Megoran’s Musings

Tuesday 8th June 1954 was the last day in service of the paddle steamer Marchioness of Lorne. She had already been displaced the previous summer from her old run between

Whit Monday June 6th 1960 was scheduled to be the Sussex Queen’s second operating day of her first season sailing on the Sussex Coast. Steamer notices had been produced and

Duchess of Devonshire made her first trips of the 1919 season on P & A Campbells’s Cardiff to Weston ferry service on Wednesday 4th June under the command of Capt

On Sunday 3rd June 1973 Waverley was taken out of service in order to undertake a repair to her boiler. She made her first trip of the 1973 season, her

On Sunday 2nd June 1940 Freshwater left Sheerness at 12 noon for Dunkirk under the command of Lt Church RN (Retired). The previous Sunday 26th May 1940 marked the start

On Sunday 1st June 1940 the mass evacuation of troops from the beaches of Dunkirk was well under way. Consideration had been given to using the Humber paddle steamers Tattershall

Tuesday 31st May was the first scheduled day of the season for Cosens’s Monarch in 1960 on which she was timetabled to run the Swanage service leaving Bournemouth Pier at

On Thursday 30th May 1963 Medway Queen was on charter at Herne Bay Pier to take part in filming a sequence for the movie “French Dressing” starring James Booth, Roy

On Monday 29th May 1967 Embassy was tied up at the shipyard of the Van Heyghen Brothers’s scrapyard in Ghent. 1966 had not been a good season for Embassy running

On Saturday 28th May 1966 Queen of the South ex-Jeanie Deans made her first public sailing from Tower Pier to Greenwich, Gravesend, Southend and Herne Bay. Her master was Captain

Monday 27th May was the first day in service of the 1963 season for Maid of the Loch. She made her usual two round trips of the loch from her

Tuesday 26th May 1953 was the second day of her first season for the newly built Maid of the Loch. The previous day she had made her first public passenger

On Saturday 25th May 1963 Waverley, under the command of Capt Hector Connell, took a group of protesters from the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) from Glasgow to Hunters Quay at

On Saturday 24th May 1969 Caledonia ran a “Kirk Cruise” from Gourock to Tarbet on charter to Rutherglen West Parish Church. She had been slipped at Lamonts at Port Glasgow

Thursday 23rd May was the second day of the 1935 season for he General Steam Navigation Company’s paddle steamer Royal Eagle for which she was scheduled for a departure from

On Friday 22nd May 1953 Maid of the Loch was named alongside at Balloch Pier by Lady Watson, wife of one of the senior members of the Railway Executive, before the

Whit Sunday 21st May 1961 was Consul’s second day in service of the 1961 season and the second day running a shuttle between the Pleasure Pier at Weymouth and the

On Monday 20th May 1901 there was a little bit of a kerfuffle in the offing in Weymouth with the focus falling on Cosens’s Albert Victor. Some money was stolen

Having arrived in Torquay from Plymouth the previous day, Princess Elizabeth backed out of Torquay Harbour at 10am on Friday 19th May 1961 for swinging the compass in Torbay and obtaining

Princess Elizabeth left Plymouth, where she had arrived for dry-docking from Dartmouth on Thursday 20th April, at 8.50am on Thursday 18th May 1961 bound for Torquay where she arrived at

On Thursday 17th 1923 P & A Campbell’s Devonia arrived at Brighton having left Bristol at 8am and Cardiff at 9.45am the previous day for the positioning run round Lands

Red Funnel’s second Lorna Doone made her inaugural trip from Bournemouth on Monday 16th May 1949 with a party of distinguished guests entertained to lunch aboard including senior representatives from

On Friday 15th May 1964 both Consul and Princess Elizabeth were undergoing the final preparations for starting their seasons running in competition with each from the Weymouth Pleasure Pier the following day.

At 2pm on the afternoon of Tuesday 14th May 1985 surveyor Mr Ahmed arrived to conduct the final running trials for KC which if they went well would lead to

Lord Elgin made her last crossing on the cargo service between Southampton and Cowes on Wednesday 11th May 1955 and moved under her own steam to the scapyard of Pollock,

Consul was the last of Cosens’s paddle steamers to be returned to service after the Second World War. Indeed given the state of her structure there was some doubt as

On Saturday 11th May 1916 at Holy Trinity Church Weymouth the funeral took pace of Cosens’s master Captain Philip St Barbe Rawle who had lost his life at Newhaven Harbour

On Monday 10th May 1937 P & A Campbell’s Waverley left Cardiff at 8am bound for Newhaven. She was followed at 10.15am by Glen Gower for Brighton. This long positioning run

After her refit at Lamont’s Shipyard at Port Glasgow in March and through to mid April 1964, Jeanie Deans returned to service on Saturday 9th May with a charter to

On Tuesday 8th May 1934 a press cruise was organised to show off the brand new paddle steamers Mercury and Caledonia which had been built for the London, Midland and

On Saturday 11th May 2011 Kingswear Castle ran a Thames Estuary cruise from her base at the Historic Dockyard Chatham. We were away at 11.05 with bacon rolls for sale on

With the arrival of the new purpose built car ferry Carisbrooke Castle for the Southampton to Cowes ferry service in May 1959, Red Funnel withdrew Princess Elizabeth and put her up for