WHY THE MEN WERE SINGING IN THE DOCK 

It was probably Falmouth Docks’ darkest hour when, in early 1979, its then owners, British Shipbuilders, announced that the yard’s shiprepair operation would end.

But a major survival campaign was mounted, leading to a remarkable turnaround, and there came a point when Dennis Pascoe, the local managing director, knew that recovery was complete.

Here is how I recalled it all, complete with an original cartoon by Brian Thomas, in my book Reflections, which I published in 2014 to launch my fund-raising activities for Cancer Research UK. (See also blog dated 30 December 2023, 12 and 26 January.)

The only problem is the resident rook 

keeps dropping worms in . . .

What a delight to see Falmouth Docks so busy nowadays, with ships and boats aplenty and nearly 1,000 people working there. It seems only yesterday (well, 1979 actually) that the yard was a “ghost” complex that appeared doomed. 

Its then owners, state body British Shipbuilders, threw in the towel and announced that shiprepair would end, with nearly all 1,200 employees to be made redundant. 

But a big survival campaign followed, with BS finally agreeing to retain 175 men. 

The public face of that campaign was the yard’s managing director, Dennis Pascoe. As the Packet’s chief reporter and Lloyd’s List correspondent, I had the privilege of regular meetings with him. 

Alas, I will never forget how he began one such meeting with the chilling line: “I’ve got the big C, Mike.” Fortunately, Dennis lived long enough to witness a remarkable transformation. 

In 1980-81, the yard began recruiting again, quickly followed by a return to profitability. Norman Lamont, then still Industry Minister and with his “Black Wednesday” a nightmare of the future, dubbed the yard “one of the great success stories of British industry.”

By now, there was also to be found on the door to the executive offices at the Docks – and on other doors in the complex – a printed sticker saying “Falmouth Shiprepair, Cream of European Shipepairing.” 

Dennis, meanwhile, always remembered the point at which he knew the battle had been won. 

“It was when the men in the yard began singing again,” he told me. “When I heard those Cornish voices and the likes of ‘Trelawny’ and those ’20,000 Cornishmen knowing the reason why’ . . . THAT was when I knew Falmouth Docks had survived and we were on the way back!”  

VODKA, VODKA, VODKA AT THE DOCKS . . . THEN THE NEAR-MISS THAT COULD HAVE BEEN ‘AN INTERNATIONAL INCIDENT’

Observing the ever-changing Falmouth port scene from the Castle Drive lay-by above, you might be intrigued not least by the delicate business of drydocking a vessel.

 

Laying her to rest on the blocks below is an inch-perfect exercise requiring much careful calculation, planning and execution.

 

I’ve no idea how it stands today, but I can recall that for much of the second half of the last century, at least, Falmouth had a particularly good reputation as an accident-free port in terms of shipping movements.

 

That little snippet emerged during my interview in 1988 with Alan Ahrens, who was clocking up 25 years as the man in charge of drydocking operations in the port.

 

There are exceptions to every “rule,” of course, and he would never forget two of them – first when only good fortune prevented “an international incident” and then when a ship was towed out of dock expressly against his wishes.

 

In the late 1960s, he told me, a Russian trawler with nets tangled around its propeller needed to go into the old No 1 dry dock (now Pendennis Shipyard) at a time when a big NATO operation was under way in the area.

 

Alan, in line with duty, had to go on board to study the plans of the vessel prior to her docking.

 

But the 6ft 6in captain was not best pleased about having to drydock and would not produce the plans.

 

“Captain, we must see your plans so that we can fit you in properly,” Alan explained.

 

The response was not the plans, but a glass of vodka, placed in Alan’s hand. “Thank you,” he said. “Now, please, the plans.” Another vodka . . . followed by several more as the sequence repeated itself.

 

The captain finally stipulated: “You drink, or no plans.” So eventually Alan got his plans and, as he put it, “floated” off the ship and went home for the night.

 

The next morning, in accordance with those plans, he supervised the laying of the blocks on the dry dock bottom to “cradle” the trawler.

 

Once the vessel was home and dry, he personally went down to the bottom of the dock. There he was amazed to discover two objects hanging from either side of the vessel’s bottom; they were 14 feet long, a foot wide, ten inches deep, and definitely not shown on the plans. 

 

“They must have been some sort of listening devices,” said Alan. “Whatever they were, they were just missing the cradle blocks. If they had landed on top of those blocks, the devices would have gone right up through the ship and we would have had an international incident!”

