A Visit to Shields...and a step back in time

The Customs House at Mill Dam, South Shields

I’m up in Newcastle. The idea was to do some research and remove myself from the distractions of London life. So far so good…

I’ve been staying in the Turnbull Building, an imposing converted Victorian warehouse, oddly reminiscent of Disney’s Tower of Terror, perched above the Quayside. Scenes from Get Carter were filmed here! How cool. Thank you, Airbnb. 

In between reading through more of my great-grandfather’s stories about Geordie and his time aboard ship learning the ropes (literally), transcribing his letters to his wife and brother from 1918, and becoming a modern day expert in sea shanties - and of course finding some distractions here (Newcastle’s 3-0 stunner at St. James Park!)…I spent yesterday in South Shields delving into the local history. 

I started my day at the famous Mill Dam where my great-grandfather would go regularly to see whether ships were taking on sailors. He talks about this place frequently in his journals, and in all my years visiting Shields I don't think I had ever made it here. I met local legend Janis Blower at the Customs House. Janis worked at the Shields Gazette for 44 years and has a deep knowledge of and connection to local seafaring history. I picked up a copy of her book at the Customs House, which has been an informative read. 

View of the Tyne along the waterfront at South Shields

After leaving the Customs House I took a wind-swept stroll along the river front to the location of the original town. Today all that’s left of this once bustling site is a series of small warehouses, workshops and a museum wedged tightly up against the waterfront. On the other side of Wapping Street, the main thoroughfare, is a steep hill. Later at the Library as I was reading about the old town’s appalling housing conditions - conditions that saw outbreaks of cholera and smallpox in the mid to late-1800s -  I wondered how so many people and houses had fit in such a narrow space.

After this I walked back up to Kings Street. I stopped in at the Museum to see an installation on Shield in the post-WWI period and headed on to the Central Library. Here I picked up a copy of George B. Hodgson’s The Borough of South Shields. Hodgson confirmed what I had always known - that “Shields folk [are] a race apart” with their own distinctive customs and speech. Indeed, as a child I remember my granddad explaining to me the differences between the “divvents” and the “dean’ts” and the differences in dialect between north and south Tyneside.  

The period in which my great-grandfather sailed from Shields coincided with a period of great prosperity and growth, fuelled by demand for coal and other commodities:  

• During the census period 1881-1891, shortly after my great-grandfather was born, the population grew by 38% - second only to Cardiff. In the period 1891-1901 it grew by 24%. 
• By the end of the 19th century almost half a million tons of shipping was clearing through Shields, compared with 87,000-tons 30 years earlier.
• Coal shipments from the Tyne between 1885 and 1914 rose from 9.84m to 20.3m tons  

This period was marked by the establishment of the Customs House, Mercantile Marine Office, Tyne River Police office and other major town developments. However the period ends with great losses of lives in both Great Wars, what are thought to be the first ‘race riots’ in Britain between Arab and white seamen competing for jobs, and general economic decline. According to Janis in the 1950s ship building and repair remained strong in the Tyne; however by the 1970s most of this had been lost to foreign competition.  

At the library I was also shown census records and national archive listings for my great-grandfather and a map of the area in which he lived from the 1850s. Princes Street in the Leygate area of town no longer exists as the area under went major redevelopment in the ‘60s - but Alice Street remains. 

Today, the centre of gravity of the town has shifted to the seafront at Little Haven. As I walked along the promenade, I was reminded of something my great-grandad wrote in one of his books:

• “My boy, wonderful happenings are recorded in books. That’s so. But, I think more wonderful are the happenings that are not recorded in them; things known, very often to no-account folk. Sailors, firemen and rovers in general.”

My great-grandfather’s insights are but a small drop in the ocean of memory and experience. Exploring and highlighting these are my small contribution to giving these no-account folk a voice - and to the town which has played such a large role in my life.

So for now, with my appetite for Minchella's, stotties and family history sated, back to London I go…

Mariner's Tale Theme Tune: Toiler on the Sea

We all went to see The Stranglers at Brixton Academy a few weeks ago and roundly agreed that this tune should be in the running for Mariners Tale theme tune:

The Stranglers - Toiler on the Sea

What is Time?

One of the most rewarding things about going through my great-grandfather's journals has been the personal discovery of learning a little more about who I am and where I come from. I have always been slightly obsessed with imagery around time, flight and travel - latching on to passages from T.S. Eliot about measuring time in coffee spoons - and they litter Myles's writings. Even the little things: he signs off letters 'Au revoir' or 'Bon nuit' and throws in gratuitous foreign words to describe what he and his shipmates are doing or seeing. I am occasionally guilty of the same.

I see in much of what he writes my own thinking - which has made me wonder whether the ideas that resonate most strongly with a person are innate or whether you learn to examine and explore certain themes through regular exposure within your family.

Rifling through some loose leaf papers, I came across this poem. Over the years I had heard my grandfather recite it to my sisters and I many a time, but never fully appreciated where it had come from. For your reading pleasure....

