P&O in the 1950s

Towards the end of my studies at Southampton University for Marine radio and radar qualifications in 1956 there was much talk about who we students should approach for a job if and when we passed our exams. The choice was mostly between the three companies which provided radio officers for most of British shipping companies, Marconi, Siemens and International Marine Radio, but, always wanting to be a bit different, I said I wanted to join P & O, which had its own department for radio officers. Some said I would have no chance, others (especially the lecturers) gave dire warnings of all the loads of bull**** for which P & O was famous, although all admitted they had some nice ships. During our year of study the lecturers had sometimes told us of the nicknames seafarers gave to shipping companies. Shaw Savill and Albion was called Slow Starvation and Agony, etc. So, learning of my choice of P & O, one of the lecturers had great fun informing me that P & O stood for Poverty and Ostentation.

Undaunted, however, in due course I applied to P & O and went for an interview. Entering the imposing office of 122 Leadenhall Street, I ogled at all the large models of big white liners, before I was sent up to the mezzanine floor and to the Electronics Department. The people there, led by Commander Dennis Barnes, ex-RN, were very friendly and encouraging but I had to have a medical and an interview with one of the directors.

The medical wasn’t much of a problem, the main requirement being that I should not be colour-blind (important for anyone connected with electrical wiring and their colour-codes), and the surgeon seemed more interested in telling me about his recent escape (carrying a bottle of whisky) from the Empire Windrush, a New Zealand Shipping Company operated troopship which had gone down on fire in the Mediterranean.

The interview was rather strange, however. I was asked if I knew where the Queen was that day and fortunately I had read the newspaper and knew she was in Malta, so that went down quite well. Then he wanted to know what my main interests were and, feeling I knew what was wanted, I enthused about radio and radar and overseas travel, which did not seem to impress as much as I had hoped and I was then asked if I liked sport. At school I had hated all sports but felt I needed to be positive and said I liked cricket, about which, thankfully, I was not asked to expand upon. There were some other questions which I cannot remember and I was sent back to Mr Barnes.

Mr Barnes regretted that there was no vacancy at the moment but that he would write to me when one arose. If I had been more worldly in those far off days I would have taken that as a sympathetic rejection, but in my youthful optimism I felt I had done quite well and left in good spirits.

I joined International Marine Radio, who sent me to the Cunard liner Saxonia as third radio officer, sailing between Liverpool, Montreal and Quebec, and waited for the call to join P & O. I should have been surprised that after only one and a half round trips aboard the Saxonia I received the letter saying P & O had a vacancy and I could join them when possible, but I had been expecting it. I immediately sent a letter of resignation to IMR from Montreal.

At the end of that voyage, I duly returned to Leadenhall Street, where I was sent to join the Empire Fowey in Southampton as fourth radio officer. Being a troopship, the Fowey was not the typical P & O passenger liner that I had been expecting, nor did I expect to be sent straight off to war when the Suez conflict broke. Southampton was full of troopships at the time which were all being refitted to carry as many troops as possible. It would not have taken a very clever spy to see what was going on. However, after that episode and one routine trooping trip to Hong Kong and back via the Cape, and a couple of month’s dock staff on ships in Tilbury, I was finally sent to my first real P & O liner, the Strathmore, built in 1934, about to set off for Australia in April 1957.

I had learned a lot about P & O procedures during my time aboard the Fowey, and there had been a lot to learn, mostly about things that were ‘done’ and things that were ‘not done’ in daily life aboard and when contacting the company. One of the latter was that all letters sent to anyone in Leadenhall Street had to be addressed to ‘The Managing Directors’, even if it was only of interest to the Electronics Department, also that I would have to end the letter with the words “Your obedient servant” before signing it.

Strathmore’s Radio Office was fitted out with Marconi equipment with which I was familiar from college, and the radar was a Marconi Mark IV, which was used rather sparingly as the Captain was afraid of it wearing out if used too much. I suspect he did not trust it since at that time there had been several reports of collisions between ships which were navigating by radar and the press made sensational reports of ‘radar assisted collisions’. On one homeward voyage the Captain’s order was that the radar should not be used any more after we left Marseilles for Tilbury.

