Barges on the Orwell off Harwich. [DW]
Barges becalmed in the Orwell, off Harwich, 1934. Sailing barges were at the mercy of calms and in light airs much time and bad language was wasted in attempting to coax them along. Here the bowsprit barge DEFENDER (right) tries for steerage way with her staysail set above the furled foresail. For some reason bargemen called what fishermen and yachtsmen term a jib topsail, a 'staysail'. DEFENDER's mainsail and topsail are patched with new canvas. She was built at Maldon in 1900 for Robert Seabrook of Tolleshunt D'Arcy and traded principally between Tollesbury and London with hay, straw and root crops and London horse manure back, for use on the farms. She cost £1,100, then a considerable sum, and in 1910 was valued at £1,200, by the Harwich Barge Insurance 'Club', which classed her 'A'.
When this photograph was taken in the 1930s the DEFENDER was owned and sailed by Cromwell Horlock of Mistley, on the River Stour, who worked her until 1949. She was typical of the design of John Howard of Maldon, that artist of small commercial sailing craft design, having considerable beam, well shaped ends, little draught and depth with a wide, shallow transom and modest sheer; all brought together with harmony in a hull which sailed well.
The stumpy-rigged Rochester barge in the foreground was typical of many Thames and Medway small sailing barges, built for river work without a topmast but having a long sprit with exaggerated peak to the mainsail in compensation. The frequent lowering of mast and gear in the river trades to draw docks, creeks and for lying alongside congested wharves and warehouses made a topmast an often obstructive luxury in their usually short passage making. By the 1930s when this photograph was taken, the few remaining stumpies were glad to secure a freight alongshore, within their capacity, and the Suffolk Orwell was on their limit, as the long sprit and often shallow, river-style hulls made them questionable seaboats.
Her boat is a good example of the well formed rowboats built for barges and smacks. About 14 feet long, beamy, yet with fine ends and capable of being propelled by one or two oarsmen, or of being sculled with one oar over the stern, which was the bargemens and smacksmens usual method of propulstion in sheltered waters. [JL]
Plate.2 in SWW.
Used in The Sailor's Coast, page 78.
Date: 1934