (after re-christening the ship,
which ought not to be allowed), if you have managed to insure her heavily,
load her until the main deck is within two feet of the water amidships,
and send her to sea. Nobody can prevent you. Nay, more, if the men become
riotous, you may arrest them without a magistrate’s warrant, and take them
to prison, and the magistrates, who have no choice (they have not to make,
but only to administer the law), will commit them to prison for twelve
weeks with hard labour, or, better still for you, you may send for a
policeman on board to overawe the mutineers, and induce them to do their
duty! And then, if the ship is lost with all hands, you will gain a large
sum of money and you will be asked no questions, as no inquiry will ever
be held over those unfortunate men, unless (which has only happened once,
I think) some member of the House asks for inquiry.
“The river policeman who in one case threatened a refractory crew with
imprisonment, and urged them to do their duty (!) told me afterwards (when
they were all drowned) that he and his colleagues at the river-side
station had spoken to each other about the ship being dreadfully
overloaded as she passed their station on the river, before he went on
board to urge duty (!) and that he then, when he saw me, ‘rued badly that
he had not locked ’em up without talk, as then they wouldn’t have been
drowned.’”
Here Mr. Plimsoll indicates another risk for the poor sailor: “There is, I
fear, great reason to think that ships are occasionally lost from the very
imperfect manner in which some of them are built; in some cases, I think
you will see that something worse ought to be said. I do not say the cases
are many; still, they exist, and we have done nothing to prevent it. The
first time I introduced a bill to prevent overloading, I alluded
(mentioning no names) to the case of one ship-owner who, trading to the
West Indies for sugar (a good voyage, deep water, and plenty of sea room
all the way) had, out of a fleet of twenty-one vessels, lost no less than
ten of them in less than three years.
“After I had concluded my speech in moving the second reading, a member
accosted me in the lobby and said: ‘Mr. Plimsoll, you were mistaken in
that statement of yours.’ ‘What statement?’ I answered. ‘Oh, that when you
said a ship-owner had lost ten ships in less than three years from
overloading.’ ‘I mentioned no names,’ I said. ‘No, but I know who you
meant. He is one of my constituents, and a very respectable man indeed. It
is not his fault; it is the fault of the man who built his ships, for one
of them was surveyed in London and was found to be put together with
devils. He knew nothing about it, I assure you.’ ‘Devils?’ I said. ‘Yes.’
‘I don’t know what you mean.’ ‘Oh, devils are sham bolts, you know; that
is, when they ought to be copper, the head and about an inch of the shaft
are copper, and the rest is iron.’
“I have since found there are other and different sham bolts used, where
merely a bolthead (without any shaft at all) is driven in, and only as
many real bolts used as will keep the timbers in their places. Now these
bolts are used to go through the outside planking, the upright timber, not
the inner planking (ceiling) of a ship, and through the vertical or
drooping part of a piece of iron called a knee, on the upper part of which
the deck-beams rest, and to which the deck-beams are also bolted from
above. These bolts, therefore, are from thirteen to eighteen inches in
length.”
The following examples will speak for themselves. Mr. Plimsoll says:—“On
the occasion of one of my visits to a port in the north, I was met by a
gentleman who knew what my errand there was likely to be, and he said,
‘Oh, Mr. Plimsoll, you should have been here yesterday: a vessel went down
the river so deeply loaded, that everybody who saw her expects to hear of
her being lost. She was loaded under the personal directions of her owner,
and the captain himself said to me, “Isn’t it shameful to send men with
families to sea in a vessel loaded like that?” Poor fellow, it is much if
ever he reaches port.’ Half a dozen others confirmed this statement. The
captain ‘was greatly depressed in spirits,’ and a friend—not the owner,
mark you!—gave him some rockets—‘in case of the worst.’ Two men averred
that they would not go if the owner gave them the ship.
“She was sent. The men were some of them threatened, and one at least had
a promise of 10s. extra per month if he would go. As she went away, the
police-boat left her; the police had been on board to overawe the men with
going. As the police-boat left her side, two of the men, deciding that
they would rather be taken to prison, hailed the police, and begged to be
taken by them. The police said, ‘they could not interfere,’ and the ship
sailed. My friend was in great anxiety, and told me that if the wind came
on to blow, the _ship could not live_.
[Illustration: MR. PLIMSOLL SPEAKING IN THE HOUSE OF COMMONS.]
