Lisa : It is the 17th December 2018, and this is an interview with Mr Hedley at his home in Wootton. The interviewer is Lisa Kerley. Could I ask you to tell me your full name please?
Peter : Yes, Peter Ian Hedley.
Lisa : And your date of birth?
Peter : 1937.
Lisa : And, where were you born?
Peter : In Cowes.
Lisa : And, could you tell me the names of your parents?
Peter : Yes, my father was Harry Edward Hedley. He was born in Newport and worked as a Pattern Maker, his trade. My mother was Elise Biddington and she lived in East Cowes.
Lisa : And were both sets of grandparents also from the Island?
Peter : Um, on my father’s side, his mother was a Stay of Newport, big Stay family in Newport but Herbert Hedley came from the Midlands and came down to stay as a young lad with his aunt in the West Wight somewhere. On my mother’s side, um, Harry Biddington, who was my grandfather, was a seafarer and he then finished up as the Steward in the Osborne Naval College which was right next door to Osborne House. My grandmother, Margaret Stewart, she was in service to Queen Victoria and came down from Balmoral to Osborne House whenever the Queen came down to the Island. They must have looked over the fence at each other and they married, and they lived in East Cowes. They had two sons and a daughter, the daughter being my mother. Does that tie it all up?
Lisa : Did you grow up in Cowes?
Peter : Yes. Yes and no. I was born in Cowes. During the War my father went to Anglesey with Saunders Roe. He was Works Engineer up there and we lived in the Bishop’s Palace on the Menai Straights where we had rooms. Saunders Roe had taken over this huge building and it made it into a sort of a hostel for people who were growing up from the Isle of Wight. We then moved to Bangor, across the Straights. Father rented a house there and my first schooling was in a little place called Garth School in Bangor. Then I passed the 11 plus and went to a Grammar School, Friars Grammar School it was called, in Bangor. We then, when I was just over 11, came back to the Island and I went to Node Hill School in Newport, Secondary Grammar School and travelled backwards and forwards from Mill Hill Station to Newport by steam train every day. Then, I then took up an apprenticeship at the age of 16, with John Samuel Whites at Cowes and went through all the national, higher national, on day release to the Technical College. I did three years in the Fitting Shop and then went into the Drawing Office to complete my five years apprenticeship and then I stayed on a further three years as a Draftsman because we had Admiralty work there. We were deferred from National Service. I then thought, rather than do National Service I would like to continue my career at sea and I joined up with the Orient Line as a Junior Engineer and did seven years, getting my Chief’s ticket etc. during that time and sailing as Senior Second on the ‘Orcadies’, having sailed on the ‘Oronsay’, the old ‘Oriana’ and those ships which used to come in to Tilbury and then were transferred into Southampton in the latter sort of days.
5 minutes and 4 seconds
Lisa : Can we just go back to the beginning of your apprenticeship? How was the apprenticeship … how was it organised for you?
Peter : Well, earlier to us, myself joining you used to be on indentures but they, for some reason, had finished the indentures so one went down there and had an interview and you were either accepted or not accepted. However, I was accepted, and I took up the five-year apprenticeship as a Marine Engineer, starting off in the Fitting Shop with Jack Gladpool who was the Charge Man there and we went through the Condenser Shop and a little bit in the Turbine Shop and of course we made boilers and all the parts. So, the ships were built over on the East Cowes side, launched and came underneath the big crane which is still there, and all the engine works, and the fitting out was done on the west bank. I didn’t work on the ship itself, but I was in the Shops making the various components and then I went into the Drawing Office where we designed and drew all the systems out ready for the shop floor to fit to the ships.
Lisa : Did you have to take an examination or interview prior to taking up the apprenticeship?
Peter : No, no there wasn’t. We had an interview, yes, we had an interview but there wasn’t an exam. We had an interview with their Apprentice Manager, Vic somebody or other, forgotten his name now, um, yes, we were accepted at that interview.
Lisa : And you said you had one day of study?
Peter : Day release, day release. The Technical College was quite new then. I suppose it had only been going for a year or so. I joined John Samuel Whites in July 1953 and I left in 1960 but during the five years, my five years would have been between 1953 and 1958 as an apprentice and then the two years after that I was a Draftsman.
Lisa : Can you tell me about the types of vessels that were being built during that time?
Peter : Um, the vessel I remember firstly, when I joined, was HMS Dainty. She was one of the Daring class, she’d been launched in 1950 and fitted out there. For some reason the Admiralty didn’t seem to want her in service straight away and they cocooned her. The reason being for this is they sealed the ship up completely and they wanted to see how quickly they could de-cocoon and put it into commission and that was done whilst I was there. We had several Argentinian, Egyptian old destroyers which we worked on and renovated. We had the Blackwood Class [Lisa coughs], three of the Blackwood Class. Then Trinity House came in with a good order for three ships which was the ‘Mermaid’, the ‘Siren’ and the ‘Steller’. I remember doing trials one night in the Channel on the 24-hour consumption trial in an awful gale out there. I shall never forget that night and we just pressed on although it was dreadful weather. Later, Trinity House then put in an order for another vessel which was called ‘Winston Churchill’ so then had four of the John Samuel White’s vessels. Ironically, after I’d been at sea for seven years I came ashore and I worked for Trinity House and I dry-docked and looked after these vessels for their maintenance etc, and I was working in Tower Hill in London then as a young Inspector of Shipping, as we were called, in the Surveyor’s Office.