 

That was the nearest Alan had come to a calamity during the quarter-century and counting in his drydock role.

 

But there was also the time when the owners of a Norwegian tanker were anxious for her to sail from the Queen Elizabeth Dry Dock, despite an easterly gale – “the worst wind we can have for this manoeuvre.”

 

Men had worked round the clock to get her ready on time and Alan recalled: “I warned that it was not entirely safe for her to come out, but the captain insisted.”

 

The bow tug was secured to the vessel before she began moving out of the dock – to avoid that exercise being undertaken in the Docks basin – and the tanker sailed safely and punctually.

 

Alan breathed a big sigh of relief – the more so when, from reports coming in from other locations, he learnt that this had been one of only a handful of shipping movements to go ahead in the whole of the UK on that stormy day.    

Winter Of ’47 *: SPRING FLOWER SHOW HIT BY ‘POLAR’ WEATHER

One of the longest and severest snow events that Britain had ever experienced  fizzled out down Falmouth way, with no more falls reported during the rest of that historic seven-week period.*

 

In fact, there was nothing more at all in the Packet about it apart from two brief references. 

 

In its issue of Friday, March 26, 1947, the lead story was all about the formal opening by Queen Marie of Yugoslavia, two days earlier, of Falmouth Spring Flower Show, organised by the town’s Chamber of Commerce. 

 

President Major Maurice Petherick said they were “a month to six weeks late” and if the weather had been normal it would have been a much better show. He described March as having “come in like a polar bear but was now like a grampus, wet and blowing.”

 

In the Packet of March 14, Messrs Boase, Sons & Company issued a statement concerning the potato shortage.

 

They expressed the hope that the shortage would ease, adding: “As to the quantities available, this will be extremely difficult to assess until the effect of the prolonged period of frost and the keeping qualities of farm stock can be more accurately estimated.”

 

All in all, then, and by comparison with what the rest of the country suffered, it would seem that Falmouth maintained the truth of what used to be its regular tourism sales line:  WINTER IN FALMOUTH – IT’S WARMER!

 

* See also blog posts, Jan 20, Feb 02, 09 and 16.  

FALMOUTH MOOR ‘FLOODED’ DEBATE – HISTORIAN DELIVERS VERDICT

Whether or not The Moor in Falmouth was once under water – as in part of the sea – has been periodically debated down the ages.

 

I touched on the issue here (January 31), recalling a letter from Lady Redwood, of Flushing, that was published in the Falmouth Packet in February, 1988. It quoted suggestions that long, long ago rowing boats and even the Flushing ferry had berthed at the bottom of Jacob’s Ladder!

 

However, I’ve now come across a once-and-for-all verdict from none other than the late Peter Gilson, who, in his retirement after a lifetime’s teaching, became one of the area’s most respected historians.

 

A few weeks after that Lady Redwood letter, he triumphantly produced evidence to confirm that The Moor, in its inhabited form at least, was not once part of the harbour.

 

He did so by reproducing a map from its publication in a book written by H M Jeffery (1826-91), a local historian and philanthropist.

 

The map, circa 1613 and possibly drawn for use in a court of law, offered no evidence to support the flooded Moor theory. Rather, it showed a road going across what is now Market Strand and also included a hedge said to be at least 60 years old.

 

“If The Moor was under water before then, there was simply no-one around,” said Peter.  “No people, no village, no town.”

 

So what, the Packet’s Pendennis columnist asked him, about the old photos showing a house on The Moor with high steps leading up to its front door?

 

“My answer to that,” he said, “is that it must have been hard luck on all the other buildings in the area, because they would have had water up to their ceilings.”

 

Or the rings at the bottom of Jacob’s Ladder, seemingly for boats to tie up to?

 

“People had to have something to tie up their horses to.”

 

Peter, who taught geography and geology, conceded that the area might well have been a creek during the inter-glacial period, when the sea level was anything up to 12 feet higher than it is now.  

 

But that was a little matter of some 100,00 years ago!

 

Supporting evidence, he recalled, was unearthed during excavations for a brewery on the site of the present Tesco store when layers of creek sand were discovered.    

Winter Of ’47 *: HEAVY SNOW HITS FALMOUTH AGAIN

The Packet of February 21, 1947, had NOTHING about the ongoing Great British Freeze, so far as I could see. (Mind you, the newspaper’s print size in those days was almost vanishingly small!) So it’s reasonable to assume that there had been no more newsworthy weather locally.

