With a bit of luck and fine weather just about anything will float and even make some passage at sea but wooden boats have the greatest heritage and they come in all shapes and sizes. In February 2008 I was on the Seven Seas Voyager, sailing from Auckland to Sydney, when, unbelievably, two young lads made international news by kayaking their way in the opposite direction, from Sydney to Auckland. The sea is mysterious and abounds in folklore including many superstitions, ghost stories, songs and poems. I even have one in my own family history that tells how my great, great, great and even greater grandfather was in a small craft when Ireland was discovered, around the year 1171. He was in a wooden boat headed for Ireland when ‘King Billy’ declared: “the first man to place his hand on land will own all the pig farms in Ireland”. My great, great, great, and greater grandfather immediately chopped off his left hand, and with his right hand flung it onto the shore. That’s how the Fahey clan came to own all the pig farms in Ireland.

Old time shipbuilding was an honoured traditional craft – usually passed down father to son and nearly every part of the old wooden ships – plank, beam and construction had a name: keel, keelson, stern, horn timber, garboard, devil boards, batter boards, etc. Even the earlier Egyptian ships were made of papyrus made from wood. Wood was the shipbuilder’s favourite – Even Genesis goes into considerable detail to tell us that Noah’s Ark was made of many cords of cedar (most probably from Lebanon).

Most wood is tough, resistant to water, naturally light and can be curved. Some woods carry ‘baggage’. For example, black walnut is unlucky and said to attract lightning and, if you work with it, its bark will stain your hands permanently. Old shipbuilders swore it was associated with the devil. Not the sort of wood you want when you’re in the middle of nowhere floating on the ocean.

Being an island continent has always shaped how Australia developed. Even our indigenous people came down by sea from the north and ever since that extraordinarily skilled navigator, Captain James Cook, mapped our coastlines and plonked down the Union Jack for the British Empire, the sea has been a vital part of our nation and identity. All the more strange considering that for all of the nineteenth century the majority of Australians lived away from the coast, in the bush.

Ever since the arrival of the eleven ships of the First Fleet the sea has played a part in our continuing history: ships transported near 185,000 hapless souls to serve time in the coastal penal settlements, they brought optimistic free settlers and later, even more optimistic gold seekers, then came the waves of immigrants as the giant sail and steam ships returned with our famed wool, beef, timber and wheat. Whalers, and seal hunters worked our coast and fishing fleets trawled the sea’s rich harvest. Our once mighty rivers continued our maritime story as they sailed up and down from ports as far as Bourke down to the coast. Ships transported our soldiers to and from wars in New Zealand, South Africa, Europe, the Pacific and Asia. Our seaports grew from wooden wharf structures to vast computerised docklands and with them more stories, superstitions, songs and associated folklore. Today’s ports are as busy as ever and the story continues.

Some examples and stories from our maritime history.

Butcher Boats.
So called butcher boats were a common sight in Sydney Harbour from 1840s onwards. These were essentially supply boats that went to sea (often as far as Wollongong) to secure ship’s provisions orders. They were generally constructed of cedar and made to order by leading Sydney boat builders. They were impressive craft, sometimes up to thirty feet in length with a three foot six inch beam and all highly varnished. Part of their tradition was to be ‘named’ and they carried signage declaring themselves – Sea Rover, King of the Sea, Jack Tar etc. so they could be easily recognized by their ‘customers’. Most boats were light enough to be lifted by two men and were graceful and fast. To enable speed the first planks were carvel built with the planks flush while the other boats were clinker built or overlapping. The supply of provisions was a competitive business and a case of ‘first in best dressed’; as a result many of the colony’s leading scullers were employed to man the butcher boats.

Superstitions.

For sailors, it was lucky:
To smash a bottle against the boat just before sailing
For sailors to have tattoos
To throw an old pair of shoes overboard just after launch
To have a black cat on board
For a child to be born on the ship
For sailors to wear gold hoop earrings
For touch the collar of a sailor
For step aboard using the right foot first

For sailors, it was unlucky:
To name the boat with a word ending in "a"
To have the bottle not break when used in the launch ceremony
To change the name of a boat
To sail on a green boat
To sail on a Friday
To see rats leaving a ship
To have someone die on the ship
To whistle on board a ship
To cross an area where another ship once sunk
To lose a bucket at sea

Other sailing superstitions:
Women and clergymen as passengers bring bad luck.

