Graythorp Yard - a general history

Snippets of information about the Graythorp Yard drawn from a wide range of personal and documentary sources and is updated as and when new material is received:

Derek Hinds remembers his father, Harry Hinds, working at Graythorp as a charge-hand turner in the fitting shop - " I used to visit occasionally when he was ‘grabbing’ on a Sunday shift. The fitting shop was the last building on the quayside and consisted of the usual lathes, boring machines and millers which were needed to facilitate ship repairs. My father was second in command of the shop working under the foreman Jack Bell. There were obviously other charge-hands but they were all fitters working on the ships looking after the repairs."

"The drydock was known as the No.2 dock as it was planned to construct another dock more than twice the size of the original. Down in the pump room the pipes and valves for the unbuilt dock were in place even to the extent of the labelling of the valves etc. I always thought that strange that the dock built was named the No.2 dock, should it have been called the No.1? I had also witnessed several ships being put into the dry dock, watching them being lined up, then as the water was pumped out the side chocks being put in to keep the ship in the upwards position."

The following article appeared in an issue of the Tees Packet, the journal of the Teesside Branch of the Worlld Ship Society:

GRAYTHORP SHIPYARD – A SHORT HISTORY 

By John H. Proud

William Gray & Co. Ltd.
As a young boy in the 1930’s I attended Seaton Carew Church of England School. This school was on the south side of the village, then with a clear view to the south. About 1½ miles distant was a ship-repair yard where up to three ships could be seen in the dry-dock and alongside the fitting out quay. I remember some wag claiming that his eyesight was so good that he could see the City of London from the school playground, to the disbelief of those around him. In a sense he was right because he was referring to the Ellerman vessel CITY OF LONDON (8,956grt/1907) which was at the yard for repair. My over 70 years acquaintance with the yard and the fact that no previous history seems to have been written, together with its current topicality gives me every excuse for writing this story.

(CITY OF LONDON – Built by Workman Clark, Belfast. Yard No.236.  B/U:- Dalmuir 6/1946)

The yard that we had all seen was the Tees Dockyard of Sir William Gray & Co. Ltd. (W.G.) whose main establishment for shipbuilding and ship-repairing was long established within the dock’s complex at Hartlepool and West Hartlepool, together with their Central Marine Engine Works. The size of ships that could be built at the Hartlepools was limited by the lock entrances to the docks so, by the early 20^th Century, the company were looking for a site where the building and repairing of larger ships could take place.

On the north bank of the River Tees, about one and a quarter miles from the mouth there was a tidal tributary named Greatham Creek (later Seaton Channel) where the Tees Conservancy Commission (T.C.C.) had a compass adjusting station and had been for some time reclaiming land behind a slag wall. By 1913 W.G. had decided to purchase an area of about 80 acres adjacent to the north side of the creek. The T.C.C. went so far as to order a new bucket dredger, T.C.C.DREDGER No.9, and six barges T.C.C. 14 – 19. These were all at work by December 1914. A railway line, the Seaton-on-Tees branch of the North Eastern Railway, already existed adjacent to the site to connect with the nearby Zinc and Acid Works, which had been operating since about 1905. This meant that a short branch from the existing branch could easily connect the new site to the railway system. By an Act of 1912 the T.C.C. were empowered to build a new road from Port Clarence to Seaton Carew which would pass close by the west of the site. Work progresses slowly and completion was not until 1918 with the help of German prisoners of war.

(T.C.C. DREDGER No.9 – Bucket Ladder Dredger built in 1914 by William Simons & Co. Ltd., Renfrew.

Yard No.557. Length:- 165 ft; Breadth:- 34 ft; Depth:- 12 ft.  B/U:- 8/1965, in Belgium).

The plan was to build a graving dock (506 ft long x 65 ft entrance, with 25 ft over the sill at high water) with provision for a second (630 ft long), a fitting out quay (1,200 ft long with 31 ft depth at high water), four shipbuilding berths, together with all necessary ancillary equipment and workshops. W.G. had hopes that all of their shipbuilding and ship repairing activities would be moved to Graythorp, where vessel size would not be restricted. The appointed Civil Engineering contractor was Holloway Brothers of London and the dredging and reclamation work was carried out by K.L. Kalis Wzoon & Co. of Sliedrecht. The dock gates were built and fitted by W.G. Due to wartime restrictions, and some very high tides, which caused flooding to the works, progress was slow. Then, when completed, the post-war depressed state of the shipbuilding and ship-repairing market caused further delay to the opening.