During the days before sailing many people from the office came aboard the Strathmore. They were all male and all wore dark pin-stripped suits and bowler hats, whoever they were. I asked about them and I was told that most of them were clerks, but I heard a story about a third officer aboard another ship in Tilbury who was overseeing the loading of mail down a hatch when one of these clerks went up to him and asked how he liked his job. “Wonderful,” replied the third, “gin at 4/6d a bottle, parties all the time and lots of love-starved young girls.” “Nice to hear you enjoy your work,” replied the ‘clerk’, who the third later discovered was Sir William Currie, the Company Chairman.

Then on the day before sailing we received the visit from two of the Directors. I was told this happened before every passenger ship sailing and that I must go to greet them, together with all other officers available, in the foyer at the top of the gangway. I had to wear full uniform, of course, including cap, but this was not unusual as we had to wear it at all times when in public areas aboard. Just before leaving the radio office, the Chief Radio Officer asked me where my gloves were. He was horrified when I said I didn’t have any and quickly found a pair of the essential brown leather ones for me to borrow, hurriedly explaining that I only had to wear the left hand one while holding the other in my gloved left hand so that I could shake their hands with my uncovered right.

We formed a long line of officers as we waited a considerable time in the foyer before the important visitors arrived, wearing their dark pin-striped suits and bowler hats. They smiled at each one of us as they shook all our ungloved hands before heading off to the Captain’s cabin, where I later discovered they enjoyed copious amounts of alcohol before heading off down to the dining saloon for a multi-course lunch. After greeting those to whom we were all obedient servants, we humble officers returned to our duties of getting ready to sail.

Once aboard the Strathmore I found there were lots more things I needed to get used to regarding what was done and what was not done. The Fowey had been an all-male ship, apart from a few Army wives, but passenger ships were obviously very different in this respect. At least half the passengers were female, of course, including many young Australian girls who had been doing their ‘Europe trip’ before settling down and getting married back home. Although the vast majority of officers and crew were male, the few women officers consisted of 4 stenographers, 2 nursing sisters and 2 children’s hostesses, while those among the crew were 4 telephone operators and 2 stewardesses for the few female passengers who objected to having a male cabin steward.

Uniforms onboard had to be strictly adhered to when in public areas. During daytime, normal blues with white shirts and black ties and a cap must be worn when on deck or in any public areas. In the tropics, the same dress applied except that the uniform suit was all white, which kept us rather hot in the Red Sea with no air conditioning. In the evenings blue mess kit, with bum-freezer jackets, black bow ties and either a waistcoat or cummerbund, no cap, unless you had to go to the Captain for any reason, which was virtually never in my case. In the tropics the bum-freezer jacket was white and there was no waistcoat, only a cummerbund. During afternoons, white shorts and shirt and plimsolls could be worn if playing deck games. Officer uniform braiding was never on the sleeves, always on the shoulders (that is, they were epaulettes). The gold braiding had a coloured piece of cloth between or around the braid, the colours showing the department, blue for deck, purple for engine-room, green for radio, white for pursers and red for medical. On a recent P & O cruise I was surprised to see an officer on deck with the same green braiding I had when I was a second radio officer. There were no R/Os onboard, of course, so I asked him what department he was in and he replied the Environmental Department!

The women officers’ uniforms depended on which department they were in. The stenographers wore uniforms similar to the Royal Navy Wrens, the nursing sisters wore outfits similar to what they would have worn had they been in a hospital ashore and the children’s hostesses wore the outfit a nanny in a stately home would have worn. All the women, without exception, hated wearing their uniforms, which looked very dated even in the 1950s.

