Tales of London's Docklands

T
ALES OF

L
ONDON
'
S
D
OCKLANDS

T
ALES OF

L
ONDON
'
S
D
OCKLANDS

H
ENRY
T. B
RADFORD

Half Title Page:
The
Zealandia
, formerly
Empire Winnie
, in Gravesend Reach, 1946.
(Author’s collection)

First published in 2007 by Sutton Publishing Limited

Reprinted in 2010 by

The History Press

The Mill, Brimscombe Port, Stroud, Gloucestershire,
GL
5 2
QG

www.thehistorypress.co.uk

Reprinted 2011, 2012

This ebook edition first published in 2013

All rights reserved

© Henry T. Bradford, 2011, 2013

The right of Henry T. Bradford to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

EPUB ISBN
978 0 7509 5318 4

Bayron and Grev27 stop stealing my books from a private site and putting them up on AvaxHome without putting anything back, not even a thanks. I shall be putting this message in all my books from now on so people will know what you are like.

C
ONTENTS

F
OREWORD

O
ne of the delights and privileges of being a general practitioner is that of getting a glimpse into other people's way of life. In the late 1970s, I was taken on a working visit to Tilbury Docks by the author of this book, just as the docks were in transition between the old ways of working and the new.

There was, inside the perimeter fence, a chain-link fence that cut the dock in half, on one side of which there were pale-faced, miserable-looking men, towing containers around on carriers, and on the other side were rumbustious, red-faced men, standing around and arguing between frenzied bouts of physical action. I was invited to help load bags of cement onto rope slings from high piles in a barge, so that they could be hoisted aboard ship, and soon learned the back-breaking nature of the work.

Best of all, I learned something of being a citizen of that closed male world, inside the walls and gates, where the dangerous nature of the work imposed its own discipline and where mutual support and cooperation were essential to avoid serious injury, or even death.

In the old days, each hatch on a ship would have a gang of twelve or thirteen men to load or discharge it, and these gangs became like alternative families, in which each member, utterly to my surprise, had gained expertise in some unexpected pursuit, such as playing chess, bridge, mending sewing machines, studying Greek mythology or interesting themselves in philately or as numismatists.

Most of the men had left school young (at 14 years of age) and served in the war, and possibly because of this there was constant arguing, intellectual ferment and a desire by many of them to learn. If anyone was sick or injured, the other gang members would cover for him within the limit of their powers. This chivalrous behaviour had to go, of course, in the perpetual drive towards ‘greater productivity', and the gang system was broken up.

It has all gone now: the excitement and drama are no more; no one will tickle the back of your neck with a crane hook, just for the fun of it. The containers have won. That, as they say, is progress.

Dr Colin Smith
February 2007

A
BOUT THE
A
UTHOR

H
enry T. Bradford was born in Gravesend, Kent, in October 1930. His father had been a regular soldier in the Royal West Kent Regiment before and during the First World War, serving in the trenches till he was wounded in the battle of the Somme. Mr Bradford met Henry's mother, Eliza Reynolds, in Aldershot. They were married in the village church in Pebmarsh, Essex, and settled in Gravesend, where they had nine children, Henry being the eighth.

As a child Henry had a sparse, primitive education because of poor teaching methods and because he was evacuated during the Second World War, once to Dereham, Norfolk, in September 1939, then to Totnes, Devon, in June 1940. In Devon he was injured in a farm accident and this necessitated his spending a year in Torbay hospital and Exeter orthopaedic hospital before being returned home to Gravesend, disabled for life.

Soldiers of G. Company, 1st Battalion Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment, resting after having been in the front line for nineteen days,
c
. 1916.
(Author's collection)

The ten last remaining soldiers of G. Company, 1st Battalion, Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment, after taking Hill 60, April 1915, France.
(Author's collection)

After leaving school in September 1944, Henry was employed in numerous jobs before following his father into the port transport industry in March 1954 as a registered dock worker. Then, having been severely injured in a shipboard accident in April 1960, Henry attended night classes for two years before applying and being accepted on a post-graduate diploma course at the London School of Economics and Political Science. After graduation, he returned to the docks, where, during 1964–5, he wrote a comprehensive labour plan for the permanent employment of all registered dock workers.

Henry was married in December 1955 to Iris Kathleen Mann. They had two children, Dawn and Roland. Henry retired from the port transport industry in December 1986 on account of injuries sustained in dock accidents. He had spent thirty-four years employed in the industry, working in every conceivable job both on the docks and in clerical work. After retiring, Henry was advised by a literary friend that he should write stories about his experiences and vast knowledge of the docklands. Except for a story called ‘Those Revolting Animals' and some short pieces, his memories appear in print only here, and can best be described as historical tales of dock work in the middle of the twentieth century.