THE IRASCIBLE CAPTAIN & THE HOBBLER.

This past week saw the passage of the autumnal equinox, the time of large tides particularly on the Rivers Severn and Avon where there are the second highest tides in the world. [The highest tides are in the Bay of Fundy, Nova Scotia.] And so on 23rd September I remembered my time sailing out of Bristol down the Avon and this particular story that I hope will make you smile.

I sailed with Bristol Steam Navigation Company from 1962 to 1966 as Chief Officer on their coastal liner fleet going to Ireland, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany, and Spain. The unique fact with these ships was that with their size was that they went up rivers to the main cities - a great experience. The Captains were all very competent pilots to do this and famous among them was one Captain who we will call Captain Cobon for this story. He was a fine seaman, he was a fine man, and he had two distinctive traits that made him even more memorable. He had an explosive temper [more bark than bite] and a slight speech impediment that was the result of a great effort by surgeons to cure a cleft palate when he was a child.

Now before going on I had better explain what the term "hobbler" means. It is a West Country word used to describe a man with a small boat that helps larger vessels moor up on rivers and harbours. It is associated with the days of sail when vessels would come into the small harbours of Devon and Somerset and would even be towed by these hobblers into pills i.e.small harbours. On the River Avon there were hobblers who all lived at Pill, a small village downstream from Bristol on the Somerset bank of the river. [Some of these hobblers can trace their ancestry back to sailing with Cabot in his discovery of Newfoundland!] This is where the young hobbler in this story lived. If you look at the two pictures above then you appreciate the requirement for hobblers on the Avon, the river is little more than a giant flooded ditch and actually dries out on Spring Tides. If the ship has to stop then it will need to run moorings out to hold it central to banks and not capsize.

One autumn evening in the 1960's one of BSNC's ships was making a passage on the Avon. It was dead calm and radiation mist hung around the banks and woods to port and starboard. Captain Cobon was in command and it was a nervous passage as the visibility might become fog and then navigation impossible. This would require mooring up and staying midstream. The critical point is negotiating the Horse Shoe Bend as shown above in the picture of my vessel at that point [mv"Dido".]

Captain Cobon reached Sea Mills Reach, the last straight section, before the bend, the mist became fog and the Master decided to run out moorings and hold his vessel midstream. He used the loud-hailer to get the hobblers take the moorings and secure them ashore to any strong point available. He shouted these orders and on this calm autumn night they could be heard across to the dwellings bordering Sea Mills. These were nice homes and actually Captain AND Mrs. Cobon lived on that road.

The boats ran out but our intrepid cobbler did not make a good job for as soon as the mooring rope became taut then it came away dragging vegetation with it. Captain Cobon then became incandescent with rage. He grabbed the microphone and bellowed:

"You stupid oriental B*****d, what the F***K do you think you are doing?? That's a F###king bush not a tree. You have as much brains as a pox doctor's clerk!"

There was no mistaking Captain Cobon's voice and his 'dulcet' tones carried far and wide as sounds do over water, fog, with no other sounds are around.

His poor wife, she did appear for days, she was mortified, and so very embarrassed. It is amusing to us but I am sure that it was a long time before she found it at all funny.