When in the dining saloon, an officer would always stand when a lady arrived or left the table. This involved a lot of jumping up and down for the junior officers like myself, since we all, male and female, sat together at a long table in the First Class dining saloon and we all arrived and left at different times. The same courtesy was given to female passengers by the more senior officers (seconds and above) who each had a table with passengers, alternating between first and second class dining saloons and between first and second sittings. They were expected to socialise with passengers and were given a generous bar allowance to buy drinks for whichever passengers they wished.

One of the rules set out in the P & O Rule Book, which we were all given, stated that no officer must ever entertain a lady in his cabin after dinner, but it was acceptable before dinner. This rule was taken very seriously by the Captain. I guess he would have been held responsible for any complaints from, say, an irate father among the passengers. I don’t think anyone thought it applied to the female officers though. The rule was often broken, of course, but for deck and radio officers is was a risky business, as we lived dangerously close to the Captain and Staff Captain’s cabins. The pursers and engineers, whose cabins were on passenger cabin decks, could get away with it more easily if their chiefs were the sort who would keep a blind eye.

Among the single passengers there was very little privacy. They shared cabins with others of the same sex, all in bunk-beds even in first class. The first class cabins were one, two or four berth and the tourist class, where most singles lived, were four, six or eight berth. I never heard of any unmarried singles occupying a cabin together, so I think they were not allowed to book one. Sometimes even married couples had to live separately in single sex cabins if there was nothing more suitable available when they booked and this was quite common among the £10 emigrants aboard. Crew cabins were even worse, with up to twelve berths and only one small tin locker each. The only people with single cabins were the officers and very few passengers in first class. Each cabin had a washbasin but all had to use communal toilets/showers, as did officers and crew, the only exceptions being the Captain, Staff Captain and those in the most expensive first class cabins, the best of which was named the Viceroy’s Suite. There were a few bathrooms on first class passenger decks but the bath water was sea water and it was impossible to get a lather and you had to have an additional bucket of clear water to get a lather.

The ship had been built with cabins for only three radio officers and when a 4th R/O was added a new cabin had to be found, so my own 4th R/Os cabin was unique in that it had been one of two pilot cabins behind the chartroom. There were two doors, one to the chartroom and another to the rear of the bridge deck outside. My window looked out onto the port bridge wing. It was the highest cabin on the ship, one deck above the Captain. It was a superb location in many ways but inconvenient and embarrassing when I needed to use the toilet or shower two decks below, either passing through the chartroom or facing the weather outside.

The senior officers had been through the Great Depression and the Second World War and seemed very elderly to we juniors. The Chief Radio Officer always referred to the ship as ‘the steamer’. However, they could only have been in their fifties because they retired at 60. The heads of department delegated most of the work to their staff.

The women officers had to retire at 40, which caused great distress to the few who stayed at sea to that age. It seemed very unfair to send them away from the job they loved having served many years. Among the few female crew, the two stewardesses did seem to carry on long after 40 but I cannot remember seeing any telephone operators looking older than about 30.

Passenger entertainment was very limited compared with modern cruise ships. There was a lounge and a smoking room in both first and tourist class. There was bingo, communal singing, card games, films in a lounge and occasional horse racing on the dance floor, where wooden horses tied to ropes were dragged across the deck by a ‘jockey’ and bets were taken. These activities were conducted by the purser’s department in the evenings. But the main entertainment was ballroom dancing. The ‘orchestra’ of typically five players would play on alternate evenings in the first and tourist class dance spaces. Ballroom would be too fine a word, and in hot weather the port and starboard bulkheads could be opened, allowing extra space on the promenade deck.

Officers were allowed to take part in all these activities but all except the most senior had to be ‘off decks’, that is away from passenger areas, after 10.30 pm. Officers on the 8 to 12 watch missed out on these of course but could partly make up for it in the afternoons because deck games of quoits, deck tennis and table tennis were available. Officers could take part in these and often dominated the deck tennis between 2 and 4.