(D. H. adds – I have memories of going into the dry-dock pump-house in the 1950’s and noting that the valves for the dry-dock in use were labelled ‘No.2 Dock’, where other valves, which were blanked off, were labelled for ‘No.1 Dock’. Some excavation work could be seen that had been started on the No.1 dry-dock, but had been abandoned. At the slipway sight, alongside what is now the Power Station, the completed foundations were in place for the slipways, which had the fixings in place for the side staging to be erected on. )

The yard eventually opened in 1924. To the west of the Port Clarence/Seaton Carew road a new village was built, presumably to house the yard’s workers. This was appropriately named Graythorp and at that time was within the jurisdiction of Durham County Council. The village was intended to be built on the lines of a modern garden city with not more than twelve houses/acre and if possible only ten in blocks of four or six. 800 houses were intended to be built but only 80 were erected to begin with. The Wesr Hartlepool builders employed by W.G. were E.M. Tweddle and W.W. Brazell. Although some work was odne on excavating the are for the second drydock this was left in its unfinished state until, as will be seen, the 1970’s. Both the dry-dock and the fitting-out quay were served by a single 15 ton electric travelling crane. The groundwork for the four building berths was carried out but no other equipment was provided at the time. The first ships to use the dry-dock and the fitting-out quay were respectively the Ellerman vessels SERBINO  (4,080grt/1919) and  MELFORD HALL(5,669grt/1920).

(SERBINO – Comp:- 5/1919.  Built:- Ramage & Furguson, Leith. Yard No:-244. 

History:- Sm/T (U-82), 51.10N/19.20W  21/10/1944. Voy:- Mombassa – Liverpool, Sisal & General.)

(MELFORD HALL – Comp:- 9/1920.  Built:- Barclay, Curle & Co. Whiteinch.  Yard No.581. 

History:- Re named:- 1929 – CITY OF JOHANNESBURG.  Sm/t (U-504), 33.20.S/29.30E  23/10/1942.

Voy:- Calcutta – U.K., Pig Iron & General.) 

Because of the dearth of shipbuilding orders in the 1930’s the Government organisation National Shipbuilders Security Ltd. was buying up and closing a great many yards throughout the country. They could not close the shipbuilding part of the Graythorp yard because it had never opened, but they did, in 1936/7, apply a restrictive covenant against shipbuilding taking place there. It is nevertheless, strange that the shipbuilding yard was not completed and put to use in W.W.2 when there was such a  great demand for new ships.

Repair work continued between the wars with varying degrees of profitability. Like all yards the depression of the early 1930’s would have had its effect on the amount of work available. Typical of the vessels using the yard were those owned by the Ellerman, British India, Livanos, Reardon Smith, Ropner and Strick lines. These companies had, of course, had vessels built by W.G. at Hartlepool over many years. It was common to see the Indian Lascars who crewed some of these ships walking through Seaton Carew, particularly in the summer. They always walked in single file about ten paces apart and never appeared to speak to each other. Dredging of Greatham Creek, from its junction with the River Tees to the yard, was carried out by the T.C.C. craft at frequent intervals. Buoyage and navigation lights were attended to by them also. Tees pilots who lived at Seaton Carew were ferried across the river to and from the Pilot Station on the North Gare breakwater by Mr Robson of Seaton Carew, who owned a coble which he kept at the dockyard when not engaged in local fishing.

During WW2 the yard suffered only slightly from enemy bombing when on 5^th June 1942 slight damage was caused to the roof of the joiners ship by four high-explosive bombs. Not so the village of Graythorp, which received bombs which caused damage on three occasions. The most serious was on the night of 7/8 April 1941 when two high-explosive bombs seriously inured seventeen people and damaged the school, co-op shop and the Mission Church. In total 34 houses were seriously damaged and 40 less so in what was a very small village. The whole population had to be evacuated for a while because of a suspected unexploded bomb. Incendiaries and other H.E. bombs were also reported nearby on a number of occasions.

