THE SEVEN SEAS MAGAZINE 1 1 The Official Organ of the Seven Seas Club wq : J £ep i Traditional 16th Century Pub Volume 79, No 7 Lunches & Evening Meals Genuine Home Made Food 1 Minute from J4 of M25- Signposted 'We11 Hill' September 2002 TEL 01959 534457 EDITORIAL: I hope all members saw the Stop Press slip inserted into the June edition of the Magazine congratulating Jim Ellard on his admission as a Member to the Order of the British Empire. This gives me the opportunity to acknowledge Jim's quiet, behind the scenes work on our behalf. He is one of a small and BARKING DEVELOPMENTS CO. LTDa devoted band of movers and shakers who keep momentum rolling under the FRESH WHARF, HIGHBRIDGE ROAD BARKING, feet of your President and he has recently acquired a Trafalgar Medal on the ESSEX IG11 7BP Club's behalf and I hope this will join our Table Silver and Trophies for our forthcoming Trafalgar Dinner. T!>1:+44 {0)20 8594 2408 ' Faxl:+44 (0)20 8594 5105 This is, of necessity, a short edition as Ihave been much pressed for time during the summer months and preparation has had to be undertaken early in t f ' order that Icould get away to sea. Iapologise for any shortfall in your : expectations occasioned by this, but hope that all of you have enjoyed the .. .. >==• - . ... \ summer recess one way or another. FOR ALL TYPES OF PUMPS Richard Woodman Honorary Editor E-mail: [email protected] 1 j coast of South Australia on 8 April 1802, the respective countries of these two explorers, Britain and France, were at war. Actually the temporary Peace of Amiens was in force, though it was to break down the following year, and CLUB NEWS & NEWS OF MEMBERS neither of the two men knew of this break in hostilities. Both had passports from their respective governments proclaiming their voyages were scientific We have received a reply from Buckingham Palace in response to our and non-belligerent. Flinders named the place of their meeting Encounter message to HM The Queen, congratulating her on her Golden Jubilee. This Bay. The two sets of stamps, a 45 cent one with Baudin and the Geographe, will be framed and displayed at our dinners. and a $1.50 one with Flinders and the Investigator, are available from me to Dr Colin Dawson has had a triple by-pass operation and is apparently making the first two philatelists who send me a donation for the Laristan fund - and good progress, but Bertie Booker, the Rev Chris Studd and John Smith have thanks to Rowley King! been reported as unwell. We hope they are both on the mend by now. The National Arboretum have not properly recorded our donation. It was SUMMER FUNCTION done properly in the Merchant Navy Book of Remembrance at Trinity House, but not at the Arboretum itself and matters are in hand to rectify this. Our September speaker is to be Club Member Keith Hanson who is going to reveal some of the dark secrets of the Tower of London. Keith is also arranging the details for the Club's Church Service at the Chapel Royal in the Tower on Sunday 29 September at 1030 for 1100. He is anxious to hear from all members wishing to attend the buffet lunch to be held in the Tower of London Club after the service. As this event follows hard on the heels of our September Dinner (on the 26th), members should get in touch with Keith or Frank. See DATES FOR YOUR DIARY. Club Funds were reported to the Club Committee Meeting held on 2 July by our Treasurer, Cdr John Mankerty, as follows: Current Account £2,227.27p with the bill from HMS President outstanding. Business Reserve Account £1,022.86p Capital Account £16,652.52p Laristan Fund £1,589.51p We shall shortly be able to produce for members' use, a List of Club Members for our private use. 9eorge Kingston was unable to get to St Malo to present the new Trophy to the Association of Small Sail Training Ships, but he attended a church service The President presents flowers to Annie Scoones (other pictures on rear pages) at Southampton before their departure and contacted Col Ron Dadswell who will be one of our speakers this winter. The winner of the Seven Seas Trophy For those of you not able to attend this year's Summer Function, it was held out of nineteen participants was the Ocean Venturer. at the Royal Naval Reserve's stone frigate HMS President on the evening of Friday 14 June. The venue, just downstream on the north bank ofthe river And finally, during his visit to our AGM and Dinner in May, Rowley King donated a couple of pairs of Australian stamps commemorating the Flinders - Baudin Bicentenary. You will recall that at the time of their meeting on the 3 2 As you will recall this is