10 minutes and 4 seconds
Lisa : About how many employees were there during the period that you started your apprenticeship? Do you know?
Peter : I would have to guess at this but there must have been a couple of thousand people there. One thing I do remember is that the whistle used to blow, and we had to be in and clocked in within three minutes, otherwise you lost a quarter of an hour on your card. I was lucky enough to be able to walk from home in Beckford Road, down to John Samuel White and even go back for lunch and come back down again and then return at five o’clock in the evening. Um, I do wonder how we would have got on this day and age with the trouble that we’ve had with the Floating Bridge because the Floating Bridge was always right there on the whistle to take men from West Cowes to East Cowes and East Cowes to West Cowes right, and they worked to the whistle, so there would have been a lot of trouble with men losing time with this particular unfortunate Floating Bridge that we have there at the moment, it’s a pity, John Samuel White wasn’t still going because they did build a couple of Floating Bridges for the Council.
Lisa : You spoke about the different elements of the shipbuilding on either side of the river, East Cowes and West Cowes. Can you describe the buildings for me, as you remember them?
Peter : Well on the East Cowes, East Cowes side, all the plate work was done, the hull of the ship was built on the ways. They had four sets of ways there so that they could be working on four ships at a time and they were really limited to the length of the ship because of course it had to be slid down the ways and not hit the West Cowes side when it was launched and for this purpose they put big drag chains on so as it slid down the ways, these huge lumps of chain dragged along the ground and held her back from speeding up too quickly. Um, she was also on ropes etc. but, and turned as she hit the, well just over the half way line and she was fully afloat. They then turned her round in the river and brought her in to the West Cowes side but some of the ships were almost too long and they did angle some of the ways to make sure that they weren’t 90 degrees across the river but angled to give them extra length for the launch. That was all done on the East Cowes side and riveting went on all night, unbelievably. You wouldn’t get that today. The noise of the platework and the riveting went on and everybody realised that it was their livelihood of course. Then of course they came to the West Cowes side, where, as I said before, we built the boilers, the condensers, the turbines and all the items for the ship, the pipework, the electrics. The guns were all brought over but of course, what was against Samuel Whites was that everything had to be brought from the Mainland in, they had some little ships that brought them over but all the plating, all the rivets, everything, had to be brought over and it was another cost against building the ships. The Admiralty then withdrew their sponsorship on us building for them and Sir James Milne, who was our Managing Director, he then had to try to break into the commercial world and we built the ‘Susan Constant’, she was a cargo vessel and as I mentioned, three or four, or four of the Trinity House ships. There was also a boat-building area where we built lifeboats, or lifeboats were built, so Samuel Whites had four Drawing Offices. There was the Ship Drawing Office, the Engine Drawing Office, the Electrical Drawing Office and the Boat Shop Drawing Office and so all of those offices fed through to the yard for the building of the various vessels.
15 minutes
Lisa : So which Drawing Office were you working in?
Peter : I was in the Engine Drawing Office. There were about 30 people in that office, and it was divided into the steam side and the diesel side of the shipping.
Lisa : And where was that based? Which building?
Peter : That was on the West Cowes side. Not too far from the crane, just a, just a couple of hundred yards from the crane.
Lisa : Is the building still there do you know?
Peter : Um, I believe it is. I don’t know what it’s being used for at the moment, um, last time I was over there all the buildings had been sub-divided and there were a lot of little firms in there and that’s one of the big problems of the moment because they want to … Peter Harrison bought the yard, I’m guessing something like 20 years ago now and he wanted to develop it but all these little industries are going on there and I believe they eventually will want to move them up to Kingston where they’re putting in an industrial area. This is what’s been going on just recently with the people who are building these fast ferry boats. Red Funnel, they’ve just built um, Red Funnel Six and Seven and they’re building other boats there now and of course they want to stay where that big Union Jack is because the deep water that they would need to launch these vessels in.
Lisa : Could you explain to me how you did the drawing then?
Peter : Well we were given a system to do. For instance, you’d do the lube oil system or you would do the main steam system and you worked through from the boiler to the turbine if you were doing the steam system and in fact for the lube oil system you’d do all the areas where the lube oil was required for lubricating the various pieces of machinery.
Lisa : Did you work at a drawing board?
Peter : Yes, we, there was none of this computerised thing. We were all on a drawing board and stood all day long, leaning on this board and draw. We used to draw it out on paper and then it used to go the Tracing Office and the girls in the Tracing Office used to put it onto linen with pen and ink, very neatly done. Then it was printed in the Print Office and then sent out to the various shops for construction. So, all that’s gone now. In fact, my cousin who just recently died, she was a Tracer and that’s obviously a dying art now as many of these industries have died out and trades I suppose.
Lisa : Can I ask if you remember your salary as an apprentice?