From late 1943 to August 1944, the dry-dock was not available for ship repair. This was because it had been requisitioned by the Admiralty for the building of two ‘Phoenix’ concrete caissons for the artificial Mulberry Harbour off the Normandy coast at Arromanches. These were 203’ 6’’ long x 44’ 0’’ beam x 14’ 0’’ draft. They were not ready until after the harbour had been built in June because they were intended for winter reinforcement of the breakwater. At the time it was a close kept secret as to what these units were for. Building reinforced concrete structures in a dry-dock was something unusal – it might have been a first for Graythorp but not its last.

Ship repairing continued apace during WW2. One notable job, which the present writer clearly remembers, was the work carried out on the EMPIRE TRISTRAM (7,167grt/1942). She had been hit by a V1 Flying Bomb in the Surrey Commercial Docks, London in June 1944 with the result that all of the steelwork above the main deck was a total shambles of twisted metal. She sailed to trade again and lasted until being broken up in 1967.

(EMPIRE TRISTRAM – Comp:- 7/1942 by J.L. Thompson, North Sands, Sunderlan, Yard No.617. 

Renamed:- 1946 – HOLLYPARK; 1955 – GOGOVALE; 1957 – AVISVALE; 1961 – ST. NICOLAS.

B/U:-:- 28/1/1967 at Split.) 

After WW2 repair work continued as before. Some unusual jobs also took place. In 1951 the two parts of ATLANTIC DUCHESS (8,631grt/1950), which had been split apart by an explosion whilst discharging petroleum at Swansea, were joined together in the dry-dock with a new centre section. She had originally been built by W.G. at Hartlepool for the Livanos Group. In 1962 the forepart of a 1940’s vessel, TITANIAN, and the after part of WINDWARD PASSAGE were joined to form a new vessel named FABIAN {9,000grt/1962). Ship repair work was not without its dangers. A boiler explosion in the Norwegian HERANGER (10,524grt/1950) which was being converted from a tanker to a bulk carrier at the fitting-out quay on 21^st February 1962, caused the deaths of three men and injured twenty-seven others.

(ATLANTIC DUCHESS – Comp:- 14/11/1950 by W.G. at Hartlepool. Yard No.1237. 

Renamed:- 1961 – MOLAT; 1968 – MA 9; 1972 – SP 3. Hulked in Yugoslavia in 1968. 

B/U:- 4/1975 at Split.)    (For more, see ‘Big Bang’ in ‘T.P.’ No.181 – Feb. 2010.) 

(TITANIAN – Comp:- 10/1930 by Swan Hunter & W.R, Low Walker, Tyneside.  Yard No.1384.

ex names:- MORGENEN; 1951 – ESPERANCE. Engine sect. B/U:- 24/11/1961 at Burght.) 

(WINDWARD PASSAGE – Comp:- 7/1945 by Gotaverken, Gothenburg, Sweden. Yard No.551, as RAILA.)

(FABIAN – Renamed 1968 – FABIA.  B/U:- 8/1968 at Shanghai.)

(For more on the above see ‘Two into One’ in ‘T.P’. No.182 – May 2010)

(HERANGER – Comp:- 2/1950 by Kockums MV, Malmo, Sweden. Yard No.321. as H.WESTFAL LARSEN.

Re named:- 1965 – CAPE DALEMOS; 1969 – DALEMOS; 1971 – VOLOS.B/U:- 9/9/1972 at Bilbao.

After fire & machinery damage.) 

In 1958 an additional 6 ton diesel-electric crane was provided to serve the fitting-out quay. In the 1950’s the quayside berths were deepened by use of a dragline dredger. For this purpose a mobile tower was erected on the quayside and on the south side a fixed high tower was erected. The recovered spoil was used to reclaim land to the south of the yard.

With the decline of the cross-channel rail ferries, several of them came to Graythorp to have their rail tracks removed and to be fitted out for road transport.