“It did blow a good half-gale all the day after Sunday—the ship sailed on
Friday. I was looking seaward from the promontory on which the ruins of
T—— Castle stand, with a heavy heart; the wind was not above force
7—nothing to hurt a well-found and properly-loaded vessel: I had often
been out in much worse weather; but then this vessel was not properly
loaded (and her owner stood to gain over £2,000 clear if she went down, by
over insurance), and I knew that there were many others almost as unfit as
she was to encounter rough weather—ships so rotten that if they struck
they would go to pieces at once; ships so overloaded that every sea would
make a clean sweep over her, sending tons and tons of water into her hold
every time, until the end came.
“On Monday we heard of a ship in distress having been seen, rockets had
been sent up by her; it was feared she was lost. On Tuesday the nameboard
of a boat was picked up, and this was all that ever we heard of her.”
Some cases seemed to be looked on as matters of course, and a gentleman as
he saw his wife reading the newspaper, said to her, “Look out, for the ——
in a day or two; I saw her go out of the river. She is sure to be lost.”
She was lost, and nearly twenty men returned home never more.
Mr. Plimsoll tells another story of two gentlemen, who told him one day
that they saw a vessel leaving dock; she was so deep that, having a list
upon her, the scuppers on the bow side were half in the water and half
out. (A “list” means that she was so loaded as to have one side rather
deeper down than the other; the “scuppers” are the holes in the bulwarks
that let the water out that comes on deck from the rain, the washing, or
the seas breaking over her.) They heard a slight commotion on board, and a
voice said to the captain: “Larry’s not on board, sir.” He had run for it.
Nothing could be done, for lack of time, to seek him, so they sailed
without him. And these gentlemen heard the crew say, as they slowly moved
away from the dockyard: “Then Larry’s the only man of us’ll be alive in a
week.” That vessel was lost.
Another large ship was sailing on a long voyage, from a port in Wales,
with a cargo of coal. A gentleman called a friend’s attention to her
state. She was a good ship, but terribly deep in the water. He said, “Now,
is it possible that vessel _can_ reach her destination unless the sea is
as smooth as a mill-pond the whole way?” The sea evidently was not as
smooth as a mill-pond, for that ship was never heard of again, and
twenty-eight of our poor, hard-working, brave fellow-subjects never more
returned to gladden their wives and play with their children.
Mr. Plimsoll saw a large ship put to sea one day. She was so deep that a
friend who was standing by said to him as she went: “She is nothing but a
coffin for the poor fellows on board of her.” He watched and watched,
almost fascinated by the deadly peril of the crew, and he did not watch
for nothing. Before he left his look-out to go home, he saw her go down.
Even more touching are the records of some visits made by him to the
sufferers left behind to mourn the fate of their husbands, drowned in
leaky ships which should never have left port.
“In this house, No. 9, L——ll Street, lives Mrs. A——r R——e. Look at her—she
is not more than two or three and twenty, and those little ones are hers.
She has a mangle, you see. It was subscribed for her by her poor
neighbours: the poor are very kind to each other. That poor little fellow
has hurt his foot, and looks wonderingly at the face of his young mother.
She had a loving husband but very lately, but the owner of the ship on
which he served, the _S——n_, was a very needy man, who insured her for
£3,000 more than she had cost him. So if she sank he would gain all this.
Well, one voyage she was loaded _under the owner’s personal
superintendence_; she was loaded so deeply that the dockmaster pointed her
out to a friend as she left the dock, and said emphatically, ‘That ship
will never reach her destination.’ She never did, for she was lost with
all hands—twenty men and boys. A—— R—— complained to him before he sailed
that she was ‘so deep loaded.’ She tried to get to the sands to see the
ship off with Mrs. J——r, whose husband was on board. They never saw their
husbands again.
“In this most evil-smelling room, E—— Q—— C—— Street, you may see in the
corner two poor women in one bed, stricken with fever (one died two days
after I saw them), mother and daughter. The husband of the daughter, who
maintained them both, had been lost at sea a little while before, in a
ship so loaded that when Mr. B——l, a Custom House officer who had to go on
board for some reason while she was lying in the river, was told, ‘She’s
yonder; you can easily find her, she is nearly over t’head in the water,’
Mr. B——l told me, ‘I asked no questions, but stepped on board; this
description was quite sufficient.’
“Mrs. R——s, H——n Place, told me her young brother was an orphan with
herself. She said her sister brought him up till she was married. Then her
husband was kind to him, and apprenticed him to the sea. He had passed as
second mate in a sailing ship, but (he was a fine young fellow—I have his
portrait) he was ambitious to ‘pass in steam’ also, and engaged to serve
in the _S——_ ship, leaking badly, but was assured on signing that she was
to be repaired before loading. The ship was not repaired, and was loaded,
as he told his sister-mother, ‘like a sand-barge.’ Was urged by his sister
and her husband not to go. His sister again urged him as he passed her
door in the morning. He promised he would not, and went to the ship to get
the wages due to him. Was refused payment unless he went, was
over-persuaded and threatened, and called a coward, which greatly excited
him. He went, and two days afterwards the ship went down. Her husband and
Mrs. R——s also told me that he and his wife ‘had a bit crack,’ and decided
to do all they could to ‘persuade Johnnie not to go.’ The young man was
about twenty-two.
