Windjammers and Sea Tramps Part 7

In the early years of the last century, right up to the seventies, north-country owners placed three to four apprentices on each vessel, and never less than three. Many of them came from Scotland, Shetland, Norfolk, Denmark and Sweden. There were few desertions, and they always settled down in the port that they served their time from. If any attempt was made at engaging what was known as a "half-marrow"[2] there was rebellion at once; and I have known instances where lads positively refused to sail in a vessel where one of these had been shipped instead of an apprentice. Impertinent intrusion was never permitted in those days. As soon as they were out of their time the majority of the lads joined the local union. One of the conditions of membership was that each applicant should pa.s.s an examination in seamanship before a committee of the finest sailors in the world. They had to know how to put a clew into a square and fore-and-aft sail, to turn up a shroud, to make every conceivable knot and splice, to graft a bucket-rope, and to fit a mast cover. The examination was no sham. I remember one poor fellow, who had served five years, was refused membership because he had failed to comply with some of the rules. He had to serve two years more before he was admitted. I have often regretted that Mr. Havelock Wilson did not adopt similar methods for his union, though perhaps it is scarcely fair to put the responsibility of not doing so on him. The conditions under which he formed his union were vastly different from what they were in those days. He had to deal with a huge disorganised, moving ma.s.s, composed of many nationalities.

At the same time I am convinced that a union conducted on the plan of the one I have been describing is capable of doing much towards training an efficient race of seamen, and I hope Mr. Wilson, or somebody else, will give it a trial.

Since the above was written Lord Bra.s.sey, by the invitation of the Newcastle Chamber of Commerce, has read a carefully prepared paper, in the Guildhall, to a large audience of shipowners and merchants, on the best means of feeding the Mercantile Marine and the Royal Navy with seamen. Lord Bra.s.sey must have been at infinite trouble in getting the material for his paper, and, notwithstanding the errors of fact and of reasoning in it, I think the shipping community, and indeed the public at large, owe him their hearty thanks for giving so important a subject an opportunity of being discussed. So far as his advocacy of the establishment of training vessels for the supply of seamen to the Royal Navy is concerned, I have nothing to say against it. The lads in those ships are trained by naval officers, under naval customs and discipline, and there should be some recruiting ground of the kind for that service. But Lord Bra.s.sey advocates it for the Mercantile Marine also. He suggests a plan of subsidy to be paid to the owner or the apprentice, and that the lad after serving four years, should be available for service in the Royal Navy. But to begin with, it may be objected that men trained in Royal Navy discipline and habits never mix well with men trained in the other service; their customs and habits of life and work are quite different to those of the merchant seaman. It used to be a recognised belief that the sailor of the merchantman could adapt himself with striking facility to the work of the Royal Navy and its discipline, but the Navy trained man was never successful aboard a cargo vessel. The former impression originated, no doubt, during the good old times when it was customary for prowling ruffians from men-of-war to drag harmless British citizens from their homes to man H.M. Navy, and all the world knows how quickly they adapted themselves to new conditions, and how well they fought British battles! But what a sickening reality to ponder over, that less than a century ago the powerful caste in this country were permitted, in defiance of law, to have press-gangs formed for the purpose of kidnapping respectable seamen into a service that was made at that time a barbarous despotism by a set of brainless whipper-snappers who gained their rank by backstair intrigue with a shameless aristocracy! All that kind of villainy has been wiped out; and the men of the Royal Navy are now treated like human beings; and they do their work not a whit less courageously and well than they did when it was customary to lash G.o.d's creatures with strands of whipcord loaded with lead until the blood oozed from their skins. There is no need to press either men or boys to enter the King's Naval Service. It has now been made sufficiently attractive to obviate the need for that. Nor is there any necessity for shipowners to be called upon, with or without subsidy, to train and supply men for the Navy. They have enough to do to look after their own manning, and this can be done easily by the adoption of methods that will break down any objection British parents may have to their sons becoming indentured to steamship owners, who will find work for them to do, and who will have them trained by a kindly discipline, paid, fed, and lodged properly; but still, if they are to be thorough men, there should be no pampering. Unquestionably, then, the place for training should be aboard the vessels they are intended to man and become officers and masters of. No need for subsidised training vessels; and certainly no need for a national charge being made for the benefit of shipowners, who have no right to expect that any part of their working expenses should be paid by the State.

As an example of how sympathy is growing for the apprenticeship system, Messrs. Watts,[3] Watts & Company, of London, have for many years carried apprentices aboard their steamers, and the grand old Blythman who adorns the City of London commercial life with all that is ruggedly honest and manly, has just purchased, at great cost, a place in Norfolk, which his generous son, Shadforth, has agreed to furnish, and then it is to be endowed as a training-field for sailor-boys. The veteran shipowner is well known by his many unostentatious acts of philanthropy to have as big a heart as ever swelled in a human breast; but, knowing him as I do, I feel a.s.sured that his philanthropy would have taken another form had he not been convinced he was conferring a real national benefit by giving larger opportunities to British lads to enter the merchant service.

I give two other notable examples of success because of the care taken in selecting the boys and the care adopted in training them. Mr. Henry Radcliffe, senior partner of Messrs. Evan Thomas, Radcliffe & Co., of Cardiff, has taken a personal interest in boy apprentices for years. His experience of them has long pa.s.sed the experimental state, and his testimony is that this is the only way the merchant navy can be adequately and efficiently maintained.

Daniel Stephens, senior partner of Messrs. Stephens, Sutton & Stephens, which firm has carried apprentices for a number of years, is a sailor himself, who has had the good sense never to try and hide the fact that he was trained amid a fine race of west-country seaman, and he is proud to be able to say that he has been training boys for years with uniform satisfaction. He relates with obvious pride that one of his boys, a coal-miner's son, seven years to a day from the date of joining his firm as an apprentice, sailed as chief officer of their newest and largest steamer.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 2: A "half-marrow" was a young man who was trying to become a seaman without serving his apprenticeship.]

[Footnote 3: During the pa.s.sage of this book through the press, Mr. Watts, senior, has pa.s.sed away.]

THE END.