Occasionally the officers would challenge a group of passengers to a game of deck cricket. This involved using a normal cricket ball and could be quite dangerous. I was once coerced into playing against the Australian Wallabies rugby team and one of their bowlers aimed for my knee while I was batting and I was hobbling around for several days. There was the usual crossing the line ceremony where any officers available at the time made complete fools of themselves. Passengers could visit the bridge at certain times at sea where they enjoyed being photographed ‘steering the ship’ and those who wanted to visit the engine-room or galley could do so by appointment.

Most passengers only travelled by ship because flying would have cost them twice as much in those days, and they were often bored after the first week of the four week voyage, especially the younger ones, but this was relieved a little by occasional special nights. Once during the voyage there would be a fancy dress ball or a mad-hatters ball where the Captain had to judge the winners. There was nearly always a group of passengers who would pass the time arranging a variety show, which used up many hours doing rehearsals and one evening for the show itself. Then there would be the crew variety show in the crew mess, which was rather lewd for those days, but a censored version would be given to the passengers and this was very popular, the high point being the tourist class head waiter dressed in drag and singing “Why am I always the bridesmaid?” Another big event for a select few of the young ladies on board was the officers wardroom dance to music from a record player, by invitation only, which was fine for those invited but caused much envy and resentment for those not invited.

Every day at sea the ship’s noon position and miles run between noon positions would be given out over the P.A. system. During the morning many passengers had placed bets on the day’s mileage, having been told the Captain’s estimate.

Every Sunday morning the Captain would conduct the Sunday service, which was one of the requirements of his job, although he did not have to preach a sermon. It was the only occasion when tourist class passengers were allowed to go into a first class area. All officers were encouraged to attend, although I did not do so usually since I was not a Christian in those days. A couple of officers were chosen to read the lessons. The hymns were mostly of the ‘look after us’ variety such as “Those in peril on the sea”, “From Greenland’s icy mountains to Ceylon’s coral shore”, “Lead us Heavenly Father lead us o’er the world’s tempestuous sea”, etc. After the service the Captain would invite the senior officers attending and the lesson readers to his cabin for pre-luncheon drinks. They called this ‘thirsting after righteousness’.

Drinking by officers before lunch and dinner and during and after dinner was accepted and even encouraged as an essential social ability when mixing with passengers. Of course, with gin at 4/6d a bottle, it went on as well with officers among themselves without any thought of entertaining passengers. The usual tipple was gin and tonic, although the Captain and older senior officers regarded tonic as an extravagance and would only provide pink gins. Junior officers always had their own pre-dinner party in one of their cabins. Such cabins were small but up to thirty would cram in every evening, not all at the same time as some were on first and others on second sittings, and spreading out into the alleyway if necessary. It became usual to drink cheap champagne laced with brandy on these occasions. The scheme was very economical, however, since one only had to be host once a voyage. Nowadays it would be called binge drinking, but in those days people were expected to learn to ‘hold their drink’ and it was expected, naturally, that no-one became too drunk to do their job but this did happen from time to time, when someone else had to take over and cover up for them. Such camaraderie was taken for granted as long as it did not happen too often. Bar bills were totted up using the chit system, you signed for whatever you bought and your bill was deducted from your signing off statement at the end of the voyage. Some officers actually ended their voyage having to pay the company money.

The crew were mostly Indian, Pakistani or Goanese and did not drink for religious reasons, but many of the stewards were British and they were also allowed to drink. I never heard much about them over-indulging except on one occasion aboard the Himalaya when we were in the middle of the Indian Ocean between Colombo and Fremantle. We had had a boat drill in the morning and around midnight a steward, who had obviously had a few, ran up to the bridge shouting, “man overboard”. He had to be taken seriously. The whistle blew, the bells rang, the Captain went to the bridge and the motor lifeboat was fired up. The Captain did the Williamson turn and we headed back, with hardly any hope of finding anyone in the blackness a thousand miles from land. Miraculously, however, a man was spotted swimming, the lifeboat went out, picked him (another steward) up and brought him back onboard, apparently no worse for his experience. There were no celebrations, however, since when picked out of the sea he was found to be wearing a life jacket. Two stewards had got drunk and decided to test the ship’s emergency system, one jumping over the side while the other raised the alarm. It was all hushed up. Later the father of the one who had jumped sent a telegram thanking the Captain and ship’s company for saving his son without ever knowing the full circumstances.

