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Albert Edward Gee - Autobiography Part 7 |
The itinerary for the cruise was; Portsmouth to pick up Admiral Jellicoe then Gibraltar, Port Said, Through the Canal to Suez, Aden, Bombay, Harashi, Bombay again Colombo, Cocos Islands, Perth Australia Albany Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney, Jervis Bay, Sydney again, Hobart Tasmania, Wellington New Zealand, Lyttleton, Wellington again, Auckland, Christmas Island, Fenning Island, Honolulu, Vancouver Canada, Esquimalt, San Diego America Santiago Chile, Bilbao, Through the Panama Canal Colon, Key West, Florida, Havana Cuba, Haiti, Kingston Jamaica, Trinidad, Pernambuco. From Here we should have gone to the Cape in South Africa but Admiral Jellicoe was appointed Governor General Of New Zealand, so we went Home to Portsmouth from Trinidad; Santiago Chile was cut out.
The "New Zealand" was a Battle Cruiser 30,000 tons; a coal ship. At each coaling she took in four thousand five hundred tons of Welsh steam coal. Before Admiral Jellicoe came on board we painted ship then coaled, then washed down. We usually coaled from lighters and it was 'all hands'. The only people excused were cooks and a few other men actually on duty. We were organised in gangs. There were 12 or 14 to a gang. The boys held up the bags whilst the other shovelled it in. Each bag was made of heavy canvas and had metal handles. They held two hundred weight of coal. We had to shake the coal to the bottom of the bag and keep the top of the bag open whilst about 5 or 6 men were shooting coal at the bag. At the end of the day my tummy and thighs were covered in bruises but later on in the cruise when I was more experienced I avoided a lot of bruising. Each hold in the lighter had four or six gangs working and a stropping party. As a gang had ten bags filled the stropping party put a wire strop through the handles and hooked the winch wire. The coal was then hoisted inboard and tipped into the upper bunkers. The ships bunkers were arranged in pairs upper and lower and a stoker in each trimmed the coal from the upper to the lower until the lower was filled then the upper until it was filled and they were really filled. The last few inches the stoker was laying on his back pushing it into the corners with his feet. The only light the stoker had was an oil lamp which was a conical tin with a spout into which a wick was placed with the end dangling from the spout. When it was alight it gave very little light and smelled awful. The dust from the coal and the fumes from the lamp made the atmosphere thick. As the bags were emptied they were thrown onto the deck of the lighter then onto the middle of the hold in the lighter. The boys holding the bags had to dart out and grab an empty bag whilst watching that they were not hit by the metal handles of a bag being thrown from above. Coaling ship was an experience of real hard work and danger in those days. There were occasions when we were able to employ "native labour" during the cruise, places such as Port Said, Aden, Bombay, Honolulu, Colon, but, at Honolulu they were taking so long that we had to turn to and finish the job ourselves.
Painting ship was another job for all hands, the stokers and engine room staff were usually excused. I rather enjoyed it although I usually found myself dangling in a bosun's chair on a funnel or a mast with a 3 inch brush and a tin of paint hooked on to the chair, and it was real trouble if one splashed paint on the deck or upset the pot. Washing paintwork was another job where I usually found myself dangling in a bosun’s chair but it was a job that I did not enjoy for the water was prepared in great wooden tubs the previous evening. Great slabs of caustic soda were put in it and by the time we used it it was so strong that by the end of the day ones finger nails were bent outwards and were very sore. I got into trouble once because during the evening I was caught hooking some of the caustic soda out and throwing it over the side. We often, before entering a harbour, such as Auckland or Honolulu, Stopped or reduced speed and washed paintwork, then after we were in harbour we coaled ship, washed down and painted, so we were always 'spick and span'. We used to start work, when we were in harbour, at 5.30 am, work until 11.30 with half an hour for breakfast then dinner and the ship was open to visitors from 1.00 p.m. until usually 8.00 p.m. We used to have thousands, they were counted on and off the ship for we were troubled with stowaways sometimes. Our record was one afternoon in Melbourne when we had 26,000. We used to bake our own bread and the bakery was always open.
Often the visitors would take over and we would go to the mess for tea at 4.00 o'clock and find a lady cutting bread and butter and a big tea party going on. We boys leave every afternoon from 1.00 to 9.00 p.m. and often the Commander received invitations for a number of boys to go on coach trips or to someone’s home. One reason that we had stowaways was that a member of the crew would have become enamoured with a girlfriend and would bring her aboard as a visitor then try to stow her away or he might desert. We had so many desertions that during the cruise we had to have replacements from England several times.
We left Portsmouth in February 1919 and, although I had been to sea before, I was horribly sea sick going through the Biscay Bay and I stowed away in one of the boats for the best part of three days, and did not come to life until we were practically entering Gibraltar Harbour. I did get it out of my system and was never sea sick again although at the time I wished I were dead. We were in Gibraltar about a week and I was able to have a good look round. I made a trip at the invitation of the army, to the batteries of guns and the tunnels driven into the rock face. I made a trip to La Lemma and sampled the very sweet smell Spanish oranges.
We left Gib. and headed through the Mediterranean to Port Said. We passed quite close to Malta but did not stop. At Port Said we coaled ship by native labour. There was no leave for the boys so, I did not go ashore. We then left for Suez going through the Canal. It was very interesting and I still have some photos taken from the ship as we passed along the canal. We stayed at Suez a few days and I did go ashore. Lots of our crew went out to Cairo some went on trips to the pyramids but I could not afford it at the time and I was not entitled to all night leave anyway. As we went through the Bitter Lakes I saw the ships anchored waiting to go through the Canal the other way, there seemed to be a lot of them. We then went through the Red Sea to Aden which was another coaling station at that time.
The Red Sea impressed me with its placid and windless aspect, but there were lots of Dhows that rely on wind so I expect there were times when there was plenty of wind.
We left Aden for Bombay where we arrived at about 4.00 am and anchored in the Bay. I can remember the smell of the East that was wafted from the shore. We coaled ship with native labour, our own stokers did the bunker trimming, then we washed down and painted ship and were ready to receive visitors. The ship stayed at Bombay for two weeks on this first visit. We used to go ashore in a ferry boat, landing at Sassoon dock. My first impression on going ashore was of the red splotches all over the paths and road which I found were made by people spitting whilst chewing Betel Nut. There were stalls where the Betel Nut was sold served up on a leaf. There were cows wandering about anywhere and everywhere.
When we first arrived we were allowed ashore unrestricted, but at that time Ghandi's civil disobedience campaign was starting and we were only allowed leave within the Fort. It was not very restrictive for most all of the town was in the Fort, some places such as the silk market were outside the Fort. During the time we were there we had to land some of our men to help keep order. There were occasions when shops were looted and we took bales of silk from looters. The houses seemed to be bursting with occupants. Most houses had doors and windows open and seemed to be crowded. Snake charmers would set up and give a show on the path, they would attract a crowd by shouting "Mongoose fight Snake". The Mongoose always won for it was harder to obtain a Mongoose than a snake.
While I was in Bombay I visited the Elephanta caves, situated on an Island in the Bay. They were rather spectacular but the man who took us round said they were supposed to have been gouged out of the solid rock in a day or a night according to the legend. There were pillars that looked as though they were one piece with the floor and ceiling so it was quite an achievement whoever did it and however long they took. The caves were visited by new brides. There was a piece of rock about table high and the bride sat on the rock, the groom grasped her ankles and walked around the rock several times, it was supposed to ensure fertility.
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