Club News
Andrew Kellard (Grumpy) is suffering from neck and lower back pain and needs to relinquish his posts of Almoner and Luncheon Secretary – any volunteers? He’ll still come to meetings.
Please email Vincent with articles or news for the Newsletter at vincent@fosdike.com
‘Full astern both’ by Vincent Fosdike
I do know that some of our membership have had nautical connections and one of our former members served aboard a very distinguished cruiser during the last war as a radio operator.
As one who has sailed nothing bigger than a thirty foot sloop in nothing stronger that a force six I have always wondered what it feels like to be on the bridge of one of the august members of our R.N. fleet perhaps in heavy weather. Not that long ago there was a T.V. series showing life on one of our latest aircraft carriers, which on its first voyage to sea had to thread its way through a dockyard channel with less than a foot to spare on each side. The channel also had to be dredged thoroughly and only had a few feet of water above “grounding point”.
What happens to people in charge of such vessels if they scrape the paint or just sink the whole ship . Navigation requires a lot of complex input not to mention judgement and decision making. Would you have thought to do more than watch the sides and make sure the water was at its highest possible level when edging an aircraft carrier out as above mentioned. How many of you spotted that you MUST also check the wind speed and direction which can put tons of lateral pressure on the ship and push it against the side no matter how much rudder and compensatory thrust is applied. Also check that the ship has not gained a bit of weight, perhaps some extra fuel has been taken on. Or more subtly there is no extra weight but someone has moved a large item and tipped the ship out of level with one end likely to ground. So at least get the last remaining smoker to light a fag and watch the smoke before proceeding to sea. Failing which a handful of grass will serve. And that is just “getting it out of the garage”. Once moving of course there are the rules for avoiding collision in harbour and at sea, and a real host of complex navigation techniques needed especially in bad weather. You still have to know what to do if the electronics suddenly fail, yes sextants, stop watches and properly adjusted compasses must be understood and applied in what may be very heavy weather. Even when the computers and radar are doing their stuff they need watching for anomalies and intermittent faults. At the end of the day it is the officers who appear at a court martial perhaps just because they assumed their charts were reliable or the depth sounder was switched on.
As to what may happen when it all comes out in a room full of gold braid you might like to read “Sailors on the rocks” by Peter C. Smith (Pen and Sword publications) as I have just done. It covers 15 incidents from 1691 to 2002, and the subsequent C.V.s of the accused!
50th Anniversary of Decimalisation by Ian Payne
I gave a talk on Decimalisation to Coulsdon Probus in April 2015, but this 50th Anniversary is an opportune time for a short summary.
Prior to 15th February 1971, there were 12 pence (12d) in 1 shilling (1/-) and 20 shillings in 1 pound (£1). We called our money ‘£sd’ (pronounced ‘l-s-d’) short for pounds, shillings and pence.
Pre-decimalisation pennies of this size were introduced in 1860. The old symbols of £, s, d stood for libra, solidus and denarius. Libra is Latin for pound weight (of silver) – hence also the pound weight abbreviation lb. Solidus and denarius are two roman coin denominations which became our shilling and penny with symbols ‘s’ and ‘d’, both silver until 1797.
The first copper penny and halfpenny were issued in 1797 and were worth their weight in copper. The ‘Cartwheel’ twopence had a diameter of 41mm/1.5″ and a thickness of 5mm/0.2″
In 1849, the first two-shilling piece (2/-) or Florin was issued – it was inscribed ‘one tenth of a pound’. It was popular and remained alongside the half-crown (2/6) until 1967. But despite many commissions and bills by Parliament through the nineteenth and early twentieth century, no further progress was made with decimalisation until 1961 when the ‘Committee of Enquiry on Decimal Currency’ was set up and reported in 1963. They recommended a £-cent system although South Africa and Australia had chosen the 10/- cent system (calling their new higher denomination Rand and Dollar respectively).
The Committee considered 25 different systems including £-cent, 10/-cent and also Unit (£1 0s 10d)-mil (thousandths) with mil=1 farthing (¼d) & Unit (£1 5s 0d)-cent with cent=3d etc.
In the run up to decimalisation, old coin sets, and new coin sets were issued and many posters and leaflets and a shoppers table for simple conversion. The new 50p, 10p and 5p came in early as 10/-, 20d and 10d (same sizes until later reduced). The 6d stayed as 2½p until March 1970. The banks displayed large 1ft cardboard cut-outs with withdrawal dates and three of these disappeared under my jacket.
I’ve written a fully illustrated 15-page article for CNHSS. Please let me know if you’d like a copy.