“Mr. J—— H——l told me that the captain was his friend, and the captain was
very down-hearted about the way in which she was loaded (mind, she was
loaded under the owner’s personal supervision). The captain asked him (Mr.
A——) to see his wife off by train after the ship had sailed. She, poor
soul, had travelled to that port to see him off. The captain said to him,
‘I doubt I’ll never see her more!’ and burst out crying. Poor fellow, he
never did see her more.
“Now come with me to 36, C——, and see Mrs. J——e R——e. She is a young woman
of superior intelligence, and has a trustable face—very. She may be about
seven-and-twenty. She lost her husband in the same ship. He was thirty
years of age, and, to use her own words, ‘such a happy creature; so full
of jokes.’ He was engaged as second engineer, at £4 10s. and board. ‘After
his ship was loaded he was a changed man; he got his tea without saying a
word, and then sat looking into the fire in a deep study, like. I asked
him what ailed him, and he said, more to himself than to me, “She’s such a
beast!” I thought he meant the men’s place was dirty, as he had complained
before that there was no place to wash. He liked to be clean, my husband,
and always had a good wash when he came home from the workshop, when he
worked ashore. So I said, “Will you let me come on board to clean it out
for you?” And he said, still looking at the fire, “It ain’t that.” Well,
he hadn’t signed, only agreed, so I said, “Don’t sign, Jim,” and he said
he wouldn’t, and went and told the engineer he shouldn’t go. The engineer
“spoke so kindly to him,” and offered him 10s. a month more. He had had no
work for a long time, and the money was tempting,’ she said, ‘and so he
signed. When he told me I said, “You won’t go, Jim, will you?” He said,
“Why, Minnie, they will put me in gaol if I don’t go.” I said, “Never
mind, you can come home after that.” “But,” said he, “they called me a
coward, and you would not like to hear me called that.”’
“The poor woman was crying very bitterly, so I said gently, ‘I hope you
won’t think I am asking all these questions from idle curiosity;’ and I
shall never forget her quick disclaimer, for she saw that I was troubled
with her: ‘Oh no, sir; I am glad to answer you, for so many homes might be
kept from being desolate if it was only looked into.’
“I ascertained that she is ‘getting a bit winning for a livelihood,’ as my
informant phrased it, by sewing for a ready-made clothes-shopkeeper. She
was in a small garret with a sloping roof and the most modest fireplace I
ever saw; just three bits of iron laid from side to side of an opening in
the brickwork, and two more up the front; no chimney-piece, or jambs, or
stone across the top, but just the bricks laid nearer and nearer until the
courses united. So I don’t fancy she could be earning much. But with the
very least money value in the place, it was as beautifully clean as I ever
saw a room in my life.
“I also saw a poor woman, who had lost her son aged twenty-two. She too
cried bitterly, as she spoke with _such_ love and pride of her son, and of
the grief of his father, who was sixty years of age. Her son was taken on
as a stoker, and worked on the ship some days before she was ready for
sea. He did not want to go when he saw how she was loaded. She looked like
a floating wreck, but they refused to pay him the money he had earned
unless he went, and he too was lost with the others.
“Just one more specimen of the good, true, and brave men we sacrifice by
our most cruel and manslaughtering neglect. This time I went and called
upon an old man I knew, and, after apologising for intruding upon his
grief, I asked him to tell me if he had any objection to tell me if his
son had had any misgiving about the ship before he went. He said, ‘Yes, I
went to see the ship myself, and was horrified to see the way in which she
was loaded. I tried all I could to persuade him not to go, but he’d been
doing nothing for a long time, and he didn’t like being a burden on me.
He’d a fine sperret, he had, my son,’ said the poor old man.
“Here a young woman I had not observed (she was in a corner with her face
to the wall) broke out into loud sobs and said, ‘He was the best of us
all, sir—the best of the whole family. He was as fair as a flower, and
vah-y canny-looking.’”
