Abstract
This essay addresses the engine room staffing of power-driven merchant ships from c. 1850 to the end of the twentieth century, both engineer officers and engine/boiler room ratings. Constituting a new department aboard ships when the industrial revolution took hold afloat, the personnel needed comprised the most significant addition to ships’ companies in centuries. To set a context for the staffing discussion, the first section offers an overview of the advances in ship propulsion technology over a century and a half. A second section addresses the provision of the senior staff in charge roles in ships’ engine and boiler rooms, their training and licensing, employment, remuneration, living conditions and changing status as marine engineers moved from casual employment to professional engineer status. The third section turns to the boiler room labourers, the unskilled coal trimmers and the narrowly skilled firemen who tended the boilers, who would disappear with the dominance of oil fuel after World War II. The future pointed to completely unmanned engine rooms.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Allington, Peter and Basil Greenhill, The First Atlantic Liners: Seamanship in the Age of the Paddle Wheel, Sail and Screw (London: Conway Maritime Press, 1997).
Course, A. G., The Merchant Navy: A Social History (London: Muller, 1963).
Gardiner, Robert, ed., The Shipping Revolution: The Modern Merchant Ship (London: Conway Maritime Press, 1992).
Gardiner, Robert, ed., The Advent of Steam: The Merchant Steamship Before 1900 (London: Conway Maritime Press, 1993).
Gardiner, Robert, ed., The Golden Age of Shipping: The Classic Merchant Ship, 1900–1960 (London: Conway Maritime Press, 1994).
Griffiths, Dennis, Steam at Sea: Two Centuries of Steam-Powered Ships (London: Conway Maritime Press, 1997).
Hope, Ronald, A New History of British Shipping (London: Murray, 1990).
Kennerley, Alston, ‘The Seamen’s Union, the National Maritime Board and Firemen: Labour Management in the British Mercantile Marine’, The Northern Mariner/Le Marin du Nord 7 no. 4 (1997), 15–28.
Kennerley, Alston, The Making of the University of Plymouth (Plymouth: University of Plymouth, 2000).
Kennerley, Alston, ‘Engineers in British Merchant Ships, 1850–1970: Origins and Careers’, Journal of Marine Design and Operations no. B10 (2006), 3–13.
Kennerley, Alston, ‘An Exercise in Social Conditioning? The Joint Education and Training of Engineer and Navigator Cadets for Careers as Officers in British Merchant Ships’, The Northern Mariner/Le Marin du Nord 16 no. 4 (2006), 49–67.
Kennerley, Alston, ‘British Merchant Marine Engineer Licensing, 1865–1925’, in Maritime Labour: Contributions to the History of Work at Sea, 1500–2000, ed. by Richard Gorski (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2007), 185–217.
Kennerley, Alston, ‘Stoking the Boilers: Firemen and Trimmers in British Merchant Ships, 1850–1950’, International Journal of Maritime History 20(2008), 191–220.
Lane, Tony, ‘Masters and Chiefs: Enabling Globalization, 1975–1995’, in Maritime Labour: Contributions to the History of Work at Sea, 1500–2000, ed. by Richard Gorski (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2007), 235–59.
McFee, William, Letters from an Ocean Tramp (London: Cassell, 1908).
Milburn, R.G., ‘The Emergence of the Engineer in the British Merchant Shipping Industry, 1812–1863’, International Journal of Maritime History 28(2016), 559–75.
Mould, Daphne D. C. Pochin, Captain Roberts of the Sirius (Cork, Ireland: Sirius Commemoration Committee, 1988).
Norris, A., ‘First Steps Towards MASS’, Seaways: International Journal of the Nautical Institute (August 2021), 6–7.
Sothern, J. W. M., How to Keep a Watch. Verbal Notes and Sketches for Marine Engineers; A Manual of Marine Engineering Practice (Glasgow: Munro, 1916).
Thorn, W. H. & Son, Reed’s Engineer’s Hand Book to the Board of Trade Examinations (Sunderland: Thomas Reed, 20th Edition, ca 1900).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2023 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Kennerley, A. (2023). The Human Element in Power-Driven Merchant Ship Propulsion Since 1850: The British Case. In: Davids, K., Schokkenbroek, J. (eds) The Transformation of Maritime Professions. Palgrave Studies in Economic History. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-27212-7_2
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-27212-7_2
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-031-27211-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-031-27212-7
eBook Packages: Economics and FinanceEconomics and Finance (R0)