Peter : My first salary was £2 and six-pence. I shall always remember that. Um, we had two weeks holidays where John Samuel Whites shut down, for Cowes Week and in August (coughs). Excuse me, and we used to get a bonus of two weeks’ pay which was a lot of money to us in those days but no, £2 and six-pence. We could work piecework and overtime which we tried to do when we could, but it was, well looking back it was good money, but it really was only a few shillings.
Lisa : And how were you paid?
Peter : Oh by, with a pay packet. You had a pay packet with, and you were paid in pound notes and coins. Oh, on the times that we had our bonus we used to have those lovely five-pound notes, the big white five-pound notes. That’s the only time we ever saw those.
Lisa : And what were the working hours of the week?
Peter : Um, I’m a little bit rusty on this. I think we started at quarter to eight. We had an hour for lunch, and we finished at five. Anything over that was overtime. People did have to go in earlier than that to light fires and things like that. There were no home comforts at all. Even to wash our hands we used to have an old drum, fill it with water and put a big piece of iron into the fire and let it heat up, pull it out and drop it into this drum of water and that’s how we washed our hands. I can remember one of the elderly gentlemen in the Fitting Office saying to me, “You shouldn’t wash your hands like that lad, you’ll get chaps” and um, what are they called, I’ll have to think of that one, “And you’ll spoil your hands” but you know, there was no alternative. We had this big drum of soft soap and you had to take your own towel. It was quite primitive.
20 minutes and 57 seconds
Lisa : OK. What did you wear when you started out in the Fitting Shop?
Peter : Oh, we had blue boiler suits and we had to supply our own boiler suits and most of our own tools in those days. What I was thinking of earlier for the hands was warts. He said, “If you wash your hands in that water you’ll get warts” and he was right and warts are a thing that you don’t see these days but whether that was the cause, we never did know but these warts, one had, one week you’d have warts on your hands and the next day, suddenly they’d gone but that was the reason behind it.
Lisa : You said you had to supply your own overalls?
Peter : Yes, and we had to supply our own overalls. My elder two brothers were engineers as well, at John Samuel Whites so mother used to wash every week, three sets of boiler suits and hang them on the line. She didn’t have washing machines and things like that and hand wringer and things so yes, it was all quite primitive when I look back at it now.
Lisa : And when you moved into the Drawing Office, did you have a different type of clothing?
Peter : Oh yes, yes you always wore a shirt and tie and either a suit or a sports jacket, yes, it was completely different.
Lisa : You mentioned about the women who worked within the Drawing Office. Was it predominantly men that were employed?
Peter : In the Drawing Office itself it was men. The ladies had their own area which was the Tracing Office but for some reason the Tracers were ladies. I don’t know why that was, but we didn’t have any ladies working in our particular office at all.
Lisa : Do you know where else women would have been employed?
Peter : Um, women were employed in the Wages Office and several of the other offices where they had paperwork etc. But in the main, machinery [clears throat] areas etc. certainly in my time, I believe during the War ladies did work on the lathes etc. certainly not in my time, no, ladies were really, usually just you know, on the admin side of things.
Lisa And, what was the work environment like in terms of Health and Safety?
Peter : Non-existent I think I must say. Um, there were a lot of casualties etc. and we didn’t have Totectors or protective gloves or things, um, as I say we had to provide our own boiler suits. Um, washing facilities I’ve already mentioned, that was virtually non-existent. The toilet systems were very, very basic. Yeah, it’s a job to think how we did get on. The place was dirty, cold, um, during the winter times it was so cold that you couldn’t hold some of the machinery which was driven by air because it was so cold you had to wrap rags round the drill or whatever you were using before you could use it because of your hands getting so cold. It was um, really very, very basic.
25 minutes and 4 seconds
Lisa : Can you talk to me a little bit about when you finished your apprenticeship, moving forward as a fully-fledged employee?
Peter : [Clears throat]. Well my apprenticeship finished when I was 21, and then I was a Draftsman for two years. As I said earlier, I had made up my mind that I was going to go to sea to further my marine engineering, rather than go into the National Service. Ironically, I’d made all my plans and been accepted at an interview with the Orient Line, who were in London and that was the July and August of 1960. In the November of 1960 they finished National Service, but we knew this was going to happen, but I’d made my plans so, and I’m pleased that I went off to sea and furthered my career. Unfortunately, John Samuel Whites, in the next five or six years, started to decline. They were bought out by Elliott’s and asset stripped and slowly they folded up completely, so I’d made the right decision to go to sea, as a lot of other apprentices were doing.
Lisa : How do you look back on that time? Are there any particular events or things that happened that were memorable during your time there?
Peter : Um, oh I remember one time there, we were in the sailing scene and members of the Island Sailing Club and I can remember we sailed in the twelve metres there. Lord Craigmyle had a boat called ‘Norsaga’ and as lads several of us including Ben Bradley, my brothers, we were all members of the crew and at one time there was going to be a big Regatta down at Brixham and Lord Craigmyle was anxious to have us in his crew and he wrote to Sir James Milne, asking if he could let us off for a week so that we could go down to this Regatta and Sir James Milne agreed and we had a great time racing against ‘Sceptre’ and ‘Flicker’ and the ‘Vanities’, we were going eight, twelve metres racing day. That was great, great fun, great time and, you know these people have these big boats but they had to have these young, fit members as crew and on ‘Norsaga’, Harry Spencer of Spencer Rigging, he was Skipper, a great Skipper and Ben Bradley, who’s an old friend of mine, he was a member of the crew and worked for Harry Spencer for many years in his rope loft.
