We often bemoan the loss of Bristol's maritime heritage, but two tug boats restored, owned and run by the city's Industrial Museum come some way to redressing the balance. One is the 65-foot, 32-ton Mayflower built just 18 years after Brunei's pioneering ss Great Britain and now the world's oldest tug still afloat and the other is the John King, which was launched from Charles Hill's Albion shipyard in 1935.
The Mayflower was built at Stothert's Clifton Marine Engineering and Iron Shipbuilding Works at Hotwells in 1861, primarily for towing ships and barges along the Gloucester and Berkeley Ship Canal. At that time, tugs were pretty much an unknown quantity but the company running the canal found them 25 per cent more efficient than horses. Soon three of them were at work and, as well as being speedier, made a saving of 65 per cent on the cost of towing by animal. Working the Sharpness canal, the Mayflower's job was to tow trains of small trows and ketches -plus the occasional steamers into Gloucester Docks.
In 1899, it was decided to make her seaworthy and after the engine was replaced, along with a new boiler, funnel and propeller, she was set to work towing sailing ships along the tricky waters of the Severn Estuary to Portishead and back again. In 1909 she was again adapted, this time to life on the Severn upstream of Gloucester Docks, and then yet again in 1922, when her bulwarks were cut away to enable the crew to step onto laden barges more easily.
Throughout her long working life, the Mayflower was crewed by three men a skipper, an engine driver and a 'boy' (who did all the other jobs) with an extra hand added when she ventured out into the rougher waters of the Bristol Channel. In the 1920s, two of her skippers were keen pigeon fanciers and the vessel was often seen heading towards Sharpness with dozens of pigeon baskets on her stern. Coal from the bunkers was often exchanged for eggs and milk along the canalside. In the 1930s, the vessel underwent more modifications and she got a proper wooden wheelhouse, a new boiler and new bulwarks.
In 1948, when the Sharpness canal came under the control of the British Waterways Board, all the tugs were either scrapped or had diesel engines fitted - except the Mayflower. The Board thought that she was too old to be bothered about and the vessel became an 'odd jobber' pulling mud hopper barges about and the like. But in the hard winter of 1962/3 she had the last laugh. As the canal froze and the diesel boats had problems working, she once again took on ship-towing work. But at the end of that winter she was laid up and in 1967 the faithful old boat was sold off.
She was bought by a Midlands scrap dealer who had plans to restore her but found the cost too high. But, when he was forced to sell her, he put on a high reserve price so that other dealers wouldn't buy her for scrap. So the Mayflower survived but then spent another 14 years moored up in Gloucester slowly deteriorating. She was vandalised and even sank. But a saviour was at hand and, in 1981, the vessel was bought for £3,600 by Bristol's Industrial Museum and towed back to the place where she had been built.
It was decided to restore her to something like her original appearance in mid-Victorian times and after six year's' hard work by a team of dedicated volunteers - which resulted in a heritage award - she was ready to steam again. Now very much the apple of the eye of the dockside museum, she carries hundreds of delighted members of the public on trips around the harbourside every year.
The John King, the other tugboat to grace the old city docks, has a much shorter history than the Mayflower. Like her older sister she was also built in the harbour, but at Charles Hill's Albion yard in 1935. Working for C.J. King, the 65-foot, 50-ton yessel was a familiar sight towing ships from Bristol to Avonmouth and she was the last tug to help ease the ss Great Britain into place in the Great Western Dock on that Old Lady's triumphant returned from the Falkland Islands in the summer of 1970.
The was subsequently re-named the Peter Leigh, the Pride and the Durdham but in 1994 was bought by the Industrial Museum for £10,000. Scores of volunteers - nicknamed the 'Black Hand Gang' - worked on her restoration, including her 350hp, six-cylinder diesel engine, and after a £35.000 overhaul and a re-paint in traditional red, black and white, she was 'shipshape and Bristol fashion' and ready to go proudly on show at Bristol's 1996 Festival of the Sea.
If you want to go on the John King the next trips around Harbourside will be on June 18 and 19 starting at noon and finishing at 6pm. It costs £3 for adults and £1.50 for children.
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