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What is Time? – Lines to an Inquirer

Time is the ever present now

Man measures by a clock

That keeps coy hands before its face

While its in’ads laugh. Tick Tock.

By solar time as east to west

The sun it seems to go

Though learned he knows quite well

Of course it is not so.

He’s sure a very clever chap

Whose thoughts seek the sublime

Yet thinks to make a longer day

With his clock pushed summer time

Time flies and on its wing

We are borne along.

Amid life’s cloud and sunshine

Pray friend, our hold be strong.

Past, present and the future

That stupendous trinity

makes humble as we ponder

dim-visioned, on its unity

Yet with the grade of God to guide us

As we sing aloud “Credo”

In our hearts we find the answer

To all we wish to know.

Written in 1957 by great-grandfather

Myles Toale

True British Sailors

To be known as a sailor in the old days was a true mark of pride, as Geordie describes as he continues his story below. This is the final instalment of the story as it was printed in the shields Gazette. 

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A Real Sailor

            “A few like myself with no great desire to be other than what was once our ideal have stuck to the deck and the fo’c’sle but we are thinning in numbers.

            “Last time at home I passed by a ‘pub’ –  yes, you hobos – I passed by a ‘pub’ – I do sometimes; it was near a dry dock. I saw a gang of chaps having a pow-wow, ‘chewing the rag’ you know. As I went by one of them grabbed my by the arm and in excitedly anxious tones, mellowed by a few pints of beer, entreated me to tell the rest that he was a sailor.

            “You know me Geordie – I’m a sailor ain’t I – tell them I’m a sailor,”

            “I looked. Sure enough he was one o the sea lads I knew. Crippled on a government trawler in the war he was; now not able to go to sea for a living.

            “’You bet you are, Fred,’ I said and he looked triumphantly at the crowd.

            “The old spirit lived. To be known as a sailor was his greatest pride.  

            “That pride was held of course by all the old mates and skippers, in fact they sometimes claimed a monopoly of it. There’s a yarn about a lady visitin’ to a ship that will show you whiat I mean.

            “She was very inquisitive keeping her officer friends busy passing along information. Noticing some of the crew working aloft, she asked –

            “’Are those the sailors?’”

            “’Oh no,’ she was informed by the mate, pointing to his pals of the afterguard, ‘We are the sailors – They are the roustabouts.’

            “You see although most of the old forecastle hands were full of this pride of craft, they were seldom given credit for it, and often treated as though they knew it not.

Changing Times

            “Times have changed and many things are in a state of transition. It can’t be expected of an old timer to see eye to eye with everything new. Changes are not always for the best.” So you will understand some old Lord Nelson – as Bill remarked – moaning about the passing of the spirit that animated him; he wonders – are even the officers losing it.

            “In my last ship the second mate was a smart young chap who got his ticket at his first attempt becoming second mate of the same ship in which he served his time. Always in uniform he was modern – natty and scholarly – a real good sort but – this is what he said to me at the wheel when the mate – an elderly man who had been officer in sail – had left the bridge after a wrangle about the ship’s position. ‘You know Brown we’ve got a mate on this ship but he’s simply a sailor’. – What did he mean?

            “There’s a change alright boys. Of late when ever I take a pasear to the old hunting grounds, I find little trace of the old type. A few riggers and sailors still haunt the Market Cross, but in King Street – the one-time parade of the ‘crowds’ from the sailing coasters – Whitstable men, Channel Islanders, Newhaven men, Devon men, to say nothing of Geordies and Scotties – an unforgettable lot to those that knew them, with their velvet collared coats, silver earrings, and unmistakeable sailor air – there is no sign they were ever there.

           

Old Spirit Survives

            “In Ocean Road brassbounders bound no more, not roll gunnels under. They have sailed away, leaving one or two old locals with a lot to think about as they wander aimlessly, lost among the crowds of pleasure seekers making for the beach – the Ocean roaders – “

            Here Geordie stopped overcome with emotion.

            Bill, ever ready, filled the gap, saying, “Never mind old hoss – old sailors never die – you – well they’ll have to hang you – and don’t you worry about the sea spirit. What about your young townie, the ordinary and the apprentice; I’m damned sure they are full of it. What do you say, hombres?”

            “Regular young sea dogs,” was the opinion of the ‘hombres’. That given to show them they were also, they sang with no uncertain voices a verse of

            “We’ll rant and we’ll roar

            “Like true British sailors.”

Call of the Sea

Part 2 of the Bygone Days of the Tyne as published in the Shields Gazette (date unknown). Geordie continues to wax lyrical about the old sailor spirit and describes the scene on the Ocean Road. 

Ocean Road in 1923

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Call of the Sea

            “There was no such thing as signing ‘sailor’ and getting an A.B.’s pay. No, they had such a tough time for a year or two – sure thing – Anyhow, go to sea they would, even if they started as the cabin boy, messroom ‘fat’ or deck-boy.

            “When a few of them boys met at home, well, it was – “Clear out you small swells and make room for the big sea’ –

             “Down Ocean Road they went arm in arm, and with no policeman in sight they probably sang “No more I’ll go aroving” – keeping in mind the order at starting ‘Now then boys, all roll together’.