Lisa : Was there a social side to work when you were at J S Whites? Were there opportunities to do things socially?
Peter : Not a lot. They did have a cricket team and Sir James Milne, um, was very keen to get first class cricket over onto the Island and it was at the time that John Samuel Whites had a, a cricket field up at Park Road and a club, a sports club and we used to have dances up there. There were, they had a bar, yes there was that side of it. There was a football team but other than that, no. We didn’t join in with any of that because we had the sailing and we sailed all through the year, known as frost-biting from the Folly Inn, used to take the boats up there and leave them and race right through the winter in the sheltered waters of the Medina. Um, Gurnard Sailing Club, we all started at Gurnard Sailing Club, then through to the Island Sailing Club where we met quite a lot of very prominent people and sailed with them.
30 minutes and 10 seconds
Lisa : Could you tell me about the um … do you remember the launch of any of the vessels that you worked on, when they were completed and how that happened?
Peter : The actual launch, they weren’t in a completed state [clears throat]. Excuse me, at that time um, they, the hull was completed and as I said earlier, when they were launched they then came over to the West Cowes side for fitting out but at the launch I do remember watching from the end of Medina Road and this ship came down, I think it was one of the Susan Constants, it was quite a big ship and she caused the tide to suddenly come up and the water was round our ankles at the bottom of Medina Road, ‘cos she displaced so much water. There was always a big ceremony when that was taking place but we, as mere workers, were not invited of course but they had the dignitaries and then [clears throat] lunches and things around that. Somebody always smashed a bottle of champagne over the bow and then when they were accepted by the Admiralty there was another [clears throat] ceremony. We did trials on those ships before they were accepted, and all the Admiralty inspection people were down to take over the vessel on behalf of the Navy. We weren’t involved in those, we were sort of on, could see it from the side-lines.
Lisa : I’m just interested to know how much … what kind of reputation John Samuel Whites had when you were an apprentice there and how much it was part of the towns of East Cowes and West Cowes.
Peter : [Clears throat] Well of course it was one of the biggest employers on the Island, without a doubt and people came from all parts of the Island to work there. I think ourselves and Saunders Roe, which was also in East Cowes, must have been the Island’s biggest two employers. Yes, it was, well, I felt that I was very privileged to be working with them and the fact that it was on the Island and I didn’t have to go to the Mainland, travel to the Mainland for it etc. but we enjoyed the time that we had there under very basic conditions.
Lisa : Did people come from other parts of the country to work there? Were there any foreign workers?
Peter : There weren’t any foreign workers but there were several people who came down from the Midlands and were in digs in the Island. I’ve got a good friend here now who lives in Wootton and he came over to the Island and worked in the ships’ Drawing Office and went on to become the MD of Appledore Shipyard. He’s now retired and lives on the Island. Yes, there were a lot of people who came over and did apprenticeships on the Island. John Samuel Whites were known as ‘Whites Built, Well Built’ and we always got the speed from the ships and I think the Admiralty were pleased to employ us but when they had to start cutting back we were one of the first ones to go because as I said earlier, we had to bring all the materials over to the Island which was an added cost to them. I also remember when I went for my interview at the Orient Line, I only had to mention that I had done an apprenticeship at John Samuel Whites and then I don’t think I was asked more than two or three questions, one being “How old are you?”, “Where do you come from?” and “What are your qualifications?” They didn’t want to know anything else. John Samuel White’s name was sufficient for them and I’ve met other people who went to other companies, shipping companies had a similar experience. Although I think, looking back at it now, apprenticeships have changed so much, they are really designed more. Unfortunately if you became very proficient at one thing in John Samuel Whites they tended to leave you there and you didn’t get moved around but I do remember that one of the Senior Managers who came to work there had a lad of our age and he started, moved around, every six months he seemed to move somewhere else so they did start to move the rest of us around to the different shops and get the different experiences.
35 minutes and 50 seconds
Lisa : So then you went away to sea and you mentioned about working for Trinity House. Where were you based when you worked for Trinity House?
Peter : [Clears throat] At Tower Hill in London, um, Trinity House’s Main Headquarters is at Tower Hill and I was one of 11 in the Surveyor’s Department. We used to go off to the various yards and dry dock the ships and write the specifications and see them right through their overhaul periods. That was very interesting. I did that for 15, 16 years and then I moved to the Engineering Department who dealt with the Light Vessels, the buoy systems, the Lighthouses and that was another change of career almost. I only dealt with the Light Vessels in as much as when we were solarising the … that was putting solar panels on them, taking crews off and automating them. I was involved with the engineers down here in Cowes when we put all the electronics side of it in and all those ships, eventually we took all the five members of crew on each of those ships and we had what, about 30 Light Vessels then, so it was a tremendous automation time and unfortunately a lot of lost jobs to the people who were on board. Similarly, we were cutting back. We had nine Tenders, that was the ships, when I first joined, and we finished up with just four who seemed to manage to do the work, but it was cutting back all the time. One of my last jobs I did was automating the buoy system. We took all the gas systems out and put solar systems on and hence that cut down on the requirement for the ships to go and service the buoys etc. and they were all electrified with the solar system. I also then went round to several of the Lighthouses, automating the Lighthouses. One of the nicest ones was in Sark, I automated that one. Also, on various islands off the Welsh coast and you know, these were places where you could only go if you worked for Trinity House because they had just a little Lighthouse on this island to guide the ships in and out, but Trinity House was, without a doubt, cutting back. When I first joined I’d guess there were about two and a half thousand people employed by them and now it’s all run from Harwich push button and I think there’s only about 300 people employed doing that so over a 30-year period that I worked for them, that’s how things had changed [clears throat].