Gray (Tees) Ltd.
In December 1962, William Gray & Co. Ltd., went into voluntary liquidation. Whilst the shipbuilding yards and Central Marine Engine Works at Hartlepool closed, an attempt was made to keep the Graythorp yard in operation by opening in January 1963 a subsidiary company named Gray (Tees) Ltd for repair work and one named Gray (Talbot) Ltd. for joinery work. It was hoped to carry out some barge building work and to provide spares for the 215 Gray-built ships which were still in existence. The work force, were told that economy and speed were the essence if the company were to survive in a highly competitive market. In March 1963 the company applied to the Board of Trade for a grant to aid the building of a second dry-dock (the one which had been planned in 1924) 675 ft x 88 ft, which would take two and a half years to complete. A rather ambitious move one would have thought. A City syndicate who wished to take over Gray’s had also applied for a £1.5m loan to do likewise.

(D.H.- I also remember that around the summer time of 1963, they wanted to reduce the number of the workers employed. At that time, during the normal holiday periods, half the workforce took their break first, whilst the remainder kept the yard open for ship repairs. Someone in management came up with the ‘brilliant’ idea of finishing all the workforce who had taken their holidays first, irrespective of whom it involved. Sadly my father, the charge-hand turner in the fitting shop, who had spent all his life working in that yard, was one of those who was finished.)

Smiths Dock Co. Ltd.
Alas things did not work out and in September 1963 it was announced that Gray (Tees) Ltd. was for sale as a going concern. In November, Smiths Dock Co. Ltd. acquired the yard, which then employed 300 men. Again the new owner was not able to run a profitable operation and the yard was closed from 29^th February 1968. All work was transferred to Smiths yard at South Bank. In that same year work commenced on the construction of the nearby Hartlepool Nuclear Power Station, however, this was not to come on stream until June 1983.

Laing Offshore.
The yard lay idle until January 1972 when Laing Offshore purchased the site. This company was an amalgamation of John Laing Construction and E.T.P.M. an associate company of the French contractors Societe Entropose and Societe des Grands Travaux de Marseille and was established for the fabrication of offshore structures. The company were awarded by British Petroleum the £20m contract to build the main steel structure (normally referred to as the ‘jacket’) of a fixed production platform for the Forties Oil Field 250 miles north-east of the River Tees. To build this it was necessary for Laing to construct a basin which took in the area of the original dry-dock and fitting-out quay and the partly dredged site of the second dry-dock which had never been completed. Work commenced in February 1972. The area 1,140 ft long x 825 ft wide was excavated and pumped dry behind a temporary 36 ft high bund wall. Permanent dock gates consisting of hollow rectangular concrete caissons resting on a sill between two sand-filled cofferdams were provided. When the basin was flooded these gates could be floated clear to leave a 400 ft wide entrance for the passage of completed structures. Two ‘American Hoist and Derrick’ series 509 Revolver cranes were erected on 150 ft high gantries within the basin. The jibs when elevated were 400 ft high and could lift 800 tons at 70 ft radius. They could move around the basin at 17 ft/minute by means of a hydraulic sliding shoe system. Other equipment included six ‘Manitowoc’ crawler cranes and two 50 ton ‘Monobox’ gantries.

Construction of the high-tensile steel jacket structure, GRAYTHORP 1, continued through 1973 and into the first half of 1974. It was erected on its side on an 11,000 ton recoverable flotation pontoon. The complete structure measured 400 ft x 275 ft and weighed 20,000 tons. Float out took place on 29^th June 1974 and towage to the Forties Oil Field began on 1^st July 1974.

An order for a second BP jacket had been received in January 1973 so that once the flotation pontoon had been returned from the North Sea, the basin gates replaced, and the basin pumped dry, work could begin on GRAYTHORP 2. At this time more than 2,000 men were at work in the yard. Because of the success with GRAYTHORP 1 Signal Oil & Gas Co, in July 1974, had awarded Laing Offshore the contract to build a larger jacket for a production platform in the Thistle Oil Field east of the Shetland Islands and 465 miles from the River Tees. After naming by Mrs Elizabeth McCreesh, a nursing officer at the yard, GRAYTHORP 2 left the basin in June 1975.