            “I can see them now, each rigged out with a ‘Second mate’s bad discharge’; a bright leather peaked cap, its strap pulled over the top – worn cock-billed on three hairs.

            “Those with square cut jacket, over their guernseys, back silk mufflers round their necks – the knots canted to port shoulders, were the schoonermen.

“The ‘Yanks’ wore no waistcoat, so as to expose a fancy shirt bought in the ‘States’ and a flowing tie. Of course those guys kept their pants up with the aid of a nice buckled belt.

            “The messroom fats – regular sea swells – wore linen collars and flash white silk mufflers, the ends tucked in their vests well down. 

Looking the Part

            “Pants were semi-bell-bottomed and shoes high heeled, though it the weather was wet Wellington sea boots were the fashion. Oh, they dressed sailor and were proud of it. Nowadays you can’t tell a sailor from an insurance collector.

            “Leaving the ‘bob’ side of the road they would invade the ‘two shilling side’ where they swanks fancied they held right-of-way; I mean the sailing ship apprentice in his smart uniform; the Brassbounder he was called, and between you and me he was far too successful with the lasses to please the ‘locals’.

            “However they tried to get their own back by a scornfully uttered ‘Light the binnacle boy.’ Rivals in love, both parties had a sneaking regards for one another. Really the locals had great respect for the brass-buttoned sailing ship apprentice, who might – if he hadn’t been a young sport – bring up ‘all standing’ some of them, perhaps truthfully with the paralysing phrase then still in use ‘Steamboat sailor!’ 

            “Steamboat sailor or not the spirit was there, and although some of the locals became skippers, I know their greatest pride is in the name of sailor. Even those that became cooks and stewards, firemen or donkeymen as fortune willed, were at heart and will remain while they last – sailors."

Bygone days of the Tyne

Myles serialised some of his journeys for the Shields Gazette later in life. Here is the beginning of one of his stories.

Sea-Dog of Days That Are Gone

By A.B.

(M.Toale)

Old Geordie sang as he stowed away his tea gear in the locker. When he finished singing, by way of apology for his outbursts, he remarked to his mates –

            “That’s one of the ditties all us young fellow-me-lads years ago delighted in. When the sea spirit was strong and we thought sailor, talked sailor, lived in a sailor atmosphere, with sailor notions – some of them Yankee ones – that I'm afraid have now reached vanishing point.”

            “Listen to Lord Nelson moaning,” cried Bill the expert leg-puller. “I supposed the young-uns today haven’t got the right spirit. What cheer and Bristol fashion like eh? In your day they were real sons of the sea – but go ahead and tell us of our loss.”

Scenting a cuffer, the rest prepared for it. Lighting their ‘dudeens’ or newly rolled fags, they puffed away in dignified respectful silence – artists in appreciation.

            “Righto young Sarcasticus,” replied Geordie casting a withering glance on the smiling Bill. “Other days – other ways I know, but the lads I knew had great pride in their calling; to them a sailorman, were he A.B. or skipper, was the real he-man, the master man to whom they rendered homage; where he went they went, following in his wake – they simply had to – not aboard yachts, big liners, or fancy craft, but on brigs, schooners, deep-watermen, ironoremen, across the ‘Westard’, Black Sea tramps, colliers and ‘scuffers’; a hard school, but the harder the better, they meant to be sailors, glorying in their hardships for A.B.’s weren’t made in a dog-watch then.

A Love Poem to his Lady

Myles's journals and letters speak clearly of his love for his wife Teresa and the desire to be back at her side whilst he is away. In one letter from 1917 he chides himself for getting soppy after saying "Teresa dear I miss you very much this time and I cant help thinking about you and I long for a feel of your arms and a taste of your sweet lips." He is worried that someone beside her or the "censorman", who would have reviewed all correspondence from sailors on Admiralty commission at that time, would see the lines.  

In honour of the Valentine's Day just passed, here is a poem he penned from a rambler to his dearest wife...

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Tuesday 19^th May, 1914

S.S. Welbury Algiers, Algeria a.m.

Dear Teresa,

Arrived here 7 a.m. and I received your letter of the 16^th May. I was very pleased to do so. You say that you have sent me more than four. I am sorry to have been worrying you in my letters about the strayed correspondences. I feel a bit of a beast after reading this letter of yours here. This is the second one I have got. Please forgive me. We are taking 250 tons of bunker coal. Will leave about noon. The address is M Toale S.S. Welbury c/o Herm, Daulsberg Esq, Ship’s Agent, Bremenhaven, Germany.

Hope you enjoyed your last social.

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I need no verse of learned prose

My hopes, ambitions, to disclose

And tell of love more pure than gold.

I pen one word and all is told

Teresa

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It took me a whole hour to compose the above yet it only faintly conveys the sentiment I feel.

Be good. I conclude with the best of love,

xxx Your loving husband, xxx

xxxx Myles xxxx

xxxxxx