But it is not merely rotten hulks which may become coffin-ships: many
superior vessels are woefully deficient in accommodation for the sailor’s
comfort. He may, and often does, wade to his bunk through water, and the
forecastle is too often a miserable hole, full of dirt and filth, where
the men are packed like herrings. The food provided is principally “salt
horse” and “hard bread,” _i.e._, sailor’s biscuit of the most inferior
description; and when scurvy ensues, as a natural consequence of exposure
to damp and cold, with poor living superadded, the very lime-juice, which
is nearly worthless if not pure, is found to be a miserable imitation or
grossly adulterated with citric acid, which, strange as it may appear, has
no anti-scorbutic properties. In the Russian and French mercantile marines
there is little or no scurvy, in consequence of the pretty general use of
common sour wine, which in some degree makes up for the lack of fresh
vegetables. And in French mercantile ships the sailor may at any time
demand the same rations as those served out in the navy of the Republic.
Owing to the carefully prepared dietary of our Royal Navy, scurvy has
entirely disappeared, except in extreme cases of exposure and lack of
precaution, as in the late Arctic Expedition.(36)
“In the West India Docks, which contain vessels trading to the West
Indies, I observed a very different class of ships. Some are large and
well supplied with provisions, but the majority are small, with wretched
accommodation, badly manned, provisions indifferent in quality and
deficient in quantity. Even in the larger vessels there is not that care
taken of the men, and that amount of attention paid to their quarters and
to the nature of their provisions, as in the ships belonging to the owners
engaged in the East Indian and China trade. Captain Henry Toynbee strongly
advocates the better ventilation and comfort of the forecastles, which he
thinks should be under the control of Government. He has himself seen
forecastles and seamen’s chests in first-class ships black from the gas
which rises from the cargo, and which smells like sewage, which is
especially the case in sugar ships. Captain Toynbee informed me a day or
two since that he had actually seen a place containing two packs of
foxhounds and three horses, which received half its ventilation by a hatch
which opened into the sailors’ forecastle!...
“In the Commercial Docks are to be seen both English and foreign ships,
varying in size and class, most of which are in the timber trade, and have
arrived from Norway, Sweden, or Memel, or the Baltic. The number of
patients taken from ships in these docks to the _Dreadnought_ hospital
ship usually exceeds that from any other dock; but the cases are those not
of scurvy, but consumption, bronchitis, and other chest diseases, which
occur not so frequently in English sailors as in Norwegians, Swedes, and
Russians—a fact due more, I think, to national predispositions than to
hygienic conditions. In ships belonging to northern countries the
provisions are abundant and good, the men’s quarters are roomy, and there
is nearly always a house upon deck in which there is a fair amount of
space and good ventilation. The hygienic condition of the men on board
Swedish and Norwegian ships is far superior to that of the ships of our
own country; the chief fault is the extremely dirty and lazy habit of the
men themselves, who allow filth of all kinds to accumulate in the
deck-house and galley, without taking the slightest trouble to remove it.
In English ships belonging to owners in the timber trade the state of
things is disgraceful; a house on deck is an exception, and the men live
and sleep in a small, close, ill-ventilated hole called a forecastle. The
quality of provisions varies in different ships, some owners being more
liberal than others; most of the men, however, live upon salt meat and
biscuit, and sometimes a little salt fish. Timber in itself is considered
a healthy cargo, but the ship is in most cases so overladen that the
forecastle is very much reduced in size—too much so, considering the
number of men that form the crew; these have either to remain on deck
exposed to wet and cold, or have to breathe the foul atmosphere of a small
forecastle, in which are stowed rusty chains, wet ropes, and all kinds of
animal decaying matter....”
The vessels used for the coal trade are now principally screw steamers,
though there are still many of the old class, generally found lying
between Blackwall and Woolwich. Our authority describes them as
follows:—They “are of small size (varying from 150 to 600 tons), and are
built as sloops, schooners, or brigs. The majority are brigs; a visit to
two or three presents a view of a state of things which is common to all.
