LIGHTSHIPS - keeping the seas safe

LIGHTSHIPS

keeping the seas safe

 LV21 moored at Gravesend, originally used on the Goodwin Sands, it is now owned by a trust and can be boarded. https://lv21.co.uk

A light vessel, or lightship is used in waters that are too dangerous or too deep to build a lighthouse. Although there are records of Romans using fire beacons the first modern light vessel was moored off the Noore sandbank, at the entrance to the Thames in 1734.

The most important function is to have a light mounted high enough, so it can be seen clearly from as far a distance as possible. Early vessels had oil lamps that could be raised and lowered for servicing, later these were fixed and employed fresnel lenses, as used in lighthouses.

In addition to the light was a large foghorn, as can be seen on the North Carr ship. It must have been absolutely deafening for those on board, particularly before the advent of efficient ear defenders.

THE OAST HOUSE or 'hopping' down in Kent

THE OAST HOUSE

or 'hopping down in Kent'

Today, St Patrick's Day, it seemed relevant to talk about beer. Well, about one of the vital ingredients - hops. I touched on oast houses, a few posts back, when I wrote about Rowland Hilder's wonderful watercolours of the Weald.

Oast houses date back to the 17th century, shortly after the introduction of hops into England. The oast, consisted of a two storey, cylindrical structure. In the lower half, a fire was lit, while above, freshly picked hops were spread on a perforated floor. The heat rose, drying the hops and the hot air was vented through a wooden cowl, which swivelled, so as to face out of the wind.

Although they look small from ground level, these cowls are usually about six feet, or two metres tall.

The biggest concentration of hops kilns in the world is at Beltring, near Paddock Wood, in Kent. Many are still dotted around the (mainly) Kent and Sussex countryside, harking back to the times when Londoners would escape the dirt and smog of the city to spend a holiday 'hopping' in the fresh air of the countryside.

Very few oast houses survive in their original guise - most have been converted into dwellings, not always sympathetically.

MYSTERY TYRE

MYSTERY TYRE

Just over four years ago I made an unusual find on the beach. The seabed along the coast is constantly changing, the sands shifted by the tide and the wind. We had endured a series of storms - strong winds and fierce seas. I was down below the cliffs at the Cliff End of the beach and could see the movement of the sand had exposed what appeared to be a tyre.

The surface was smooth so I thought at first it was just a large inner tube, used by fishermen on their boats. But as I scraped away more sand I realised it was much larger than any tube I'd seen before. I posted a picture on a railway forum I contribute to then someone re-posted on a specialist aircraft forum and what emerged was quite exciting.

It appeared that a Wellington bomber, N2767 from 99 Squadron in Newmarket, Suffolk, had run out of fuel after returning from a raid on Dusseldorf on November 9th 1940. The crew were unable to find an aerodrome so made the decision to ditch the plane in the sea, rather than make a normal landing in darkness. The aircraft broke up as it hit the sea but, thankfully, the crew were uninjured. Later the wreckage was recovered and taken away, but the tyre remained, buried in the sand, for over 70 years. 

A police report at the time stated:

"I beg to report that this aircraft made a forced landing on the waters edge 500 yards from the shore. In the course of the landing the aircraft ran into deep water. The shore patrol of "A" Coy 4th Royal Sussex Regiment heard the crew shouting for assistance and with the coast guards they went to their assistance. All were rescued. One of the pilots left the 'plane from the front and fell into deep water. There was some difficulty in rescuing him. The aircraft was washed ashore by the next tide. It is now on the foreshore at Cliff End in the military area. The Officer in charge was Flying Officer Belbin. The crew were all taken to the 4th Royal Sussex Regts billets. One of the pilots was later taken to Military Hospital (probably Brickwall, Northiam) suffering from shock and the effects of immersion in water."

A few days after my discovery a neighbour stopped me and said, 'I've just seen four blokes wheeling a huge tyre up the beach and wrestling it into the back of a transit van!' I was a bit miffed, as it was 'my find'. However, I soon discovered that it had been collected by, and was on its way to, the Wings aeronautical museum in Balcombe, West Sussex, where it now resides. http://www.wingsmuseum.co.uk/index.htm

Aggie, always a star, became even more famous when an article about the find was published in the Daily Mail online. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2548425/A-stormy-history-Winds-high-tides-expose-TYRE-Wellington-bomber-crash-landed-beach-74-years-ago.html#ixzz2sSLwAKPT

SCRAPING THE BOTTOM

SCRAPING THE BOTTOM

photo - National Maritime Museum

As part of the research for my new book, working title, BLOOD ON THE STRAND, I've been looking at dredgers. If you've read my first book, BLOOD ON THE TIDE, you will be familiar with the hamlet of Compass Point. At lot of the action takes place around this little quayside village, loosely based on Rye Harbour. 

Captain Salt, who owns the land around the quay is keen on promoting the area and encouraging Yachties, newly emerging after WW2, to moor their boats there. Although the tide flows quite fast, silt and mud build up along the river bank and he decides to employ a dredger to clear the channel.

There are various types of dredgers but, as part of the plot, I need one that would bring up some hidden objects, which were not mud or silt - you'll have to wait for the book to find out what they are - and a small bucket dredger fitted the bill. The diagrams explain how they work better than I can.

ROWLAND HILDER - ARTIST

ROWLAND HILDER - ARTIST

Oast Houses

I've lived in and around the Weald of Kent for the best part of my life. So, it will come as no surprise that I love the rolling countryside, and the farms; the picturesque blossom on the fruit trees in spring and the heady scent of hops, in the autumn. An artist who, for me, typifies this magical landscape is Roland Hilder. In my first DI Sonny Russell novel, Blood on the Tide, I wrote:

Russell’s train journey to Dover was uneventful. He was able to sit in a seat by the window and watch the Kent countryside slide by. Hop gardens, the bines twining ever upwards, were interspersed with apple orchards, the blossom fading as fruit buds formed. Distinctive oast houses, their conical kilns topped with sparkling white wooden cowls, and peg-tiled farmhouses nestled in the soft folds of the gentle countryside. “Perfect compositions for Rowland Hilder watercolours,” he thought.

Advert for Shell Petrol

Roland Hilder was born in New York in 1905. His English father moved back to Kent at the start of WW1 to enlist in the Royal Horse Artillery. Rowland enrolled at Goldsmiths School of Art and his talents were soon recognised. He had a long relationship with the Shell company, producing posters and calendars for them. He also worked for Oxford University Press and his decorative end papers and black and white drawings of "Treasure Island" won him The Times illustrators award in 1929.

Treasure Island

But as well as his watercolours of evocative Wealden landscapes, he was a skilled maritime painter. 

The punt

His critical eye and attention to detail produced some of the best nautical paintings of the 20th century, and he was called 'the Turner of his generation'.

The Shipwrights Arms

The pub that features in Blood on the Tide is called the Shipwrights Arms. Hilder's Shipwrights Arms is probably in Essex but it captures the exactly the atmosphere I tried to create.

The Shipwrights Arms was a modest building, with stone walls, tiny recessed windows and a pantiled roof. It sat right at the end of the quay, next to the station, hunkered down against the weather. It had withstood any number of gales and powerful storms and had survived, battered but unbowed. Inside was a small, low-ceilinged room, the once white paintwork now the colour of nicotine, stained dark from years of coal fires and the smoke of a lifetime of tobacco pipes. 

Sailing 1934