Life at sea - Scarborough man

The following is a discription of Don Pickards time in the Merchant Navy.

Don Pickard spent just seventeen weeks in the Merchant Navy. He joined as a hospital medic. He left mainly because of the long hours as he was expected to work from 7 till 7, then again from 10 at night till three in the morning doing watch. The pay was very poor as well as he only had £15 a week (though he did make money on the side selling durex to the passengers).

He describes the 'Empress of India' as "a bloody rust bucket". The bulkheads were especially bad as they were rusted and it was impossible to move them even with a hammer.

He saw some amazing ships during his short stay on board. They saw the SS Nimitz, a United States aircraft carrier. You could have picked up the 'Empress of India' and placed it into the 'Nimitz'. The aircraft carrier had thousands of crew on board plus numerous kitchens, cinemas and restaurants. It only needed to go into port every three months just to replenish itself with food. It did not have to put in for fuel though as it was nuclear powered.

Don remembers when the alarms went off on board the 'Empress of India'. It turned out to be a false alarm as someone had dropped a smoke bomb in the ventilator. This did not go down very well. The passengers could not understand why the waiters kept disapearing. Th alarms went off in stages. Only the staff could hear the alarms in the early stages so as not to alarm them.

Because of an emergency Don was transferred to another ship. This was an oil tanker which was on fire. It had sent out an SOS and the 'Empress of India' was the nearest ship. Don was 'volunteered' to go on board the tanker. The ships doctor was drunk and the nurses had refused to go on board so he was pressured into it.

He transferred over in a little liberty boat and then the passenger liner scooted off. If the oil tanker had blown up it would have caused a tidal wave so they moved away as quick as possible. So after twelve weeks on board the 'Empress of India'.

The oil tanker was quite a ship. It took two days to reach tp speed of 30 knots. It had to put its engine into reverse five days before reaching port in order to slow down. They had no breaks on board so this was needed.

They used electric tricyles to move around the tanker. 120 foot of the ship was beneath water!

The oil tanker pulled in at New York. Here Don left and he also left the Merchant Navy. He had been at sea just eighteen weeks.

Dons family did have some seafearing experience. His Uncle Stan Wilson lived down the bottom end of town. He was caretaker of the Graham Sea Training School. They sued to teach the boys seafaring skills such as knot making and seamanship. They used to go to sea on the Maisie Graham. Dons aunt has lots of photos of the fishing family but will not part with them. She will not even let people see them.

DEMOLITION: Dons father worked in demolition. He remembers knocking down the old icehouse where Bamfords cafe is. In the foundations they found a tomb. The bodies were quickly whipped out and the hole quickly filled with concrete. His Uncle Billie went down to say that they couldn't do it because it was of historical interest. But they just ripped out the gable end. The firm knew what they were doing and got fined.

PHANTOM JET: A phantom jet went down in the north side during a display in the 1980's. The pilot stayed with the plane thus saving the 5000 people on the beach. The pilot was still alive and probably drowned. He had no air tank and the rescuers could not get air to him.



OTHER ARTICLES
• Life at sea - Scarborough man
• A great storm in 1874 along the coasts of England
• A sea shanty about a storm on the Scarborough coast
• The history of the Graham Sea Training School
• A great storm off Filey Bridge and a famous rescue in 1799
• Charles Dickens account of Filey and Scarborough graveyards
• Stories of human interest from the sea port of Scarborough
• A great storm in 1871 in Bridlington Bay
• The Allen and Truman Scarborough fishing families
• Tommy Rowley - stories about loss of life at sea
• Stories from Flamborough Head and Filey
• The press gang and the Royal Navy at Scarborough
• Filey and the gales of 1860,1867,1869 AND 1880
• A great storm in ancient Scarborough. by John Rushton.
• A huge storm at Scarborough and a shipwreck
• The national RNLI and the Scarborough lifeboat of 1861.
• Charles Dickens account of a shipwreck at Filey
• The loss of the Scarborough trawler Heritage in 1993
• Filey and the Great War - minesweeping and influenza

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