Meeting at Plymouth - Saturday 27th October

An appreciable number of us made it to this meeting held in the premises of the august Royal Western Yacht Club. This venue was chosen as the late Dr. Janet Cusack was to be our Key Speaker but you all know that sadly this was not to be. However, Judith Godfrey, our organiser of this event came up trumps with a good programme.

The first talk The Story of H.M.S. Cambridge was given by Andy Endicott and his colleague from the Devonport Naval Museum, Ann Stewart.

Here are a few notes provided by Andy:

"H.M.S. Cambridge: School of Gunnery
A historic run through the life of the Naval Gunnery School called Cambridge, which sadly has just been closed down.

It started as a Training Hulk in Plymouth Sound in 1856. Later the ship was joined by Calcutta and Foundryant, and these wooden walled school rooms, moored in the Hamoaze, dealt with 300 lads at a time.

Eventually in 1907 the training was transferred ashore to H.M.S. Drake. Training continued and 1912 saw the breakaway group forming the Field Gun Crew for competition purposes.

During the 2nd World War the Navy took over areas of Penlee and Heybrook Bay. Later a holiday camp near by at Wembury was taken over and the Cambridge Gunnery School was in business. However, it was 1956 when this site became a commissioned H.M.S. Cambridge. Since then it has trained students from 37 countries in the use of ships main armament.

The school supported 4 methods of training. Medium Range Gunnery using 4.5 Mk 8 Single Turret. Close Range Gunnery using Oerlikon, 30mm Bofors and 20mm decoy launchers. Naval Training in small arms and finally Board and Search facilities."

These few notes give only a hint the enthusiasm that Andy and Ann had for their subject, which was illustrated by many interesting slides.

If you would like to know more, read Andy Endacott's new book:
Wooden Walls to Stone Frigate, available at £8.99, from D. L Endacott,
10 Cedar Court, Saltash, Cornwall, PL12 6DQ

After that short commercial break by the Editor, we move on to the next item of the agenda, an illustrated talk by Martin Read. Here is his write up:

Plymouth Ropewalks
Rope must have been made in Plymouth from the medieval period onwards and Devonport Dockyard still contains an almost complete naval ropemaking complex. Recent research has attempted to identify the location of the civil ropewalks within Plymouth, Stonehouse and Devonport and to trace their establishment, development and history.

Rope was manufactured for use in shipping, agriculture, mining and other industries. Almost every home and factory used to need some rope. Ropewalks or rope yards were manufacturing complexes which turned raw hemp into rope by a series of activities including processing the hemp (or other fibre), spinning the yarns, tarring and laying the rope or cable. Most of these processes took place in specialised buildings such as the rope house, rope walk, store and tar house.

At present 17 ropewalks have been found, ranging in date from the late medieval period onwards. Five ropewalks have so far been identified from the 18th century, located outside of built up areas due to the risk of fire associated with the use of hot tar and the inflammable fibre. In 1816 there were 14 ropewalks recorded, but at present only eight have been located dating to the first half of the 19th century. In contrast to the 18th century almost all ropemaking now took place in long covered ropewalks (up to 1200 feet long) instead of open to the elements.

In the second half of the 19th century 10 ropewalks are known, but with the expansion of Plymouth to the north and west these become concentrated to the east of the town, particularly in the Coxside area which also had other unpleasant industries, such as soapmaking and fertiliser manufacture. The ropewalks gradually reduced in length as the century progressed due to the increasing mechanisation of ropemaking.

Teats Hill ropewalk is the earliest and longest lasting Plymouth ropewalk. Probably late medieval in origin, it lasted into the early part of the 20th century. The earliest image of a ropewalk in Plymouth is of this ropewalk, dated 1714-1717. Originally an open ropewalk this became a covered building during the late 18th /early 19th century with a ropehouse, tar house and other buildings by 1816.

The use of wire and chain in ships and the increasing use of steam power reduced the need for rope and cable, causing the number of ropewalks to fall to perhaps 4 by the beginning of the 20th century. The market seems then to have become limited to rope for agriculture and decorative use.
The last remaining Plymouth ropewalk closed in 1966.

Martin Read

Martin Read had the advantage of cooperation from the TWS Film &Television Archive when Graeme Spink showed some old footage from a film about the Ropemakers A. W. Willy. It showed this name and a date of 1832, outside the premise and Martin wants to know if any reader recognises the name and can tell him the whereabouts of this works and more about the business.

Indoor Ropewalk at Willy's Photo TSW FTA copyright

The above photo taken from the film narrated by, I think, Tom Salmon, somewhere in Devon?
Any reader with more information is requested to tell Martin all about it. He can be contacted at Institute of Marine Studies, University of Plymouth.

Next Graeme Spink from The South West Film & Television Archive in Plymouth gave a half hour talk on Wrecks around the coast of Devon and Cornwall.