A collier brig is generally worked by a captain and a mate, who live in a
small dirty cabin, and by four men and a boy, who live and sleep in the
most miserable of forecastles. This forecastle is very small, and so low
that no person of ordinary stature can stand upright in it. It is dark,
and the only approach is by a very small hatchway. It generally contains a
quantity of old ropes, some rusty chains, a large tub of grease, and some
damp canvas. These things, together with three or four dirty hammocks,
take up the whole space, and it is only from sickness and the most urgent
necessity that the sailor remains there for any length of time. So old and
ill-constructed are some of these colliers, that in rough weather the
forecastle is deluged with water. This condition of things is made much
worse by the negligence of the sailor himself, for it seems to be a rule
that the cook, instead of throwing over the side of the ship the refuse of
material used for food, as dirty water, potato parings, &c., deposits
these with great care in some corner of the forecastle. No attention is
paid by the captain to the sanitary state of the ship; during the voyage,
which is often a rough one, he is engaged in working the vessel, and while
she is in harbour he is on shore waiting upon the owners of the vessel, or
transacting their business in the Coal Exchange. I was informed the other
day by a friend, who was engaged during the recent cholera epidemic as a
sanitary inspector, that a patient afflicted with cholera was taken to the
Belleisle in the month of September, who had been lying in his hammock for
two days prostrate, and with much vomiting and purging, and during this
time the captain, although on board, was not aware of the man’s absence
from deck. The provisions supplied in this class of ships vary both in
quality and quantity; the supply, though, is very deficient, and there is
an almost universal complaint among the men and boys that they have not
sufficient to eat. Although coasting voyages last not longer than three or
four days, and the ship is very seldom far away from land, the men
scarcely ever get fresh meat; the supply always consists of salt beef—the
coarsest parts of the animal. To this I may add that the biscuits are of
the worst description, very hard, and are masticated with the greatest
difficulty. The quality of provisions depends entirely upon the liberality
of the captain, who not unfrequently has a share in the ship, and whose
interest is consequently concerned in keeping down all expenses; the
comfort of the men seems to be made subservient to pecuniary advantages.”
And now—for a change—to good owners. There are many, and the present
writer believes fully that the average ship-owner not merely wishes to
preserve his ship, but all on board—crew, passengers, and cargo. The
proprietor of a grand vessel feels, as he should, that her loss is a very
great deal more than his loss. Dr. Stone, some years ago made an
inspection of the docks, and his remarks, published in our leading
journal,(37) deserve to be recorded. He says:—
“From conversations I had with many of the officers and crews engaged in
Green’s, Wigram’s, Smith’s, the Black Ball, and other services, and from
what I saw, I judged that the provisions are good and ample, and I was
informed that scurvy is seldom met with in the vessels belonging to these
owners, owing to the fact of the masters not being content with simply
ordering the crew to take a certain quantity of lime-juice every day
during the ship’s voyage, but satisfying themselves by personal inspection
that the juice is actually drank. Outside the dock gates, and off Plaistow
Wharf, may occasionally be seen American vessels which have arrived with
petroleum. An inspection confirmed the opinion I have always entertained
regarding the superior accommodation met with in the vessels of the United
States; they are large, well manned, and supplied with good provisions.
The berths and sleeping quarters are better even than those in large East
Indiamen; every ship has a raised house on deck, spacious, well
ventilated, and clean, which, being furnished with a stove, the men are
thereby enabled in wet weather to dry their clothes, which is of course a
great preservation of their health. The general condition of the men is
far better than that of the sailor of any other nation. Although the cruel
treatment exercised by the officers of American ships is proverbial, there
is seldom any difficulty in obtaining a good crew. The masters in the
commercial marine of America pride themselves upon the general appearance
of their crews, and they say that it is the best economy to give them good
and abundant food, and to pay rigid attention to their sleeping quarters.”
Sometimes it is the cargo itself which is a fatal cause of disease or
death. Ships carrying large quantities of minerals, sulphur, petroleum,
&c., sometimes smell intolerably, but are not considered unhealthy places
of residence. But how of guano and other manure ships? In one of Dr.
Stone’s letters to the _Times_, published in 1867, he says:—“The most
objectionable and unhealthy cargoes brought into the Thames are those
consisting of the different kinds of manure. A large bone trade is carried
on in the port of London; barges are constantly passing up and down the
Pool laden with bones collected from bone-dealers and the slaughter-houses
of London. Many of the bones are not dry, but are covered with decomposing
flesh. The smell is very bad, and is not limited to the immediate
neighbourhood of the barge itself, but may be carried for a long distance.
These bone barges discharge their cargoes into some small coasting
ship.... The sailors and bargemen engaged in work of this kind suffer very
much: they are nauseated by the offensive smell; their appetites fail
entirely; they consume large quantities of spirit; and, as a consequence,
are invariably attacked by diarrhœa, accompanied with vomiting. In the
summer time it is a matter of surprise how anyone can remain, for a short
time even, in the neighbourhood of the vessel; a thick offensive steam is
constantly rising from the bones, and the decks and rigging are covered
with large blue flies. When the vessel (generally a small, very old, and
ill-manned schooner) puts to sea, the hatchways are kept open, so as to
give free egress to the gaseous products of decomposition and to prevent
the ship from taking fire.”
Many have been the instances of ships’ decks being blown up by the gas
from coal becoming ignited, and loss of life has been caused thereby.
Gunpowder may, under certain conditions, become a most dangerous cargo.
