The sailing smack JOHN BULL, dandy rigged and carrying a beam trawl........The sailing smack JOHN BULL was a typical late nineteenth century wooden fishing vessel. She was ketch-rigged, (dandy-rigged was the local term) carrying a jib, fores’le, mains’le, tops’le, mizzen and mizzen tops’le. She was built by John Bell at his shipyard just to the north of the Union Dock, in Grimsby, which looked out onto the creek (Later to be known as Doig’s Creek) and the mudflats of Pyewipe. American Elm was used for the planking of the hull, English Oak for the stem, stern-post and keel, and fastened with treenails and bolts. The masts bowsprits gaffs and booms were turned from pine. The cost of a smack at this period was about nine hundred and fifty pounds. Her launch took place on Christmas Eve, 1889 and on completion she was registered as a fishing vessel in February 1890, with John Bell as her owner. He had built and sold fifteen smacks previous to this one and knew that in all probability would not find a buyer for her, but such was the character of the man and his caring attitude to his loyal shipwrights, he decided to keep her, employ a skipper and crew and work her for as long as possible. Not only did he carry out this task but also went on to build and own two more! Crewed by three men and two boys, she would work the fishing grounds in the North Sea and beyond, using a wooden beam trawl, usually worked on the port side. This large beam was fitted with iron shoes on each end helped the beam trawl to be dragged along the sea bed. Working these vessels was both harsh and dangerous with many vessels and their crews never to return. In fact, between 1880 and 1900 about 200 apprentices were lost at sea off Grimsby smacks. Between the years 1876 and 1895 a total of 1,287 men and boys lost their lives at sea. Many smacks were run down by other ships, many went ashore but the vast majority of losses occurred through heavy weather. With the rapid introduction of the steam trawler, (The first iron, pupose-built steam trawler was the ARIES, built in 1863), the demand for sailing smacks dropped and building them was almost abandoned. By the end of 1892 113 steam trawlers were registered in the port. Many smacks were sold to Scandinavian countries at almost give away prices and others sadly saw up. Some of their owners went bankrupt, being unable to keep up payments on their mortgages and the value of their vessels almost worthless. The John Bull worked out of Grimsby until she was sold to Danish owners in Iceland May 1901. At that time, Iceland was a Danish Colony. She was bought by the merchant Asgeir Sigurdsson in 1901, (he was a partner in the company known as Edinborgarverslun, the main owners of which was the merchant firm of Copland and Berrie in Edinburg, which was the largest firm of fish merchants operating in Iceland at the time.) She cost 750 pounds, which was the (joint) highest paid, paid for a smack. The Isabella, which the Faroese bought at the same time, cost 450 pounds, Hafstein 325 pounds. The lowest price paid was 160 pounds. Fisheries statistics list only one kutter which is 88.10 gross tons. That was the Ragnheidur RE 49, bought in May 1901, and sold to the Faroes in 1914. This was the JOHN BULL. She was bought by the Faroese in 30 October 1914 and given her old name, John Bull, KG360. A small 2 Stroke Danish Tuxham engine of 28HP was taken out at her arrival in Klaksvik because of economic/logistic reasons regarding fuel. It was put back in place in 1923 and she became the first motor powered smack in Klaksvik, Faroes. Same name in the Faroes, John Bull KG360 The John Bull ran aground on the west coast of Greenland When she was line fishing, at 5:30 am on July 7th 1934. Assisted by some other ship she was refloated at 13:30 the same day. On August 20th in 1939 she was run down by the Norwegian Vessel Reykjanes, and sunk. There were no casualties. Dimensions were; 91.27’ (with bowsprit) x 78.3’ x 21.5’ x 10.7’ Official builders number 96210. The sailing smacks built by John Bell were as follows, FRANK BUCKLAND 9/1893 PROFFESSOR HUXLEY 2/1884 EMPRESS OF INDIA 6/1884 SILENT WAVE 8/1884 SALACIA 11/1884 PANDORA 12/1884 DEVONIA 4/1885 YOUNG LIZZIE 6/1885 RICHARD BOSTON 19/1885 JOHN GUZZWELL 3/1886 RAINBOW 6/1886 MIGNONETTE 9/1886 WHIMBREL 11/1886 YOUNG HERBERT 11/1886 ROSEBUD 8/1887 JOHN BULL 2/1890 BRITTANIA 2/1891 REGINA 11/1892
Posted on: Wed, 22 Oct 2014 20:10:51 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015