Smoking was also almost universal. I soon got to like my tipple but I never smoked and I hated the smoke-filled rooms and seeing people stamping their dog-ends into carpets or on dance floors. I seem to remember cigarettes costing about two shillings for 200.

The P & O company was extremely tolerant when dealing with officers who had behaved badly or were eccentric or drank too heavily or all three. In fact such people seemed to become accepted as ‘characters’, even becoming more easily remembered by head office than others who just did an excellent job but were boring. Promotion was largely a case of ‘Buggins’ turn’, you were usually promoted when your turn came around, but becoming known by head office seemed to help advance this somewhat and these characters certainly did not lose out unless they disgraced themselves in some grossly inexcusable way among passengers. One engineer, when introduced to any lady, had a habit of saying, “Hello, didn’t recognise you with your clothes on”. He was continually being ordered to refrain from doing it but he seemed unable to stop himself and was finally sent off to a cargo ship.

A head surgeon, another character who always wore a monocle and liked his gin, once treated me for a stomach problem, giving me codeine. I became very drowsy and when the junior surgeon visited me he was horrified that I had been prescribed four codeines every two hours instead of two codeines every four hours.

Captains could also be characters. Our Captain, on one outward voyage, once took the ship between the island of Ushant and the French mainland during darkness, to the consternation of all the other deck officers. It was a quite unnecessary hazard for the ship but he liked to show what he could do. The same Captain lived in Australia and between Melbourne and Sydney the ship always passed very close to the shore where his house was and our ship’s foghorn would blow several times while his wife ran out of the house to wave to us.

The only air-conditioning aboard P & O ships in those days was in the two dining saloons. Cabins with a round porthole had a gadget like a bottomless coal scuttle which attached to the open porthole and caught fresh air from the ship’s forward movement but it only worked when the ship was travelling at some speed (the Strathmore could do over 20 knots) but even then it did not help very much. Then there was the punkah system. In every cabin you could open a vent and air at outside temperature would blow in but again this only worked if the outside temperature was low anyway and sometimes soot from the ship’s funnel would also come in. In really hot areas like the Red Sea passengers would often sleep out on deck at night. There was no more privacy for them, however, since there were too many people doing it.

The ships then had no stabilisers and the Strathmore could roll really badly at times. On my first voyage she rolled alarmingly all the way from Durban to Fremantle (Suez was closed for a while after the war) but everyone got used to it in time.

Security aboard was very lax compared with today, the only concern being that someone might try to stay onboard for a voyage without paying. The public address system, on which every announcement began with the words, “May I have your attention please” was used to urge visitors to leave the ship as it was about to sail, and this was always given three times. After sailing, a stowaway search would be made throughout the ship and offenders were sent back to where they came from and prosecuted. It was not too unusual to find the odd stowaway but one man in particular made a career of it. He was of mixed race appearance and no-one knew who he actually was as he used a different alias every time, but he was known throughout the fleet as ‘Speedy Gonzales’.

After the Suez Canal was re-opened, the round voyage left Tilbury for Suez, Aden, Colombo, Fremantle, Melbourne and Sydney, before returning via the same ports, but sometimes calls would be made at Lisbon, Marseilles (for French passengers and those who wanted to avoid the Bay of Biscay), Malta, Navarino Bay (for Greek passengers), Bombay and Adelaide. The ship spent two days in Melbourne each way and five days in Sydney as there were cargo and mails to deal with. The Sydney Dance was always very popular, where the officers could invite their friends from shore to visit the ship, have a good meal and enjoy dancing until the small hours. Occasionally the ship would do the odd summer cruise in the Med, but that did not happen while I was aboard.