Lisa : Did you have a … the Lighthouses that we have on the Island, did you have involvement with their automation?
Peter : No I didn’t, no. The St Catherine’s and the one at The Needles, no, but they were automated and of course helicopters came in and a friend of mine, he designed the helicopter pads which were put up on top of each of these Lighthouses and this helped with changing, first of all changing the crews because sometimes if the weather was bad, those men who should have only been doing a month on, a month off, were there for two or three months because of the bad weather but helicopters did change all that and the crews were changed and the Light Vessels and the Tenders, we put helicopter pads on. That was a job that I was involved with when I was in the Surveyor’s Department, putting these helicopter pads on so that again, the crews could be changed so much quicker and easier. Yes, it was just modernisation as everybody was doing and helicopters were really being used. We hired in the Bond people who were the helicopter people that Trinity used.
40 minutes and 41 seconds
Lisa : Were there any Light Vessels in The Solent or around the Isle of Wight?
Peter : Well, there was one at Calshot, many years that one had been there. I can remember as a boy, going out there with one of the vicars in Cowes and he used to go out there once a fortnight and take out their newspapers and their mail etc. and our job was to wind up the mechanism for turning the light. It was a clockwork mechanism and I think we had to turn this handle about 200 times to pull the, like a clock, winding up a clock, we’d pull these big weights up and that is how the optic was revolved but we were just lads there in those days, choir boys at St Mary’s Church but I do remember that. Other than that, no. We’ve obviously got a buoyage system right down through The Solent but there were, no not on the south coast. Most of the Light Vessels were on the east coast, um, the Goodwin Sands and all round there marking those areas. There were a few on the Welsh coast and one or two higher up, right up to Anglesey area.
Lisa : Could you tell me a bit more about the buoyage system in The Solent and then how it changed? You mentioned that, did they used to be gas powered?
Peter : Yes. They had a gas lantern on them, and they had these big bottles, gas bottles which stood about five feet six high and very, very heavy and they were put into pockets on the buoys. They had three to each buoy and that was an awful job for the crews of the ships to service but now, when we eventually changed over to the solar system it was only a matter of putting the solar panels on and the batteries and of course the lights and now that’s changed again since my time, with these LEDs who use much less power and well, I’m not up to date with it but they wouldn’t need such big batteries etc. that we had to put in.
Lisa : And, how many are there going through The Solent, or were there?
Peter : Oh through The Solent, overall there were 360 buoys that Trinity House looked after so through The Solent, the main channels of The Solent are marked by Trinity buoys. The ones that you see that go up Southampton Water, they’re under local authority, ABP, they look after those, as do the ones in Portsmouth Harbour, they come under the Admiralty so Trinity House just marks the main channels and I think they’ve cut back on that 360 number now that I dealt with and that was back in the 1980’s.
Lisa : So during your time working for Trinity House, what other involvement did you have with the Isle of Wight?
Peter : Well [clears throat], of course we had a depot at East Cowes and I moved to the engineering part who were in London at the time but they were trying to de-centralise from London and the Surveyors Department that I was with, was sent to Harwich, which was bad news for me because I lived on the Island at that time but then, in changing to the engineering side, I was placed down here at East Cowes where we were, that was from 1992 and unfortunately it’s razed to the ground now but they moved everybody out of there and those who survived when to Harwich where, everything is run from now, they’ve shut down the Penzance, Holyhead, Great Yarmouth. All those Depots have been shut down, they do a little bit in the Swansea area still, just as a buoy storage but the main part of it is run from Harwich, all on a telemetry system so they know if a light is on or a fog signal isn’t working or what, it’s all transmitted back there.
46 minutes and 19 seconds
Lisa : And, how long were you based at the Depot in East Cowes?
Peter : Well I did 30 years in total with Trinity House and 20 years I was at London and Harwich and then moved to East Cowes for the last 10 years I was with them.
Lisa : And, did your time there come to an end when the Depot closed?
Peter : No, I decided I wanted, and I could retire at 60 so [clears throat] excuse me, I retired at 60 and the Depot went on for another four to five years before it was closed or most people then moved to Harwich.
Lisa : And, what were your responsibilities when you were based at the Depot in East Cowes?
Peter : I was … I ran a section as a Team Leader and for a section of jobs as they came up. There were four teams and we each took a job, it might be, as I mentioned earlier, automating Sark for instance. We had to do the design work, then we had to do all the ordering of the components and getting them all out to their installation and acceptance, so it was an interesting job.
Lisa : About how many people worked there during the time that you were there?
Peter : I’m guessing, this is a guess, I would say about 80 to 90.
