Mersey Shipping Remembered
ISBN: 0 7524 2815 2
pp 128
Author: Ian Collard
Published by:
Tempus Publishing Ltd, The Mill, Brimscombe Port, Stroud, Gloucestershire, GL3 2QG www.tempus-publishing.com
- Price £12.99 in UK
Mersey Shipping Remembered is the sixth book written by Ian Collard and published by Tempus.
It is once again a feast of nostalgia for the older enthusiast and a reminder of the great
variety of ships which once sailed in and out of the Mersey for those of lesser years and for some of us who were pursuing other hobbies when we should have been paying attention to the changing shipping scene!
The book is divided into four chapters:
- The Liners
- Cargo Vessels
- Coastal Vessels
- Mersey Ferries, Tugs and Dredgers
Mersey Shipping Remembered continues the successful formula of Ian's previous works in which photographs are supplemented with period publicity material, schedules etc.
Those of us who enjoy travelling on the short haul Irish Sea routes today would certainly have appreciated the Aznar Line service from Liverpool to Spain and the Canary Islands provided by the stylish ro/ro vessels MONTE GRENADA and MONTE TOLEDO from Liverpool. If you know where to look on the side of the former Alexandra Dock passenger terminal you can still just make out a faded plastic sign reading Aznar Line!
A wide variety of cargo ships are featured in the chapter dealing with cargo vessels. This section also contains a detailed listing of all the outfit required by New Zealand Shipping Company navigating and engineering cadets. Looking at this extensive list one wonders why a track suit was listed as required though a lounge suit "must not form part of a cadet's outfit" - how ships have changed and fashions too!
Several photographs, including an aerial shot remind us of the former Grayson Rollo and Clover shipyard situated between the former Cammel Laird yard and Woodside and now occupied mixture of flats and part of the Great Western House Office complex only the indentations on the river wall remain to remind us of the location of the dock gates.
An item which caught my attention for personal reasons was the B&I Line advertisement for school trips to Dublin. At school in the early 1970s I very nearly went on one of these trips. Unfortunately outside forces mitigated against it. The political crisis in the north of Ireland was at the time showing signs of moving south. When the British Embassy at Dublin was burned - the trip was cancelled. It was to be another twenty years before I eventually crossed the Irish Sea for the first time on STENA SEALYNX II in July 1994! In the past nine years or so, I have certainly made up for that twenty odd years delay to my first crossing of the Irish Sea.
The 1961 sailing list for the Scindia Steam Navigation Company is sure to cause a second glance. The company's house flag which heads the list, might lead one to think it represents a German shipping Line of the 1930s rather than an Indian shipping line the flag incorporating a swastika a symbol which had its origins as a good luck charm in the far east before being as the flag of the Hitler's Third Reich.
A reminder of the dawn of the ro/ro age on the Mersey is is provided by the Liverpool Daily Post Coast Lines Supplement for Wednesday April 19, 1967 which heralded the maiden voyage of the Belfast Steamship Company's ULSTER PRINCE.
Anyone interested in the Mersey and Irish Sea Shipping scene will find this book a "must have" addition to the book shelves as a reminder of shipping over the past 40 years..
However, it is sad to reflect that recent restrictions on the renewal of photographic permits by the Mersey Docks and Harbour Company, may mean that authors trying to assemble books such as this in 40 years from now will be facing a much more difficult task in assembling a collection of photographs to record shipping in the first part of the twenty first century.