 

Seven days later, the topic was back on the front page, with this headline and sub-head:--

 

TWENTY SUNLESS DAYS

 

Second Snowfall In One Of Severest Winters Experienced

 

And the report that followed:--

 

Yesterday week, for the second time in three weeks, snow fell over Falmouth and district to a considerable depth. While for the children it was a further welcome diversion, the fall proved a severe handicap to tradesmen and transport, and deliveries of mail and foodstuffs were again delayed.

 

Believing it may prove of interest to our readers (quaint, huh? – MT), the Packet made enquiries concerning comparisons between this winter’s weather and that experienced over a period of years.

 

Mr W Tregoning Hooper, superintendent of Falmouth Observatory, stated that similar weather occurred during the early part of 1917, when, however, the cold spell lasted for a longer period.

 

Whereas two distinct cold spells, each with an attendant fall of snow, have been experienced this year, during the first four months of 1917 the weather was very severe. This year, 30 years later, climatic conditions second only to the Great Blizzard of 1891 have resulted.

 

A feature of the recent exceptional weather has been the complete obscurity of the sun on 20 out of 25 days.

 

A temperature of 19 degrees Fahrenheit, registered at the end of January, proved to be the lowest recorded at The Observatory since its foundation in 1868. On Friday 21 degrees Fahrenheit was noted.

 

Many residents will recall occasions when skating and even races took place on the Swanpool, which has been frozen on approximately 12 occasions during the last 100 years. Some children have been seen walking on ice around the edges of the Swanpool during recent weeks. 

 

* See also blog posts, Jan 20, Feb 02 and 09   

WEMBLEY OR NOT, THIS CLUB IS IN A LEAGUE OF ITS OWN

It’s a long, long time since Falmouth Town football club generated so much excitement in the town and so much publicity locally and much further afield.

 

But that’s the way of it right now with the first team “just” two rounds away from a Wembley appearance, no less, in the FA Vase Final.

 

Their current outstanding run in the competition is very much the icing on the cake in a remarkable revival of the club’s fortunes after courting with disaster a few short years ago.

 

The Phoenix that has risen from the near-ashes – with its Bickland Park ground having undergone a veritable facelift and so many individuals pulling together in the common interest – has become a classic example of a genuine all-round CLUB.

 

In local lad Andy Westgarth (“an Old Hill boy,” as he likes to describe himself), they have a young manager who has not only led the team to its current dizzy heights but has also pitched in with countless other invaluable contributions to the club’s recovery.

 

The supporters and players are as one – as evidenced when you see Westy take his lads down to the Packet End goalmouth area to join the now-famous F-Troop fans in singing and dancing after another win. 

 

Those of us of a certain age have no difficulty recalling Falmouth Town teams of past eras who were some way ahead of their present-day successors in pedigree and skill.

 

We oldies would take the argument further and cite the team of 1961-63 as Town’s  best-ever. That team’s record-breaking achievements included the historic 1962 FA Cup run culminating in a home tie with League club Oxford United.

 

But those involved then – at least the fans and officials – would still surely envy the Falmouth Town 2024 model.

 

Lest there be any doubt in that – at least so far as the player-fan relationship is concerned - I will quote from Second To None, the autobiography of John Garwood RIP, who was the only local-amateur member in the team of match professionals, otherwise all based in or close to Devon, who lost 2-1 to Oxford.

 

“I don’t want to dispel any of the ‘romantic’ notions lingering in the memories of that great Cup run,” John told me, “but among the players themselves there really was no great sense of ‘romance’ – or even any great sense of club loyalty. (As was demonstrated at the end of that season when, with the budget tightened, nearly all the team departed for pastures new.)

 

“They were a good bunch of lads and they obviously enjoyed the Cup run, but they were quite mercenary about it all.” 

LAID BARE: An Eye-Opening Aspect Of Falmouth’s History That You’d Probably Never Seen Before!

For all that so much of YouTube is drivel and trivia, just occasionally you can unearth  an absolute gem. 

 

One such – and I really should have found it so much earlier – is the Cornish Walking Trails channel with Sarah and Andrew.

 

Their real USP, apart from such professional, friendly and entertaining delivery, is the extent of their research into the historical background – much of it long lost or forgotten – to their featured trails.

 

Watch their 20-minute “Secrets of Victorian Falmouth Exposed” and I guarantee you will find it fascinating from start to finish.

 

In particular, you might never see the entrance to the town’s Wilco store in Market Street – albeit now being converted to Mountain Warehouse’s new home – in quite the same light again.