Lisa : And now it’s completely gone?
Peter : It’s razed to the ground and Red Funnel are now using as a Marshalling Yard, so, it’s a shame really because there’s a good deep-water area there that our ships used to come in alongside and berth. They were loaded with buoys and things in those days but no, it’s all gone now. I don’t know whether they will ever use those berths for any other reason but maybe Red Funnel might use it for their ships, I don’t know.
Lisa : Did Trinity House have its own vessels that were based in East Cowes?
Peter : At one time yes, um, the ‘Siren’ was there for some years, then the ‘Winston Churchill’ was there for some years, um, then slowly they moved everything on that side to either Harwich or to Swansea and now it’s all in Harwich, so Swansea side is shut down.
Lisa : You’ve experienced that period of change through your career in terms of the technological advances which is really fascinating.
Peter : Well this started of course with the liners. In my time it was steam-driven ships and I can remember going to the Technical College and having lectures, being told that all these ships the size of liners would always be driven by steam. Unfortunately, that’s not so but it’s all changed now to diesel electric and ironically the Trinity House ships were all diesel electric, stemming from a very early one, the old ‘Patricia’ which was built in 1937 I think it was. She was diesel electric but she was really one of very much ahead of the game but now all the ships that you see here now are diesel electric, so you’ve got maybe five, four or five big diesel engines which generate electricity which turn an electric motor coupled to the shafts and that’s the way of the world and the beauty of that is that you can have any number of engines running and you could be working on one, shut down another one etc. so you had a lot more control over the ship, whereas with the turbines you have two turbines and you hope that they ran all the time that you wanted them and of course you had the boilers and things. Much bigger areas for machinery than is needed now, although the ships of course have got bigger but you didn’t need the machinery space now as you did in those days. More room for passengers to pay there is.
51 minutes and 43 seconds
Lisa : Do you think all the technological changes have been for the better?
Peter : Yes and no. I think we had more camaraderie etc. in those days than one gets today, and people don’t want to, or wouldn’t do the job that we did in those days. For instance, in the big ships now you have an air-conditioned control room. Well, we were down there in the heat of everything, going through the Tropics you know with temperatures of 120, 130, 140 degrees sometimes but we lived through it and, but I don’t think you would get people who would do those sorts of jobs now. We were getting to the case where, when I was Second Engineer, we were getting Junior Engineers who said, “Oh well, I don’t want to do that. I wasn’t told that that was part of my job.” If they had to clean out a dirty strum box or do anything in the bilges or anything. “Oh no, we were told that they had Alaskans and Chinese who would do those sorts of jobs.” They wanted to just walk around in a white boiler suit but I’m afraid that wasn’t the job. So, they didn’t do too many voyages with us.
Lisa : Thank you.
[Interview stops and then starts again]
Lisa : So, this is a photograph, which side is this?
Peter : On East Cowes.
Lisa : East Cowes.
Peter : This is adjacent to the, this um, the Chain Ferry, which would be running just the other side of this … this shed here was built for, to build submarines and they only ever built one submarine. It was always known as the Submarine Shed but you see, this Chain Ferry being launched alongside on one of the ways.
Lisa : Mm, and, was this the same, I’m not sure, it doesn’t have a date on does it, that photograph?
Peter : No it doesn’t.
Lisa : Was that the Chain Ferry of your days working there?
Peter : I think it would have been a little bit earlier. Yes, I guess it was somewhere in the 40’s, 1940’s but I was looking for the date on that. Brian doesn’t seem to have done that so no, I’m not sure. No idea what is was but, you can see there again, it’s in the background there and this ship has just been launched from one of these ways.
Lisa : OK, yes, it’s referred to there as the ‘Submarine Shed’.
Peter : Yes.
Lisa : Yes.
Peter : And, there is where the Chain Ferry comes in on the East Cowes side.
Lisa : Yes.
Peter : But I think there was a good photograph of, oh, these are the men I worked with in … it was, this photograph was taken two years before I joined but I remember Mr Scadding, he was the Head Draftsman, and Mr Brown, he was the Deputy and he was a Chargeman. I worked under him. Mr Berry, all these men, I can remember the majority of them. Ron Trowel, he was the photographer. He worked in our office, but photography was his passion and he did it so well that he was taken on as the official photographer for John Samuel Whites and a lot of the photographs of all the launchings and things were his. I worked with him, he was a good cricketer. Yes, it’s amazing, he worked next door to me on my board and his board. He was made Yard Manager, Joe Williams. Yep, brought back memories that one.
56 minutes and 10 seconds
Lisa : So ‘Engine drawing staff in 1952’.
Peter : Yes, 1952. Well I didn’t join them until 1956 so I started my apprenticeship in 1953 and then three years later, after I’d got Ordinary National, we were invited to join them. No, I think this book’s been put together very well and the crane’s fallen down there, I don’t know which crane that was, obviously one of the earlier ones. Nobody was hurt, they say.
Lisa : Were there many cranes in use during that time?
Peter : Well, each of the shops had a crane which ran down rails either side and that ran up and down these huge shops which would lift individual items, um, but this big one outside, um, was the one that put all the really heavy stuff into the ships, yet, this is East Cowes [telephone rings], though they also had them [interview stops and then starts]. That’s the ‘Arethusa’. Now that was a very well known one. She did tremendous speeds, I think I’m right in saying she was one of the fastest ones that we built down there.
