Stories of the Ships

by Lewis R. Freeman

The decks are black with waiting men as the collier comes alongside, and the instant the mooring-lines are made fast several hundred of them—each with a broad short-handled scoop—clamber over her rail and leap down into the open holds. Others toss down bundles of the sacks in which the coal is hoisted aboard. These sacks are a highly important and distinctive factor in British naval coaling, the ingenious way in which they are used being largely responsible for the remarkable speed-records which have been put up. They are made of extremely heavy jute, bound with light manilla rope, and of a size sufficient to hold two hundredweight of coal. At the mouth are two beckets or iron rings, through which the strop is rove. Each sack weighs in the neighbourhood of 16 lb., even when new; water-soaked and smeared with a paste of coal-dust, its weight may be increased by from 20 to 50 per cent. Before the war, the cost of a sack was about 11s. 6d., but the rise in jute must have made it much greater at the present time.

The sacks are filled by scoop in the holds of the collier, and dragged together in bunches of about a dozen each. The wire cable from the hoisting-boom is run through the rings at the mouth of each sack and made fast. As the winch winds in, it tightens and takes up the slack, thus drawing the mouths of the sacks together and preventing the spilling of coal in hoisting. The instant the sacks are hoisted to the deck of the warship a man casts loose one end of the wire cable, and on the swinging back of the whip it is pulled out of the rings, and the coal left ready for the barrowmen.

The barrow employed appears to differ in no essential detail from the truck used by railway porters in handling trunks. It is perhaps a little smaller than the average of the latter, and somewhat more "squattily" built. After the "technique" of picking up and dumping one's sack is mastered, it is by no means difficult to handle, the main point being to trundle it as nearly as possible on the "balance," so that a minimum of strength is wasted in keeping the barrow from "sitting up" and "sitting down." Once these details are understood, any fairly strong man or boy should be equal to the physical exertion of coaling for two or three hours at a stretch without rest. A short, sturdily built man is at something of an advantage over a tall one, as the latter has to stoop considerably to bring his "centre of effort" behind his load.

The wheeling of the sacks, from the point where they are left in a tottering pile on the deck to the opening of the chutes down which their contents are dumped to the bunkers, is the most important stage of the operation, for the way it is carried out makes all the difference between a fast and a slow coaling. Obviously, then, it is to the organisation of this "traffic" that the greatest attention is given.

Since a battleship is primarily made for fighting, the facility with which coal may be taken aboard is necessarily a secondary consideration. Between turrets, hatches, and various other obstructions on the decks, the route by which a coal-sack is wheeled to a chute is always a devious one. Part of it usually runs across open deck, where "double-track traffic" is possible; at other points the way may be so narrow that only a single barrow can be wheeled through at a time, and even that only when carefully steered. To avoid the latter "necks," the returning "empties" must, if possible, find an alternative route, or, if this is not practicable, going and returning barrows must be "flagged" through by turn, as on a congested stretch of city street when half of it is torn up for repairs. The same sort of thing occurs where the track of the loaded barrows crosses that of the returning empties. In both instances it is customary to give "loads" the right-of-way over "empties," the latter watching their chances to push through in the frequent "gaps" in the traffic of the former. It is in the "control" of the traffic at these points, and on the quick-wittedness of the men in keeping out of each other's way and avoiding a jam, that a great part of the secret of speedy coaling lies.

But perhaps we can learn more about it by taking our barrow and falling into line. The frost-silvered metal handles strike a chill to the fingers straight through your woolly mittens; but don't worry on that score—your own animal heat will more than even-up the balance by the time you have kept your place in line for ten minutes. The last of a pile of sacks has just been trundled away, and, to the scream of the winch, another "cluster" is rising slowly out of the hold to take its place. The scoopmen are falling into their stride by this time, and from now on you can expect them to be sending up a fresh "boquet" every forty or fifty seconds. That your barrow wheels may have a fair run, a man with a scoop pushes aside the lumps of coal which have fallen out of the last sacks, and another man shovels them up and throws them into a half-filled sack hanging to the rail. There is a warning cry of "Stand clear!" and the cluster of sacks plumps down upon the deck with a heavy thud.

Even while it is still in the air two men have seized corners of the swaying mass and pushed it along so that it lands in the centre of the rather restricted working space in this particular corner of the fo'c'sle deck. At the same time, one of them frees an end of the wire cable, and, as the boom retreats, the two help to make it run smoothly out through the beckets at the mouths of the sacks. At the release of the encircling grip of the cable some of the sacks begin to topple over, but before one of them has fallen to its side (which would, of course, result in the spilling of a good part of its contents), quick-footed barrowmen have pushed their trucks under them, and they are held sufficiently upright to retain their loads. A tug or two from one of the "loading" men sets a sack straight on a barrow, and the man behind the latter—watching from the corner of an eye to keep from fouling another load—backs quickly but carefully out, executes a dexterous right-about, and trundles off on a trot along the track to the nearest chute.

After three or four barrows have been pushed impatiently past you (the wheel of one of them over the toe of your sea-boot), you suddenly realise that the dump is no place for "Alphonse and Gaston" tactics, and decide to shove in on your own. Your timid advance, however, proves too slow to head off a more pushful mate in a "sou'wester," and he gets the "lip" of his barrow under the sack you had marked for your own. You edge back politely to make an exit for him and his load, and lo!—two other "vultures" pounce in upon the pair of remaining sacks and roll away with them. You jump back towards safety at the "Dump Bosses'" shout of "Stand clear!" step in the scoop of the man who is brushing up the "crumbs," stumble against the man who has charge of the sack on the rail, and in sitting down manage to thrust your barrow between the legs of one of the men who is humouring the fresh "boquet" of coal-sacks into place. So perfect is your camouflage of overall, sou'-wester, and sea-boots, that none of these hasty individuals whose activities you have inadvertently interfered with recognises you as an officer and gentleman in disguise, and each of them (without arresting a single motion) curses you fluently in the picturesque persiflage of the sea.

You salve your barrow as best you can, and stand by for the withdrawal of the "strop," which is your signal for action. In your eagerness you fail to give the "lip" of your barrow that "finessive" safety-razor sweep along the deck which experience subsequently teaches you is the proper way to get under your "White Man's Burden," and give the tottering sack you are nose-diving for a vigorous dig—just the same kind of a dig that the keen-edged "lip" of the barrow you have stepped in front of gives you on your Achillean tendon. The sack totters drunkenly and sludders down upon the deck; you reach the same—less directly, but with greater impact—by caroming off the barrow which has slashed your heel.

A spilled sack—in clogging the nicely adjusted coaling machine—always has the germ of a jam lurking in it, and only the two or three stout fellows who buck their laden barrows straight through the mess you have made—by clearing the last of the sacks away a hair's breadth before the next "boquet" descends upon them—avert disaster now. Luckily, they are able to swear and work at the same time, and, by plying their hands no less vigorously than their tongues, save the situation.