Work soon began on THISTLE ‘A’, the jacket for Signal Oil, which in turn was completed in August 1976. A flotation pontoon was not used for this structure, which was 807 ft long and weighed 34,400 tons. With no further orders to hand the yard was then closed leaving only about seventy men on a care and maintenance basis. However, a further order did materialise, which allowed Laing Offshore to re-open the yard in May 1988 to build a reinforced concrete structure for the Ravenspurn North Gas Field off the Humber Estuary. This unusual construction with a roughly square base and with three legs towering up in the sky left the yard on 3^rd August 1989 after which the yard once again closed.

During 1981 the village of Graythorp was demolished and the area became a small trading estate. The surroundings of the shipyard had now become totally industrialised.

Able UK Ltd.
In 1996 Able UK Ltd, who had already had a site further up the River Tees at Billingham Reach Industrial Estate since the early 1980’s, purchased the Graythorp Yard for the purpose of de-commissioning, remediation and disposal of marine structures. Because of the nature of the intended work the yard was named TERRC (Teesside Environmental Reclamation and Recycling Centre). Since taking over the yard Able have dealt with marine structures from many of the well-known oil companies and the dock facility has imported rock armour, steel pipes and aggregates.

Able were awarded, in 2003, a contract by MARAD (Marine Administration Authority of the U.S. Government) to dismantle and dispose of thirteen U.S. Fleet Auxiliary Vessels which had been mothballed and laid up for many years. Four of these, the so called ‘Ghost Fleet’ were towed to the U.K: the fleet oiler CALOOSAHATCHEE arriving on 12^th November 2003, a sister CANISTEO on the 13^th November 2003, the submarine tender CANOPUS on 27^th November 2003 and the submarine tracking vessel COMPASS ISLAND on the 3^rd December 2003. They were berthed side by side in the Graythorp basin.

Their arrival caused a considerable disquiet, particularly amongst various environmental pressure groups, members of Hartlepool Borough Council and members of the local population who were all concerned that obnoxious materials claimed to be in the ships would cause local environmental damage when dismantling took place. Able claimed, not unreasonably, that their existing expertise could safely dismantle and dispose of the vessels without danger. Eventually at a High Court hearing it was decided that the existing licence and planning permission for handling ‘Marine Structures’ did not include ‘Ships!’ Also that planning permission did not exist to revert the wet basin back to the dry basin that it had once been when the oil rig jackets had been constructed. So at the time of writing (May 2004) the four ships lie forlorn awaiting a decision as to whether they will be broken up at Graythorp or have to be towed back across the Atlantic to the U.S.A.

(More recent history of Graythorp can be found in my booklet ‘To Journey No More’ which covers the comings and goings of the vessels/rigs that were dismantled or have visited the yard. I have recently updated the booklet to cover the recent arrival of the BRENT-DELTA rig topside.)

Thus this interesting story of the 80 years of Graythorp shipyard remains unfinished. Hopefully 2004 will see a resolution of the problems holding up the demolition of the four U.S.A. ships and the arrival of the other nine. So watch this space !

Sources Consulted:- 

Northern Daily Mail – 13^th October 1920

The Shipbuilder, July 1924:- ‘The New Tees Shipyard of Messrs Wm Gray & Co Ltd’

Shipping Monthly, July 1924:- ‘A Modern Shipbuilding & Repairing Yard’

Middlesbrough Evening Gazette:- Various Issues

“Fast Anchor” (Wm Gray’s house journal):- May 1958

D. Hinds:- Personal Reminiscences

M. of T., 30^thJan.1963:- ‘Report of Enquiry into boiler explosion on M.V. HERANGER at Graythorp

Laing Offshore, Brochure September 1974:- ‘Graythorp Fabrication Yard’

TERRC Brochure, July 1997

TERRC Website http:/www.ableuk.com/ableshiprecycling/historyofterrc.htm

Norman Polmar:- ‘The Ships and Aircraft of the U.S. Fleet’ 13 Ed. 1985.

** The author also thanks the following for providing information which has been incorporated in this history. Harold Appleyard, Ron Lowes, Clive Marshall (Able UK) and Bert Spaldin. Thanks also to Derek Longly for typesetting the article.

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