 

For it was through here, as Sarah and Andrew discovered, after a mazy tour of the town’s warren of iconic alleys and opeways, that you would have made your way in the Victorian era to what was known as Allen’s Yard.

 

This might especially have been your destination if you were a sailor returning to port after many months at sea.

 

For “the world’s oldest profession” was to be found here in abundance, with no fewer than four brothels and 33 prostitutes listed in the 1871 Census.

 

That’s right. They were openly self-identified, with full names and trades, i.e. “prostitutes.”  They were all there, spotlighted in the video:  Matilda Meworth, 15, prostitute, Falmouth; Susan Jordan, 16, prostitute, Budock; Harriet J Jordan, wife, 37, brothel keeper, Constantine, and so on.  

 

At that time, the age of consent was as low as 13 and sadly, as Andrew points out in the video, in big, hard-pressed families children would routinely be sold as “commodities.” 

 

Among other eye-catching entries in the 1871 Census records, one of the four Allen’s Yard brothel keepers was named as Elizabeth Defreeze, who was EIGHTY-FOUR years old!

 

Her son, Albert Defreeze, 49, was recorded as “supported by prostitutes” – or, as Andrew uncharitably suggested, “pimp of the day.” 

 

Twenty years later, in the 1891 Census and for the same Allen’s Yard area, precisely no-one was listed as a prostitute or brothel keeper.  Here Andrew speculated that the names may have been recorded by a local person who chose to disguise their true professions. 

 

Allen’s Yard would have disappeared with Falmouth’s major slum clearance programme after the Housing Acts of the 1930s.

 

The age of consent wasn’t changed until 1885, when it was raised to 16, and brothel-keeping only became illegal with the Sexual Offences Act 1956.

 

Alas, the comments below Sarah and Andrew’s video include “nothing much has changed” and even “I never knew about all that. I think it was still going on behind closed doors back in the 1970s and ‘80s as I remember foreign merchant seamen walking around the streets and frequenting the pubs and clubs.”

 

And – back in the Victorian era - Falmouth was hardly alone in its profusion of such services.  At one point in that era, apparently, Britain had more brothels than schools!

 

  For a Cornish reporter’s visit to a latter-day brothel, see  https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornwall-news/day-discovered-brothel-next-cornwall-6037160

 

Winter Of ’47*: ‘VERY Grave’ Energy Crisis

By the Packet issue of February 14, 1947, there was still no indication of any further significant snowfall having hit the Falmouth-Penryn area, but a front page editorial left readers in no doubt as to the severity of the Big Freeze’s effects.

 

Here is that Packet message in full:--

 

We wish to impress upon our readers that the crisis caused by the shortage of coal is VERY grave, and we urge them to co-operate with the authorities by using the absolute minimum of electricity, gas and solid fuel.

 

The Cornish Riviera has been spared the prolonged spell of hard weather, and electricity cuts experienced by the remainder of the country, but we must not allow our good fortune to blind us to the gravity of this crisis.

 

One result of the crisis is that from February 12^th all newspapers were ordered to revert to their wartime sixes. This week’s issue of the Falmouth Packet is, therefore, four pages instead of six, and we shall continue to publish four-page issues until further notice.

 

News items, features and advertisements have had to be curtailed or omitted, but we know our readers and advertisers will understand these cuts and omissions are unavoidable under the present circumstances.

 

Falmouth Gas Company has one week’s supply of coal in stock and is waiting for the arrival of the motor vessel Avidity, from Hull with a cargo of 400 tons of coal.

 

Recent storms and freeze-ups have delayed all transport, but if the Avidity is able to sail to schedule her arrival, expected at the beginning of next week, will greatly ease the situation in this district.

 

There is no coke to spare for any consumers in the area, other than the bakers.  Schools, shops, cinemas and other places will have to go without supplies, since the coke is being used to make water gas. Unless more coal comes into the port, the present coke supply will disappear altogether.

 

Last week’s output of gas for this area was 25 per cent above that of the corresponding week of last year, and the manager of the gas company, Mr F G Kingwell, told the Packet that the public are not economising as they should.

 

Cases have occurred where gas jets on cooking stoves have been left burning for the sole purpose of heating a room.

 

Economy warnings have been given to consumers by the Penryn and Helston Gas Companies, but the public is not responding.

 

Penryn is fortunate in having three weeks’ stock of coal, but until last Friday had only three days’ supply to rely upon. Pressure is being considerably reduced from 11 in the evening until 6 in the morning.

