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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 28
Introductory
Introductory,
"Everybody knows that there is a great loss of life on our coasts annually, and nearly everybody deplores it. I am sure that if the English public equally knew how much of this loss is preventible, and the means of preventing it, no long time would elapse before means would be taken to secure this end.
"It is with the view of giving this information, so as to enable each person who reads these pages to pronounce with decision upon this question, that this pamphlet is submitted to the public.
"I have kept steadily in mind the idea of writing to an individual, as otherwise I should not have had the courage to address the public in what (from its length alone) looks like a book. As to a portion of it, I (perhaps naturally) shrink a good deal from submitting it to the public. It seemed, however, in writing it, and still seems to me, to give weight to my testimony on behalf of the working men. I apologize to any of my friends who may feel annoyed, and who would doubtless have aided me had they known of the straits to which I was brought in the earlier part of my life in London; but I ask them to think what a grand and glorious thing it will be if, by any sacrifice, we can put a stop to the dreadful and the shameful waste of precious human life which is now going on.
"I thank all those gentlemen in the east, in the west, in the north, in the south, and in London, who have so greatly assisted me for some years in my inquiries, but they would not thank me if I thanked them by name. They are, however, one and all, longing to tell a Royal Commission all they have told to me—and more; for then they would speak under the protection of the law, whereas now they have to depend upon my discretion."
This sufficiently indicates my purpose. In a note appended to a cheap edition, which I was requested by many good friends of my cause in all parts of the country to allow to be published, I gratefully acknowledged the generous spirit in which my Appeal had been received, and recorded my confidence in publicity. This present abridgment, consisting of the Appeal only, without the evidence, is also printed to meet wishes that have been expressed to me with an urgency I do not feel myself at liberty to set aside.
page 4
The Appeal was published, as the date at the end of it shows, in January last. On the 4th of March I fulfilled the promise contained in it (see page 7), and moved for "a Royal Commission to inquire into the condition of the Mercantile Marine of the United Kingdom." In order to give greater completeness to this pamphlet, I have appended the speech I made upon that occasion.
The following passage from the earlier part of my book forms a fit introduction to the portion herein reproduced:—
"On occasion of one of my visits to a port in the north, I was met by a gentleman who knew what my errand there was likely to be, and he said, 'Oh, Mr. Plimsoll, you should have been here yesterday; a vessel went down the river so deeply loaded, that everybody who saw her expects to hear of her being lost. She was loaded under the personal directions of her owner, and the Captain himself said to me, "Isn't it shameful, sir, to send men with families to sea in a vessel loaded like that?" Poor fellow, it is much if ever he reaches port.'
"Mr. C——B——k said, as he saw her, 'That ship will never reach her destination.'
"Mr. J——B——said, 'She did not look to be more than 12 or 14 inches out of the water.'
"Mr. J——H——, a policeman, said to his colleague, 'Dear me! how deep she is!'
"Mr. W——B——said to a friend standing by his side, 'Dear me! this vessel appears very deep in the water.'
"Mr. J——S——said, 'It strikes me she is dangerously deep.'
"The Captain called on his friend, M. J——H——, who said he (the Captain) was greatly depressed in spirits. He told him (Mr. H——), 'that he' (the Captain) 'had measured her side loaded, and she was only 20 inches out of the water.' He also asked his friend to look after his (the Captain's) wife. Mr. H——gave him some rockets in case of the worst, and then they shook hands and parted.
"J——N——and——C——, two workmen, said to each other, 'that they would not go in that ship if the owner would give them the ship.' And J——L——, another workman, said 'he'd rather go to prison than go in that ship;' and lastly, two of the wives of two of the sailors at least begged the owner 'not to send the vessel to sea so deep.'
"She was sent. The men were some of them threatened, and one at least had a promise of 10s. extra per month wages to induce him to go. As she steamed away, the police boat left her; the police had been aboard to overawe the men into going. As the police boat left her side, two of the men, deciding at the last moment that they would rather be taken to prison, hailed the police, and begged to be taken by them. The police said 'they could not interfere,' and the ship sailed. My friend was in great anxiety, and told me that if it came on to blow, the ship could not live.
"It did blow a good half gale all the day after, Sunday—the ship sailed on Friday. I was looking seaward from the promontory on which the ruins of T——Castle stand, with a heavy heart. The wind was not above force 7
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—nothing to hurt a well-found properly loaded vessel. I had often been out in much worse weather, but then this vessel was not properly loaded (and her owner stood to gain over £2,000 clear if she went down, by over-insurance), and I knew that there were many others almost as unfit as she was to encounter rough weather—ships so rotten that if they struck they would go to pieces at once, ships so overloaded that the sea would make a clean sweep over them, sending tons and tons of water into the hold every time, until the end came.
"On Monday, we heard of a ship in distress having been seen; rockets had been sent up by her; it was feared she was lost. On Tuesday, a name-board of a boat was picked up, and this was all that was ever heard of her."
S. P.
March, 1873.