Close look at dock

The recent illustration in the column of Earl Grey Dock and its environs brought back some memories to Montrose Port Archivist John Aitken.

He emails: “On numerous occasions in the 1950s I wandered round the inner docks observing the flotilla of sandboats berthed there, prior to catching the train back home to Perth from the nearby West Station. Occasionally, an additional veteran steam coaster would be acquired and it was often a challenge to research its background as most were of elderly vintage.

“With the preparations for and subsequent construction of the Tay Road Bridge they were decanted further east to the relative obscurity of Camperdown Dock until the second Middlebank sailed out the morning of March 17 1974.

“The vessel at the top of the dock would appear to be the steam paddle ‘Fifie’ Sir William High built at the Caledon shipyard in 1924 which was followed by the larger similar B L Nairn five years later. The retired ferry was towed down to West Africa in the early 1950s while the latter paddler went to shipbreakers at Blyth, Northumberland after the Tay Road Bridge opened.

“Slightly to the right at the other side of the harbour warehouse can be made out the shape of an elderly sandboat. In later years an engineless hulk was used for storing sand at this berth in the shadow of the Royal Arch.

“Further to the right can be seen a mud hopper used for working in tandem with the Dundee Harbour Trust’s dredger. Behind the Swimming Baths complex is the entrance to Earl Grey Dock. In a recent Craigie item regarding the whaler Snowdrop there was a mention of the dock gatehouse as the gathering place for ‘old seadogs and other nautical experts.’

“At the bottom left of the view can be seen the warehouse of Messrs. Batchelor, potato merchants, a name also familiar in Montrose in the same line of business”.

Albert Merralls of Errol has sent this photograph of himself (in the centre) with his brother Stuart (left), sister May and cousin Brian Fitzgerald at the back. “We are sitting on a ‘bogie’ built by my father,” he says. “The picture was taken at...

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