After a year aboard the Strathmore and some leave I was sent to the Himalaya, of 1949, which was bigger and faster, but since the Strathmore had been fully reconditioned after wartime service there was not much difference in the equipment or the amenities or the life aboard. The Himalaya, however, extended the voyages from Sydney to New Zealand, Fiji, Honolulu, Vancouver, San Francisco and Los Angeles, before returning home via the same route, so the complete voyages were much longer.

During this time, we were joined by the P & O’s very first Social Hostess, whose job was to jolly up the bored passengers in both first and tourist classes. Entertainment was much the same as before, but she turned ‘community singing in the lounge’ into ‘songs round the camp fire on the boat deck’, and so on. She made more evening dances theme nights, where passengers could wear different clothes, like Tropical Night, Mountain Night and suchlike. She was the forerunner of the huge entertainment departments we now see aboard P & O cruise ships.

I left the P & O in 1959 when I emigrated to New Zealand but I returned to the UK in 1961 and was fortunate enough to be accepted back by the Company. My first ship on my return was the Canberra on her maiden voyage and I was 4th radio officer (there were 8 altogether, Chief, First and 2 each of seconds, thirds and fourths). I had never heard of this new superliner until a fortnight before we sailed.

There had been some changes in my absence. There was a new Chairman, Sir Donald Anderson, and I no longer had to address my letters to the Managing Directors or to sign off as their obedient servant. Stenographers were now Women Assistant Pursers and there were now two social hostesses. Announcements now began with the words, “This is the Captain speaking” instead of “May I have your attention please”. There was air-conditioning throughout the ship, stabilisers and the ship even had a bow propeller. The bar prices had doubled, because American passengers had complained that whisky at ten cents a tot must be inferior, and doubling the prices seemed to make them happy. The dining saloons were now called restaurants and sometimes there was also choice of a cold buffet lunch on deck in warm weather. We spent less time in ports, since no cargo was carried. The Captain gave cocktail parties to all passengers a few days after they first embarked and all officers were expected to attend if not on watch and they were also expected to circulate and not latch on to the young ladies all the time, another rule often broken.

The Strathmore had been reduced to a tourist class only ship but the Canberra was two class at that time. The radio equipment was much more modern and the radio officers were also responsible for a cinema, black and white TV in all public rooms and some first class cabins, and a closed circuit TV system to send films out when there was no TV available from shore. A Tannoy PA system included sending taped music and radio to every cabin, available at the turn of a switch. There were two Kelvin Hughes radars, one of which was the prototype Photoplot.

I have been on P & O cruises recently but they are not recognisable as anything I knew when I was an obedient servant. The ships are American owned and officers alternate between Cunard and P & O. Many of the officers are women in all departments, even a woman Captain. The officers do not congregate with passengers much. They are allowed to but nearly all passengers are pensioners and the only people of their own age are among the other officers and the crew, probably equally male and female, among whom there is a mixture of races and some of them are still Indian. They are allowed to drink but can be breathalysed at any time without warning. The officers, including the Captain, wear very casual dress (open neck shirts, for goodness’ sake!) except at the Captain’s party.

Passengers can meet the officers at a party if they pay £75. They can also visit the bridge, engine room and galley if they pay £75 per person per visit. They take security and safety much more seriously than they used to and I’m sure they are much safer these days.

Captain and officers are all regularly scrutinised and re-educated to ensure they are still up to standard and promotion is by merit only, no more Buggins’ turn. There is a vast number of entertainment staff, around 75. There are still traditional restaurants but many people use the buffets for most meals. Bar prices are astronomical, much higher than our supermarkets. Bets on the ship’s daily run are no longer possible because everyone has their own sat nav.

If I were a young man I would not like to work onboard a P & O ship these days in any capacity. The officers and crew work even longer hours than we did and seem to be under continual pressure to excel. Despite all the bull**** and lack of comforts, for the officers at least, Poverty and Ostentation was much more fun