Lisa : And it says here that she was the last ship built for the Royal Navy.
Peter : Yes.
Lisa : At J S Whites.
Peter : 1963, I had left in 1960, I’d left but she would just have been a couple of plates on the ways when I left but there she is, being launched and taken across to East Cowes, West Cowes rather, and put under the crane for her engines etc.
Lisa : So about how long from start to finish then, would it take to construct a ship like that?
Peter : I would guess, two to two and a half years, yes, from laying the keel to completion of trials. I think during the War the stops were pulled out and things were done quicker but they threw more men at it and they, nightshifts and things like that. But in my time, I guess that it was two, two and a half years.
Lisa : Mm, and here we have a photo of a Lifeboat and you mentioned about the building of Lifeboats.
Peter : Yes.
Lisa : Were they, um, used locally, the Lifeboats that were built?
Peter : Um, er, the RNLI built some of their Lifeboats there and as I mentioned earlier that the crane was used to turn them over to check for their self-righting properties but these sheds down in the south end of the yard were the Boat Shops, as we called them, and they did Minesweepers, um, built a wood double-diag construction and yes, RNLI and then they started with fibreglass and, you know, there’s a fibreglass Lifeboat just being tested for the number of people that it could take and its stability.
Lisa : Just for the benefit of the recording, we’re looking at a book compiled by Brian Greening, called ‘Just 50 yards from the Floating Bridge, the story of John Samuel Whites of Cowes, Isle of Wight, as told by those that worked there’.
60 minutes 6 seconds
Peter : Yes Brian’s put together a very good book because of course he worked there and understood fully but he’s covered all aspects. The social side as well as the work side but I know in speaking to him, he was never very happy with the conditions in which we had to work but, you know, there weren’t many alternatives and you just got on with it. There’s one of the Trinity vessels. We had four of those built. This is the ‘Winston Churchill’ which is the last one that was built down there, um, they had … they were rigged to lift the buoys onto the foredeck where they had maintenance or they put, took an old buoy away for shore maintenance and put a new one back in its place but, they went round the Welsh and the English coasts. The Scottish coasts were run by Northern Lights and the Irish area were Irish Lights but now I believe they’ve all started getting together a little bit more and they share the different areas. If there’s a casualty with a buoyage or any wreckage or anything like that. And you see the conditions that these men are working at here, they’re bending some steelwork for frames there, but it was all hands on and there’s one of the Machine Shops. My brother worked in one of the Machine Shops and all the machines were belt driven and the noise was horrendous, just these belts and the pully works. Um, that is what is Long Shop, is it? Just go and see there, top, no it’s a workshop. Yes, they did a lot of woodwork; they made all the furniture for these ships. It was amazing, all made of mahogany and polished and beautifully made work, um, with the Joiners.
Lisa : Did you witness … you were talking about the working conditions and the dangers involved, did you witness any accidents?
Peter : [Clears throat] A good friend of mine got caught in a lathe and um, he was very badly hurt and he’s still alive but he’s got very feeble now and maybe due to this injury which he’s borne very well all his life but he would be in his late 70’s now but, yes, that was one of a very bad accident. [Clears throat]. That is the Irelands’, Mrs Ireland and Mr Ireland who used to do all the catering on the ships when we did trials and they ran the Gloucester Hotel down in Cowes for many years. Sid Ireland, he was very well known. I knew his sons, we used to sail together and his daughter. That’s Sir James Milne there, obviously at one of the functions and what’s this one? James Milne launching ceremony, yes, all the ladies in their fur coats.
Lisa : And this is the works Canteen?
Peter : Yes, that must have been at East Cowes, I don’t remember that, I’m not quite sure where that was.
Lisa : Was there a Works Canteen where you worked?
Peter : No, people took their sandwiches, um, anybody who worked or came from Ventnor and Sandown, Shanklin etc. they brought their sandwiches and sat there in the dust and dirt and ate. This is the Tracing Office where the girls worked and as I said, Carol Wootton, she was Carol Lashmar at the time, she would be able to, no I don’t know if she’s in that picture, that’s a picture of them but as you see, they were all girls who worked in the Tracing Office and they did very, very good work, very neat, all with pen and ink onto the linen. There’s [clears throat] a train that I used to go backwards and forwards to school on from Mill Hill Station to Newport and then we used to walk up to Node Hill and the train station was roughly where Lidl’s is now although Lidl’s is on the site of New Langton’s Brewery. There was a brewery, every Thursday you smelt this lovely smell of brewing when they did their brewing on a Thursday. [continues to look at photographs]. What’s that? 1945, oh that was before my time. That’s a landing barge by the looks of things. Oh, looks as if they went in to, that’s the Boat Shop entry in Cowes Carnival. That’s they’re all dressed up and in Cowes Carnival, when it used to be so much more than it is now, all shot through.
66 minutes and 18 seconds
Lisa : So different departments would perhaps make their own float?
Peter : Yes, yes, there’s one there from the Boat Shop and this, Ray Saunders? No, I don’t know those people.
