tarboat's photos with the keyword: boats

As winter draws in the boaters on the Macclesfield Canal need plenty of solid fuel to keep warm and maybe diesel for the engine or central heating. The setting sun glints on the moored boats and the fuel boat Alton as it makes a delivery to the moorings at Middlecale.

Redcar steelworks from the harbour South Gare. At the time the steelworks was due to close imminently but was eventually reopened for a short period before the final axe fell.

Fishing boats on the slip at the tiny harbour at Portloe.

A pair of maintenance boats built for duties on the Ashton, Peak Forest and Macclesfield Canals. Maria was built by Jinks at Marple in 1915 at a cost of £155. It replaced another boat of the same name built at the same yard for the Buxton Lime Company. Joel was originally built as a horse boat for the Buxton Lime Company in 1918. Sold out of service to the London and North Eastern Railway Company in 1926 she was subsequently rebuilt in 1929 as a motor boat fitted with a Kelvin 9HP petrol engine. This was the first motor boat in the maintenance fleet and always betrayed its' origins as a horse boat through the short, low horse boat style cabin cum engineroom with no gunwhales and the long rear deck and consequent long tiller. By 1946 the boat was in need of rebuilding and it was replaced by a new motor boat built at Gorton. It entered service in British Waterways colours in August 1948, retaining the fleet number 9. It may well be that a number of parts from the original boat were incorporated in the new Joel and that for accountancy purposes it was actually classed as a rebuild rather than a new boat. The boatbuilder at Gorton at this time, one Tommy Challinor, is said to have lacked the confidence to build a new boat from scratch and consequently always rebuilt or modified existing boats so they were like the aged broom that had 3 handles and 4 heads. Powered by a new 15hp twin cylinder Kelvin petrol/paraffin engine this was a fast boat which served until the Ashton canal became derelict in the early 1960's. Both boats were abandoned on the Ashton Canal by the early 1970s but were rescued by enthusiasts who formed the Ashton Packet Boat Company and undertook extensivel rebuilds. They continue to keep these rare wooden narrowboats in good order.

Night shot of day boats in the canal arm at the Black Country Living Museum. These narrowboats were used around the Birmingham Canal Navigations and the Great Western Railway owned boats would have been employed moving goods to and from a number of interchange basins owned by the railway company. These are referred to as day boats as they were not lived on as a matter of course unlike the long distance narrowboats. The cabin is smaller than on the latter vessels and provided some shelter and a stove for warmth. The boatmen would usually go home at night as they would never be far from there on the Birmingham Canals. Occasionally they would spend a night on the boat but this was not the usual practice. The initials TB & Co on the rudder or elum are thos of Thomas Bantock & Company. Bantock became boatage agent to the recently completed Oxford Worcester and Wolverhampton Railway in 1853 and then to the Great Western Railway in 1855 dealing with canal wharf to rail transfers. In 1858 he set up a business as Thomas Bantock and Company with offices within the Great Western Railway station at Wolverhampton. He was appointed as ‘carrier’ for the Wolverhampton District. The agency was for: ‘carriage of rail-borne goods by road less than 40 miles along a route taken between places within a 25 mile radius of Wolverhampton Low Level Station’. He was paid a percentage of the GWR charge to customers. The cartage agents, as later referred to, were required to provide suitable vehicles, in an approved livery, horses and harness and employ civil, energetic men to the GWR Company’s satisfaction. In 1860 Bantock owned 51 canal boats working from GW/OWW transfer wharves on the Birmingham Canal Navigations (BCN). In 1861 he was still the Duke of Bridgwater’s Trustees District agent too. Bantock boats were based throughout the Black Country including 5 boats at Stourbridge (1858 to 1956) and 3 at Stourport. The Great Western had its own narrow boats working on the BCN and in 1866 Bantock hired 16 boats from the GWR at £15 per month. Thomas Bantock and Company expanded their interests becoming an ironmaster, coal mining (Ettingshall Lodge Colliery, Springvale 1865-90), and boat builder at Ettingshall Dock, Millfields. They built for themselves and the GWR completing 116 boats by 1895. They were said to have built their own railway wagons at the same works. The Company offices were now based at the rear of Albion Wharf at Herbert Street, Wolverhampton.

Boathouse at Williamstown Harbour on the western shore of Lough Derg, County Clare. SCL stands for Shannon Castle Line, the hireboat fleet seen behind in winter storage mode.

Corrugated iron boathouse at Williamstown Harbour on the western shore of Lough Derg, County Clare.

A trip to the Boat Museum for the Easter gathering was rewarded by fine weather and a good selection of historic boats in the upper basin. In this image the boats are (from the right)' Birmingham', 'Starling', 'Badger', 'Joel', and 'Lindsay'.

Aldeburgh beach.

Macclesfield, the home of Hovis flour which was milled here between 1898 and 1904. The business outgrew the premises and was transferred to a mill at Trafford Park in Manchester whilst this mill became the publicity works and printed the paper wrappers for Hovis bread. It has now been converted to apartments after a long period of decline and then disuse.

Commercial carrying on the Leeds and Liverpool Canal. Short Boats Wye, owned by Apollo Canal Carriers, and Derek Bent's Weaver, on a contract for Bradford Corporation moving sewage pipes from Esholt to Shipley in August 1973. I was working with Derek Bent on this job and on completion we made a fast dash back across the Pennines to Leigh. One particular memory of the job is that the Corporation's steam locomotive Elizabeth was in action on the sewage works' system whilst we were loading.

Sheffield Basin is the terminus of the Sheffield and South Yorkshire Navigation but nowadays the keels no longer call at the warehouses and pleasure boats rule. Considerable revitalisation of the area as taken place, some developments being more successful than others, and there is an upbeat feel to the canal here. The Sussex Street gasholder dominates the background but I don't know which industrial premises the chimney served.

I do love the Irish loughs, particularly on days when the clouds scud across the sky and the sun makes sudden and fleeting appearances. The light changes so quickly and there are so many different moods to the water and sky. Rainbows are a regular feature and the wide-open spaces across the water makes it possible to see the whole arc, as in this example, snatched on a wild October day on Lough Derg, looking north-east from Williamstown Harbour.

Two boats from the maintenance fleet used on the Ashton, Peak Forest and Macclesfield Canals. Joel and Maria, both beautifully restored are seen here at Marple.