Many of the events shown had occurred in the 1930's and were therefore very rare items of film. The wrecks included the 599 ton "Charles Jose" out of Antwerp carrying scrap metal on December 18th 1933, the wreck of the Plymouth steam trawler "Chancellor" at Withnoe Point Rame Head on January 17th 1934, and the SS Kentish Coast off Mount Batten Plymouth November 16th 1928, where the crew were rescued by rocket line.

Louis Shied Photo copyright TSW FTA

Later Graeme complimented this footage with a rare piece of film of the rocket line life saving apparatus being tested at Hope Cove in the late 1930's.

Probably the two most famous wrecks mentioned were the Belgian freighter Louis Shied which had on board survivors of the torpedoed ship Tanjandoen at the start of the war. She broke in two as clearly seen in the photograph.
The other was the loss of the Herzogin Cecilie at Starehole Bay Salcombe 1936. She was one of the last German sailing cargo ships and was bringing grain from Australia to Falmouth.

There followed some more modern wrecks and incidents at sea including memories of the Penlee lifeboat disaster during the rescue attempt on the "Union Star", and the Archive's oldest film shot in 1912 on a hand wound camera showing the wreck of "The City of Cardiff" off Lands End.

Judith Godfrey then gave us an illustrated talk on one of her favourite subjects: Plymouth's Merchant Shipbuilders - Richard Hill and his Contemporaries

Plymouth is always thought of as a Naval port but a great deal of merchant shipbuilding went on throughout the 19th century and earlier. My special interest is Richard Hill of Cattedown. I have been researching the family for nearly 30 years and during that time have gathered information about other shipbuilders working in the port.

Small yards came and went in quick succession and there were many shipwrights building "one off" vessels all over the Sound. Most of Plymouth's merchant shipbuilding dynasties began during the first quarter of the 19th century. The Hill's were then in Oreston, Richard Hocking at Stonehouse, Joseph and William Moore and John and William Shilston in Sutton Harbour, James Gent at Teats Hill, the Pope's were also at Teats Hill and Mountbatten before taking over the Turnchapel yard formerly in the possession of Isaac and Peter Blackburn. The Blackburns built ships for the Navy but went bankrupt in 1814. Joseph Banks was at Franks Quarry, Cremyll. He later moved to Queen Anne's Battery and built a graving dock there. His son David took over the yard at the young age of 21 years following the death of his father. David's grandson, David Banks, is one of our members. Richard Hill and his son Richard moved across the river Plym to Cattedown in order to expand their business as the tonnage of ships increased and they outgrew the yard in Oreston.

Plymouth's merchant shipbuilders followed the trends in shipbuilding, changing the rig and the method as knowledge increased. In the period 1834/51 the Hills launched 15 vessels from the Cattedown yard - seven schooners, five sloops, one brig, one barque and a ketch. A survey of the output of the other large yards reveals much the same except for the ketch. Richard Hill was the only shipbuilder to launch a ketch during this period. Repair work was also a major feature of the Plymouth yards, most of them installing patent or railway slips during the 1830 to 1850 period.

Of the fifteen vessels launched by Richard Hill during 1834/51 six were sold and nine were kept and worked by the family. Most of Plymouth's merchant shipbuilders also owned vessels, the largest number by the Hill and Shilston families. I have traced the history of over 60 vessels owned by the Hills. They ranged from small barges, sloops and ketches to barques and a fully rigged ship that brought back cargoes from around the world. In 1852 and again in 1858 Richard Hill built what was, at the time, the largest vessel to be launched in the port of Plymouth. He was overtaken by David Banks in 1870 when he launched the 1100 ton Nimrod from the Queen Anne's shipyard.

There was no iron shipbuilding in Plymouth at this time, probably due to the lack of coal all of which had to be imported. An attempt was made in 1865 to sell shares in the Plymouth Ship-Building and Iron Works Company which was formed to purchase the Queen Anne's shipyard of Joseph Banks. The plan was to build and repair iron vessels and Joseph Banks was to be the manager. The scheme came to nothing.

Richard Hill must have been aware of the changing times and desired a ship built of iron. He might have been one of the first customers for the new yard but he had to go elsewhere. He chose William Pile of Sunderland and the 492 ton barque Laira was launched for him in 1870. She was the only iron sailing ship to be registered in the port of Plymouth at this time.

In the 1870's the number of shipbuilders working at the Great Western Dock increased and William Kelly moved to Mountbatten from Dartmouth. The end for wooden shipbuilding was in sight though. William Moore and Richard Hocking closed their yards in that decade. Pope had already gone. The Shilston's turned to building fishing trawlers. Charles Gent and Richard Hill closed their yards in 1885. David Banks closed his yard and moved to the Great Western Dock to concentrate on repair and re-fitting. He and Shilston were the only Plymouth shipbuilding dynasties to carry on into the 20th century.

Reported by Judith M L Godfrey

Add your comments

Please note: this is not an email facility, all comments are placed on this page and on our Forum

Message type (select one)

Respond to this whole topic.

Respond to part of it using this sub-title

Start an entirely new topic using this title

Your name

Message contents