 

At Helston, coal stocks are severely depleted, and because of the lack of co-operation from consumers pressure is being cut down to the safety margin from 1.30 to 4.30 each afternoon.

 

* See also blog posts Jan 20 and Feb 02  

THEY MADE A DIFFERENCE: DENNIS PASCOE

Think of an “influencer” these days and chances are a not altogether wholesome image of someone who is paid, conventionally or in kind, to recommend a brand on social media will spring to mind.  

 

Long before the word took on this meaning, I was spending the majority of my working life writing about, or directly dealing with, a good many of the people in Cornwall who were what I would regard as genuine “influencers.” 

 

In short, these people were the real deal, the achievers – the sort who made the world go round.  They quite literally made a difference.

 

One such was Dennis Pascoe, who died 36 years ago this month, aged 64, following  a short illness.  He had retired through ill health six months earlier after a 45-year association with Falmouth Docks.

 

Dennis had few if any contemporary equals in his contribution to local business and public life.

 

It is for his years at the helm of the dockyard’s management, during which time it pulled back from the brink of closure, that he is best remembered.

 

But he was also closely and enthusiastically involved with a number of other organisations and interests, including Penryn Rotary Club and Falmouth Amateur Operatic Society.

 

Further, he earned widespread respect and popularity for numerous unpublicised acts of goodwill and kindness.  

 

Above all, having himself classically worked his way from the bottom to the top, he was always ready to provide help and advice in generous portions to those who sought or needed it.

 

In 1983 he received the Saracen Award, the highest honour that his home town of Penryn could give, and four years later he was co-opted onto its Town Council.

 

In early 1979, the district reeled under the bombshell announcement that shiprepair at the Docks, its biggest private employer, was to be closed down by its then owners, British Shipbuilders.

 

An intense survival campaign persuaded BS to keep the yard open with a “skeleton” workforce of 175 men, including 71 allocated to shiprepair, while nearly 1,000 men lost their jobs.

 

Dennis, then commercial director, was appointed director and general manager, subsequently becoming managing director.

 

Within four years, the Docks workforce had more than doubled and two successive million pound-plus trading profits had been recorded.

 

Educated at Falmouth Grammar School, Dennis began his career at the Docks as an apprentice fitter and turner in 1939.

 

After a period at sea with the Eagle Oil and Shipping Company, he came ashore as a 2^nd engineer and returned to the Docks as a foreman fitter in 1950.

 

He subsequently worked his way through the positions of estimator, chief estimator, accounts administrator and commercial manager until, in June, 1975, he was appointed to the board of Silley, Cox and Co Ltd, then the yard’s owners, as commercial director.  

WEEK TWO OF THE BIG SNOW OF ‘47 – HOW FALMOUTH AREA FARED

After such massive local coverage the previous week, and with the nation now gripped in what occasionally seemed like a permanent blizzard, you might have expected loads more about the white stuff in the next Falmouth Packet, published on February 7, 1947.

 

Not so.

 

The only front page reference to one of the area’s biggest weather events of any century was the description of the hills surrounding Falmouth harbour as still “mantled in snow” as a severe gale caused havoc afloat.

 

Inside the six-page broadsheet edition, there was just this little collection of  miscellaneous follow-ups:--

 

 Between 50 and 60 residents of Manaccan took part in winter sports in a field at Glebe Farm yesterday and today week. Improved sledges and surf boards were in great demand.

 

 Not quickly forgotten will be the spectacle of a skier travelling through Helford at speed. A resident took the opportunity to keep his hand in at the sport.

 

 At Gweek, banks of the Helford River were frozen and large sheets of ice were seen floating in the salt water. Many villagers walked to Helston (some four miles) to obtain their meat ration. Eggs were found frozen inside their shells.

 

 In Woodlane, Falmouth, an unsuspecting pedestrian stepped off the pavement where it was at its highest – and found himself breast-deep in a snow drift.

 

And that was all.  So the assumption is that there was no further significant snowfall in the week following that first spectacular carpeting of the Falmouth-Penryn area.

 

Amazingly, the Packet didn’t carry a single photo of the snowy local scene in those first two editions – nor, in fact, throughout the whole devastating period nationwide from January 22 to March 17, when snow fell every day somewhere in the UK.

 

So how did Falmouth-Penryn fare for the rest of that historic chapter?  Watch this space! 

 

* See blog dated Saturday 20 January 2024