Lisa : A work outing?
Peter : Yes.
Lisa : Did you ever have an outing?
Peter : No, I never went on one of those, no, that was just prior to me, 1951 but, oh this is one of the Listers he’s talking about, these little things used to pull all these things around, heavy loads, all round the works. These Clinsol Strainers, they were to strain oil. I built hundreds of those, but I see during the War they had ladies in doing it but when I was in the fitting shop, where they were done, it was all apprentice work and we thought, ‘Oh, not another one’. We were building hundreds of them and trying to do it on piecework, and you’d earn another tuppence or threepence for doing it in a certain time. These are the boilers that were built in what was known as Boiler Shop but there, you see, that is a crane there running down these lines and that would move all the heavy loads and then they’d skid those boilers out on trolleys under the big crane, which would pick them up and put them in the ship (coughs). Yes, that one’s been launched. They had their own fire protection and thing, especially during the War, and of course the ‘Blyskawica’, the Polish ship was there and um, spent most of the night trying to save Cowes from the bombing and that still goes on in a big way at the moment, the ‘Blyskawica’, they come over to Cowes once a year and meet up with people here who still remember it all. That was…
Lisa : That’s during the Second World War again.
Peter : Yes. Well there you can see the, the way it was all laid out but that’s looking at East Cowes but you see there’s one ship there, another there, another there, another there so they have four ways, as they were called, where they could build the ships and what was the [clears throat] Submarine Shed is there and just over here would be the Chain Ferry area but that’s looking at East Cowes but now that’s all gone, they’ve shuttered it all along and in-filled it all so it’s all flat now, built on, which actually has increased the tide, the rate of tide there to an extent where when we used to race dinghies in Folly Regatta, we used to race down the river, round number four gas harbour buoy, just off the Squadron and race back up the river. You wouldn’t get against that tide now, in any conditions of wind. The tide, because they’ve narrowed it and also taken a lot more spoil out to form the Marinas etc. up above the Floating Bridge and when the Good Lord floods the tide, he fills all that area and of course it’s all got to come out on an ebb tide and it … the amount of water, extra water that’s gone up there has got to come out and it’s sped up because it’s narrowed just near the Floating Bridge and that’s one of the big problems with the Floating Bridge at the moment, being pushed down hard against the chains. This is Bannisters, the rope works, I remember going round this with my grandfather. My grandfather, he was Manager at Shepperd’s which used to import a lot of the things into the Island, coal and anything that had to come over in their, their little ships, um, and was offloaded at Medina Road there and he was Manager there and this Bannisters was just up the road from where he worked and he knew the people and he took me round this, er, rope making area and the road, um, the road, Medina Road, no it’s not Medina Road, it’s another road, they’ve taken the hump out of it and the hump was put into it to allow this walk rope way and now they’ve flattened it out because of course they don’t use that tunnel any more.
71 minutes and 39 seconds
Lisa : And, this is a tunnel?
Peter : Yes that’s a tunnel which went under the road and under a lot of the houses and things. And, there was another tunnel which went from Mill Hill to Cowes railway station, um, I don’t know what they use that tunnel for now, but they did a lot of work for all the rope works in their day. Then Carisbrooke Shipping moved into it and now they’ve, they’ve now built their own place further down Medina Road. I remember some of these girls who used to work in the office. She was a Guide, I was a Scout at the time, and she was a Guide. These were the little ships that used to bring things over to the Island, all the plating and all the rivets and whatever was needed for the building the ships and John Samuel Whites ran those. This was New Langton’s 4X, they took the barrels of beer and things across to the Mainland.
Lisa : And that’s on the River Medina.
Peter : Mm, yes.
Lisa : Heading down from Newport Quay.
Peter : Yes. Yes, the cricketers, there were quite keen cricket teams and they used to have their Sports Day. I never did get involved in that, and they used to have rowing, some rowing gigs and racing but I didn’t get involved in that, as I was saying, we were into the sailing side of things which took up all our spare time. Yes, Brian Greening’s done a very good job with this book.
Lisa : Well thank you for talking to me about some of these photographs.
Peter : That’s the Turbine Shop, that’s where they built the turbines. These are turbine rotors and all this was done and then that rotor sat in, into that shell and then there was a top piece went over, that turned over top but it was very labour-intensive getting all these face to face joints absolutely perfect. That joint would fit absolutely flat onto that and it was all scraped and … oh, it’s a pity it’s all gone but there we are. Still a lot of industry on the Island and small industry. We found that all these motherboards and all these electronics and things, there are little places here that, as Trinity House we dealt with them rather than going to the big boys on the Mainland and they did a very good job for us.
Lisa : So our ship building, and boat building heritage still lives on?
Peter : Well not so much the ship building but I’m looking at the ships, that size but they do the little passenger ferries at East Cowes but it’s all aluminium now rather than, and fibreglass of course, rather than the steelwork that went on, yes that’s gone. It’s a pity as a lot of jobs have gone with it but Cowes and East Cowes were built around, um, without a doubt, um, John Samuel Whites and Saunders Roe.
Lisa : Thank you very much.
Peter : Right, that’s that.
Interview ends
75 minutes and 53 seconds
Transcribed March 2019
Chris Litton