Take the case of the _Great Queensland_, which was blown up entirely,
leaving no survivors to tell the tale. The cause is not far to seek when
we learn that two tons of impure wood powder, sufficient of itself to
burst the ship to pieces, and from its condition likely to explode, were
stored in the same compartment with thirty tons of ordinary black
gunpowder.
Compulsory survey and no overloading were Mr. Plimsoll’s main remedies for
the prevention of the terrible loss of life in the mercantile marine. He
cites two cases of great firms—the first engaged in the coal carrying, and
the second in the guano trade—who do not permit overloading, and the
first, in fifteen years had not, out of a large fleet of steamers, lost a
single vessel, although they made from fifty to seventy double trips per
annum. And yet the voyage from the Thames to the Tyne is more dangerous
than an over-sea voyage. There are a whole crowd of dangerous shoals off
the Essex coast alone, to be avoided or steered between, as the case may
be, as soon as the ship leaves the Thames, followed by equal dangers on
the Suffolk and Norfolk coasts. The latter sands are all under water even
when the tide is at ebb, but there is not water enough on them to float a
ship; hence the losses when ill-found, overloaded, and undermanned vessels
get on them. Further north there are others, and then come the dangerous
rocky coasts of Yorkshire and Durham. The second case deserves particular
mention. About the year 1860, the firm of Anthony Gibbs and Co., of
London, took a contract from the Peruvian Government to charter and load
ships from the Chincha Islands with guano, and as many as three or four
hundred ships left those islands annually for different parts of the
world. At first they were allowed to load and proceed to sea without
inspection or surveying, and were permitted to load as deeply as the
masters thought fit. What was the result? Accidents and losses were
reported every few days, and many of their ships foundered at sea, some
with all hands on board. When the head of the house at Lima, Peru,
introduced proper surveying before loading, to discover what repairs were
needed, &c., allowing no overloading, and not permitting the ships to go
to sea without full inspection of her pumps and gear, a sudden and
wonderful change took place, and for years after not one of these ships
foundered at sea.
[Illustration: EXTERIOR OF LLOYD’S.]
We often hear and read of “unclassed” ships; does the reader understand
the term? Nearly all new ships are fit to take valuable merchandise—silks,
tea, provisions, cloth, or what not; and if “tight,” _i.e._, not leaky,
would be classed A 1 by Lloyd’s Committee. The letter refers to the ship
proper; the numeral to its equipment, rigging, boats, cables, anchors, &c.
The term or period for which she is classed varies with the quality and
kind of timber employed, and the quality of the workmanship is also taken
into account. A ship built mainly of hemlock, yellow pine, beech, or fir,
will generally be classed A 1 for four or five years; of elm or ash five
to seven years; and so on through various grades, until, if built of
English oak or teak, she may be rated nine to twelve years. All are
subject to the “half-time” survey of a strict character; thus a ship
classed A 1 for eight years is examined by Lloyd’s surveyors at the end of
four years. “She may again, at the request of the owner, be examined for
continuation, _i.e._, to be continued A 1 for a further term; usually
two-thirds of that originally granted. She may again and again be
re-examined for continuation, or, if she have meantime gone into a lower
class, be examined for restoration to the character A, but each of these
surveys is increased in thoroughness and stringency as the age of the ship
increases. When from age she ceases to be entitled to the character A in
the opinion of Lloyd’s surveyor, but is still tight enough and strong
enough to carry valuable merchandise to any part of the world, she is
classed A red, usually for a term of half or two-thirds the original term
granted her in the first character.... When from increasing age she is no
longer fit to carry valuable goods for long voyages, she falls back into
class black, diphthong Æ; while in this class she is deemed fit to carry
the same class of goods, but only on short voyages (not beyond Europe).
And when after survey and re-survey at intervals, as before, she is no
longer fit to carry valuable goods at all, she falls into class E, and is
deemed fit only to carry goods which sea-water won’t hurt, as metallic
ores, coal, coke, &c.” And so it goes on till she is classed 1; and when
she is run through her terms here she is said to have run out of her
classes: to be, in fact, an “unclassed ship.” The lettering is slightly
varied for iron ships. But it must be remembered that all this submitting
to survey is entirely optional, and that a newly-built ship may be
“unclassed” also. In the former case—a ship which has run out of all its
classes—the vessel is usually fit for nothing more than a river trip, and
ought really to be broken up. It is then that the disreputable shipowner
steps in and purchases her. Happy is it for its poor crew if she does not
prove their coffin!
[Illustration: INTERIOR OF LLOYD’S.]
It may be asked, as Lloyd’s will now have nothing to do with such a rotten
tub, How does the owner get anyone to insure it? It is generally done by
mutual insurance clubs formed among these very owners, though not
exclusively. Plimsoll says: “It almost seems as if there was a race who
should lose his ships first on the formation of a new club, so great are
the sums the members are called upon to pay as premium;” and such clubs
are constantly failing.