If you meet someone with red hair, a clergyman, or someone with cross-eyes
on the way to the harbour, you are encouraged not to set sail.

Bananas are bad news. (for obvious reasons)

A bell ringing by its self on the ship is a death omen for one of the crew.

The word drown can never be spoken at sea or it may summon up the actual event.

A ship without its figurehead will not sink.

Horseshoes on a ship's mast help turn away storms.

A ship carrying a dead body will sail slower.

Whistling, cutting nails and trimming beards at sea will cause storms.

Weather Superstitions – refer to the maritime sub index for some more examples of maritime weather lore. There is also a collection in the section ‘calendar lore’.

Squalls – bad weather ahead for sail-driven ships.

Fire (phosphorous) on the water is a warning – usually a bad omen.

Sometimes a greenish line follows in the wake – prepare for a heavy blow.

Maritime Sayings

Rainbow in the morning
Sailors take warning
Rainbow at night
Sailors delight

Sea Songs and Shanties

Sea songs fall into two main groups – work shanties and fo’c’sle songs for idle times. There are, of course, thousands of songs and melodies written about life at sea and especially of the romantic attachment many feel towards the sea and the seafaring life. Songs have been written about mighty ships, major shipwrecks and the role of shipping in every century since we set sail.

Some sort of rhythmic beat to coordinate man-powered rowing no doubt dates back to the very earliest days and Hollywood’s interpretation (think 1940s and 50s films like The Bible, Ben Hur, Spartacus etc) of drum-beating to accompany Egyptian slaves rowing along the Nile probably is close to the truth. When ships took on complicated sails and rigging coordination became a vital part of sailing and shanties were developed to make these jobs more effective.

There are several different types of shanties depending on the work they accompany. Long and short haul shanties are used for pulling ropes, turning the capstan and other ship jobs and an intelligent listen will reveal particular rhythms that allow hard pulls, jerks and continuous pulls to make the ropes do their work.

The Mid-1850s were the heydays of shanties because of the sheer number of square-rigged vessels that ploughed the world’s oceans. The England to Australia run was one of the world’s busiest and, because of the distance, demanded solid, reliable ships and capable sailors to man them.

In November of 2007 I located a rare manuscript collection of over 60 sea songs and shanties used on the Australian trade run. They were taken down (including the music) in 1924 from an ex sealer on Cape de Coudie, Kangaroo Island, South Australia. – see Clive Carey Collection in left menu.

Work songs are usually open versed – each line can virtually stand on its own: for example the shanty man would sing out:
Whiskey is the life of man
And the team would respond with:
Whiskey Johnny
Shantyman:
Whiskey is the life of man
Crew:
And it’s whiskey for me, Johnny-o

Another example:
Shantyman:
In south Australia I was born
Crew:
Heave away, haul away
Shantyman:
In South Australia I was born
Crew:
Heave away your rolling chain
We’re bound for South Australia

Another example:
Shantyman:
Were you ever in Quebec?
Crew:
Bonnie Laddie, Highland laddie
Shantyman:
Stowing timber on the deck
Crew:
My bonnie highland Laddie-o

Often the shanty would have instructions shouted out at the same time, such as:
Watch that rope! Harder on the lee!

Short haul was usually quicker than the long haul shanty as the line is shorter/

An example of a short haul would be:

Shantyman:
Up aloft this yard must go
Crew:
You say so – I say so

Songs allowed a definite solidarity amongst crew members and because the use of shantying was international it meant new crew members could readily fit into the work mode. It should be remembered that sailing was far from a safe trade and many men were swept overboard and killed by negligence. The shanties also provided an opportunity to sometimes get back at the ship’s officers and owners, as their names were included in the shanties, including some very bawdy references.

Origin of Shanties

The common belief is that shantying came to us from American Negroes working the cotton trade on wharves along the Mississippi, New Orleans. Others say the tradition originated in the West Indies.