one of our Black-Tie-with-miniatures occasions and from Tower Bridge, overlooks the Thames. Sixty-one members and their this year members who wish to wear the mess-kit of any branch of the naval, guests attended and enjoyed a convivial evening enlivened by several guests military or public services to which they belong or have belonged are invited from down-under, including Charlie Scoones. Much help and support was to do so to add a touch of colour to the ceremonial. I recall once attending a provided in looking after our guests by Mike Pinner and his wife, also Jeremy Trafalgar Night dinner at HMS Dryad at which there were a number of army Miller and Frank Whymark. Exchange presentations of Club pennants were officers, including some hussar officers. The guest of honour, a retired vice made and all hands thought the food and wine excellent. .,I!, ·,.,- . admiral, in welcoming the company, remarked how nice it was to see some of The caterers have been warmly thanked for their hard work and our gratitude their colleagues from the other services in their pyjamas. I know some of us in to the Commanding Officer of President has been passed on. the Seven Seas Club are getting on, but... No, perhaps I'd better not say it. Possessing a terrace overlooking its own landing stage, along with a fme drill• hall, HMS President provided us with a very suitable place to gather and it FEATURE would not have mattered what the weather did, though on the 14 June it was a fine, if breezy evening. A BRIEF IDSTORY OF THE BRITISH MERCHANT MARINE HMS Victory OFFICER drawn by Tony Fernandes During the long wars of the French Revolution and Empire, Great Britain's Royal Navy had been compelled to adopt an all-weather, world strategy in order both to defeat France and her allies, and to protect her own, immense trade. This was essential not only for the preservation of herself, but for the funding of her own war-effort and the subsidies paid to her allies. The legacy of this was to leave Britain the mistress of the seas and while this mastery was not unchallenged in theory, it was unchallenged in fact until the outbreak of war with Germany in 1914. This largely peaceful century therefore became a period of unparalleled opportunity for trade and enterprise, of scientific advances of which the most notable at sea were the introduction of steam and adoption of first iron and then steel as ship-building materials, and of general social progress. In 1815 Britain still relied upon the highly restrictive Navigation Acts to protect her shipping, still allowed the Honourable East India Company the greater part of its monopoly on trade with India and China, and still maintained archaic tonnage regulations which inhibited the development of ships's hulls. But all these shibboleths were under threat and being eroded by expedience, opportunity and a quickening pace in technological change. During this period, although steam ships were to progress from experimental TRAFALGAR DINNER, 2002 eccentricities to fast and reliable providers of long-range transportation and vast numbers of people were be relocated in America and Australia, the This year our Trafalgar Dinner takes place on Thursday 31 October. The sailing vessel co-existed and participated in this enormous diaspora. President is to be the speaker and I understand, in my capacity as magazine Editor, that we are to be exposed to his rather unorthodox views on Nelson's great victory. 5 4 She carried low-freight cargoes 'Yell into the 20th Century and continued to Almost by definition, ship-owners are an exploitative breed whose watch• undergo her own evolutionary process. words were essentially to keep freight-rates high and running costs low. In the However, as far as the British were concerned the shipping slump of the 18th century, standards of ship-board safety were largely a matter of 1920s which affected world trade after the immediate post-war boom, individual judgement on the part of a merchant master, and qualifications for effectively killed the British merchant sailing fleet. At this period too, were promotion often relied more upon blood-relationships and nepotism, than any sown the first seeds of British maritime decline, though the long twilight really proven skills on the part of the commanders of ship. This was generally period of empire and the vital role of merchant shipping during the Second true of both warships and merchantmen, but the stern rigors of a prolonged World War ensured a brief, final flowering of British mercantile shipping in and demanding war were to change this and there were exceptions.