To be classed A 1 in anything is good, and, as applied to a ship at
Lloyd’s, means, as we all know, that the vessel is first-class in every
particular. But what is Lloyd’s? Many readers would find it difficult to
give a clear answer to this query. The secretary of that institution told
M. Esquiros, when that distinguished writer was visiting England, that he
received many business letters addressed to “Mr. Lloyd,” and we all know
there was long, in fact, a celebrated Lloyd’s Coffee-house in the City,
where the merchants interested in maritime matters used to congregate. A
poem, “The Wealthy Shopkeeper, or Charitable Christian,” published in
1700, alludes to the establishment, and the writer adds, as an addendum,
that the London merchant at that time never missed “resorting to Lloyd’s
to read his letters and attend sales.” Later, Steele and Addison both
spoke of it in the same light. “The veritable, personal Lloyd,” says
Esquiros, “as we see, has made a great deal more noise in the world after
his death than he ever did during his lifetime.” The name of the
coffee-house keeper has become inseparably connected with the greatest
maritime institution of the world.
The original Lloyd was a wonderfully good example of a pushing London
citizen. Little was, speaking in these later days, known of Edward of that
ilk till Mr. Frederick Martin unearthed, in the vaults of the Royal
Exchange, a long-forgotten series of its archives. Then he found “huge
stores of manuscript papers and immense leather-cased folios, partly
singed in the great fire which, in 1838, destroyed the Royal Exchange
above them.” Now we know that Lloyd, early in the reign of Charles II.,
kept a coffee-house in Tower Street, and contrived to make it the
gathering point for the underwriters, who had been previously scattered
all over the city. This house was near the Custom House, the Navy Office,
and the Trinity House, as well as to the Thames “below bridge,” and the
position was obviously a good one for the purpose. Having surrounded
himself with a growing connection in Tower Ward, Lloyd found himself in a
position to approach the haunts of the leading merchants and bankers, and
we find him in 1693 securely established at the corner of Lombard Street
and Abchurch Lane, near the spot where the Lombard Street post-office now
stands. Here he held periodical auction sales “by the candle,” and started
a weekly paper devoted to maritime affairs, the first of its kind: indeed
it was, saving the _London Gazette_, the only London newspaper yet in
existence. But he now met a severe blow, for, as we learn from Macaulay,
“the judges were unanimously of opinion that this liberty (of printing)
did not extend to gazettes,” and that, by English law, no man not
authorised by the Crown had the right to publish political news. The said
political news in this case consisted of mere headings and brief
paragraphs, as, “Yesterday the Lords passed the Bill to restrain the
wearing of all wrought silks from India,” or that they had received a
“petition from the Quakers.” Lloyd had to succumb and stop the
publication, but his sales of ships and cargoes increased, so that in
fifteen or twenty years Lloyd’s had become the recognised London centre of
maritime business, including marine insurance. From this comparatively
small beginning has sprung the all-powerful organisation whose agents are
to be found in every part of the habitable globe.
“When,” says a writer already quoted, “I landed, about three years back,
upon one of the group of rocks lost in the bosom of the waves, and which
are called the Scilly Islands, there was only one thing which brought
London to my mind, and that was the name ‘Lloyd’s’, in letters of brass,
on the door of one of the least poor-looking houses. I might have gone
much further afield, into some of the still wilder islands of the Old or
New World, and there, even at the very ends of the earth—provided only
that there was a town or port of some sort—I should have found an agent of
this English society. The definition of Lloyd’s which was given by a City
merchant can now be better understood by us. ‘It is,’ said he, ‘a spider
planted in the centre of a web which covers the whole sea, and the
shipwrecked vessels are the dead flies.’”(38)
“The loose connection existing between the underwriters of London,” says
the leading authority on the subject,(39) “as frequenters of the same
coffee-house, where they carried on their business transactions, formed
itself into a final ‘system of membership’ by transmigration to the Royal
Exchange in 1774. The author and leading spirit in this all-important
movement, which had far-reaching consequences for the commerce, not only
of England, but for that of the whole world, was Mr. John Julius
Angerstein, a native of St. Petersburg, but of German extraction,
descended from an old and highly respected family of merchants.” The
writer goes on to show how young Angerstein, from junior clerk, had risen
to be a successful merchant and underwriter. He became one of the most
honoured of those who assembled at Lloyd’s Coffee-house, as he was a most
sagacious and far-seeing man, of unimpeachable integrity, and when the
movement for obtaining a suitable home for the underwriters was mooted he
was its greatest supporter. He became virtually the leader in the whole
matter, and seventy-nine underwriters agreed to pay one hundred pounds
each to start it fairly. Thus was the “New Lloyd’s,” as it was then
called, first organised. It is not, nor ever has been, an insurance
_company_, but rather a fraternity of merchants, shipowners, bankers, and
capitalists subscribing for a place where they could meet and transact
business. It is a maritime exchange. But each man is guided by his own
intelligence, and must measure the extent of business which he undertakes
by the standard of his personal capital.
