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Here are just a few extracts from some of the e-mails to the site.
" I was Master of the Kinghow for several years and, indeed, she was my
first command. She took quite a bit of handling as she was engine room
controlled unlike today's modern tugboats and you still had a brass telegraph
on the bridge. She certainly made you think about what you were doing before
you did it, as there were no brakes on her prop shaft and no gearboxes
either, so the propellers had to be stopped before they went the other way!!"
- Alan J Hughes
ABOVE: The Kinghow in Howard marine colours (source - Alan J Hughes)
Kinghow was originally the Charles Hearn, built 1959 yard no. 475 for Preston Dock Commissioners
"I started my working life in Henry Robbs 1963 and left there in 1976 to go to Rosyth
Dockyard.
I Started as an apprentice Loftsman and worked on the five Wilson line boats Salerno, Salmo,
Sorrento, Silvio, Sangro. The Lloydsman was a great tug and she did her bit in the Cod War.
SA Wolradd Woltemade was an incredible tug, so strong that she had to go to Amsterdam, I think,
to do her bollard pull. It was the only place that had one big enough! She did her speed
trials on the measured mile running on one engine.
Another big job was the Helicopter ship the Engadine built for the Royal Navy, it took a
lot of man-hours to build. There was also a big ship built between the two yards, by that
I mean Burntisland and Leith.
There were a few dredgers, small tankers that went up the Thames and I can remember
building a gas tanker and the huge gas tank was built outside by another company. They had
to get big cranes in to install it on the ship before it was launched. "
- John Conafray, New Zealand
"I was born in Leith but have been living in New Zealand for nearly 50 years.
I came across your message in the Leith Memories web site and visited your web site
The Ships of Henry Robb’s.
My father Jock Thomson worked in Henry Robb’s most of his life and was still working
there until his death in 1955.
In 1953 my husband & I came to New Zealand and in 1954 my father wrote to me and said
he had the opportunity of being part of the crew to deliver a ship they had built for
the Golden Bay Cement Co. here in New Zealand. I really don’t know if it was called the
Golden Bay. He never took up the opportunity because my mother would have been all alone.
The other ship he spoke about was an Inter Island Ferry called the Maori which ran
between the North & South Islands in New Zealand and had also been built in Robb’s.
I am sure I read in the papers that this ship was sold to Japan sometime in the 1960’s."
- Betty O’Connor, New Zealand
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If these details are not correct or you have more information please e-mail me graham@pilot.pprune.com |
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