The Last Ship.....










There is a saying at sea that the last ship was the best ship. It means that we all the habit of remembering the good things and forgetting the bad incidents. Anyway I was browsing through some old photographs and came across one of my favourite ships of yesteryear the RMS "Winneba", a passenger cargo liner owned by Elder Dempster's of Liverpool. The photo shows her called the "Umgeni" but she was bought by EDs to trade from London [Tilbury] to Madeira, Freetown, Sierra Leone, Takoradi, Ghana, and finally Apapa [Lagos] in Nigeria. The voyage homeward was the reverse and the whole voyage took six weeks with a week in London and then home leave.



The ship was like an elegant Edwardian lady - lots of teak, mahogany, brass & bright work - and powered by two steam reciprocating engines with exhaust turbines - it was almost silent as it made 14 knots in great style across the Atlantic Ocean. There were 100 passengers in old fashioned luxury. The Master was Captain "Sheerlegs" Humphrys, a Merchantman who had served with distinction in the Royal Navy in the war, and so he called me "Pilot" as I was Senior Second Officer and hence in charge of navigation.



Navigation was before GPS and all that easy stuff so I used the sextant to ensure we knew our exact position and kept to the tight schedule. Passengers were often intrigued to see me 'shooting' Venus during the day - they could not see anything!



Oh and the Chief Engineer was from Edinburgh who had played for rugby for Scotland - cannot remember his name.



Yup that's me - one of the last taken before growing a beard - I seem to remember it was taken in Madeira north bound and we had just changed from whites to blues.



Talking of ships, I have always been somehow envious of Gerard sailing with Windstar [see other picture above] and was very sad when he packed up sailing on such beautiful vessels - they must have been a joy to have sailed upon - anyway one cannot live your children's lives and they have to make their own way in the world. Still I am so glad that he had that experience.


I guess that you can understand why ships are referred to as "She".......................




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