“The English merchant especially,” says Esquiros, in his charming work,
“having so many bonds of union with the ocean, can hardly expect to always
have tranquil sleep. Let the south-west squalls be ever so little let
loose, the ruin of his house and family is hoarsely muttered through his
dreams. Oh, if he could only see from afar the good ship in which he has
risked the better part of his fortune! In the morning he rushes to
Lloyd’s, the fountain-head of all marine news. Nothing, either in his face
or conduct, shows the least emotion—he has the art of veiling his features
with a mask of indifference; but what a tempest of anxiety rages under
this outward calm! He asks himself a thousand questions: What does the
telegraph say? What ships have touched at distant ports? What are the
names of those which have reached England? To all these questions and many
more he finds answers affixed to the walls of the vestibule. There the
lists and advices give exactly the maritime bulletin of the day. But the
critical moment has yet to come; this man, whose whole fortune perhaps is
on the sea, has not at present consulted the ‘Loss Book,’ or, as it is
also called, the ‘Black Book.’”
This gloom-inspiring volume is placed by itself on a high desk, and each
can refer to it in turn. It is, of course, written by hand, and contains
every day the wreck record, briefly told. Laconic as is the formal
record—the name of the ship, destination, nature of cargo, coast on which
shipwrecked, and so forth—there have been as many as twelve pages
blackened with the sad summary of the losses announced by telegraph during
one day. “In each of these announcements—frigid and taciturn as fate
itself—the mind may conjure up many a sad drama. How many human lives are
there sacrificed? This is often the fact of which the ‘Black Book’ takes
but little notice; the matter with which it has exclusively to deal is the
property insured against the perfidy of the sea. Who was the insurer? and
who has lost? These are the great questions. It is also remarkable, after
a storm, to see with what anxious and fidgety hands some of the insurance
speculators turn over the pages of this sibylline book.” And no wonder:
for the underwriter(40) is a speculator who is taking long odds against a
terrible gambler—the ocean.
The Underwriters’ Room at Lloyd’s to-day is a splendid hall, with
Scagliola columns and richly decorated ceiling, and mahogany tables placed
at intervals all round the room. “What an animated, yet demure, hubbub is
here!” says the French writer before quoted. “One might fancy that the
sea, with the thoughts of which every brain is occupied here, had imparted
some of its agitation and uproar to the business world. The current of
news, transactions taking place, and chat going on, runs from one end of
the hall to the other with a kind of deep murmuring roar.” Those going to
and fro are of two very distinct classes—the insurers of ships and the
insurance brokers. The latter have become very necessary, the reason being
as follows:—The merchant who wishes to insure a ship, or a certain kind of
merchandise that he is about to export, may by no means always meet the
underwriter who is prepared to take that particular risk. While he is
trying to insure his ship she may have already started—may even be at the
bottom of the sea. In the latter case a delay might be fatal, for the news
once arrived that his ship had been wrecked, he could not, of course,
effect any insurance. He therefore goes to a broker who knows the habits
of the place, and probably the very underwriter whose means or known
predilections for certain forms of investment will make him desirous of
taking the risk.
The business of Lloyd’s is conducted by a committee of twelve influential
members, while the working staff includes a secretary, clerks, and a staff
of assistants technically known as “waiters,” which would make it seem as
though the odour of the original Lloyd’s Coffee-house still clung to the
body. The funds of Lloyd’s Association, as it might be termed, are large,
and are used to great advantage: partly in charity bestowed upon
deserving, though unfortunate seamen, and partly in rewards, in various
forms, to special cases of merit. It costs an underwriter £50 entrance fee
and £12 annual subscription to belong to it; the brokers are let off for
about half the above rates; an ordinary subscriber pays £5 per annum for
the privilege of entering the rooms of the Association. We have now traced
the history of the greatest maritime company of the world, one that could
only belong to a great nation. No other could devise, much less support
it.
[Illustration: THE “GREAT EASTERN” IN A GALE OFF CAPE CLEAR.]
[Illustration: MR. I. K. BRUNEL. MR. SCOTT RUSSELL. (_From a Photograph by
Mayall, 1858._)]