Christmas on the Cambrian King

Norena Shopland

Christmas is a time when loved ones are often far away, and this was true for Mary in 1897 onboard the Cambrian King.

She had set sail from Penarth, where her husband, Captain William Hansord had handpicked his crew because his wife and child were accompanying him and he ‘would have no roysterers.’

They were bound for Shanghai carrying coal and oil but had docked at Twenty-sixth-street, South Brooklyn for the Christmas period.

It was a Brooklyn paper who wrote of the ship, fascinated that it was ‘Welsh from forefoot to truck’ (and republished in the Weekly Mail).

‘Welsh flings’

‘Consonants are more plentiful than cockroaches aboard this three-master, whose sailors for the most part think in Welsh, talk in Welsh, write in Welsh, sing in Welsh, and dance Welsh flings. It is a pleasure to hear her Able Seaman Griffith carol “Yr hogun yn gyru’r wedd,” or the “Farmer’s Boy.”’

It wasn’t the first voyage Mary had made with her husband, in fact just nine months earlier she had nearly drowned. They had been on the same route in March when a hurricane hit and Mary and baby Annie had to be pulled out, about 10 minutes before the ship capsized.

William told the press, ‘It was about as hard an experience as I have ever had in over a quarter of a century’s life at sea; but it was valuable in one sense. It showed me that my wife had no fear while knowing I was doing my utmost. I cannot say too much for the splendid bravery she showed during the hurricane.

“At one time she was up to her armpits in water with the ship working heavily and holding her little daughter above her head. We were forced to drag them out through the stateroom sky light, the door being under water and jammed.”

Mary did know what sea life was like. Originally from Llangybi, Caernarvonshire she was born in 1874, her mother, Martha Jones of Felin-Plas Du, and her father a sea captain.

William too, came from a sea faring family. They had married in 1891 and had a daughter Martha Ina (Annie) born in 1894, and later two other children, Gwylim Prys and Eluned Maie.

In December, Mary, Annie, and William were enjoying their Brooklyn Christmas. Due to William’s careful selection of the crew, ‘From Penarth she sailed with the soberest and youngest crew of any ship in three years. Not a man jack was drunk. She was the only ship in eighteen years that sailed out of Cape Town Harbour with her entire crew, not one having deserted.’

The crew had planned many activities and both William and Mary gave out caddies of tobacco for prizes.

At three bells of the afternoon came all sorts of athletic games. There was a game ‘that the Welsh call “Throwing an ugly face through a lifebuoy,” which consists of grinning through a buoy.

Able Seaman Acton won.

Mary wagered a half-pound of tobacco in the tug of war and lost, but Mary ‘who is young blithe and pretty, became so enthusiastic over the contest that she almost danced a hornpipe on the quarter-deck, while baby Annie clapped her hands.’

Sailor E. Jones won the prize for writing the best love letter. Able Seaman Frederick Farrell, an Irishman, took the prize for the pronunciation of the words “Llanfairfatharfanethaf, Chwilog, and Llangollen.”

John Sandell, a Russian Finn, was ‘a close second in twisting his tongue around the jaw-crackers.’

Grog

Songs in Welsh, jokes in Welsh, choruses, the Highland schottische, and the sailor’s hornpipe, an original recitation by Farrell on “Rorke’s Drift,” an episode in the Zulu War; “God Save the Queen,” and a pannikin of grog wound up under the tropical stars the merriest Christmas ever spent at sea.

“I’ve been sailin’ for fifty years in kinds all and conditions o’ ships, and with all classes of crews,” said Bos’n Williams, “but them holidays was the jolliest I ever spent.”

Before they set sail again, Mary ordered ‘an organ and there will be jolly larks indeed on board the Cambrian King.’

Nothing more is heard of the voyage. William died ten years later on 17 October 1907 at sea and is buried in Criccieth.

He left Mary £1,433 4s 2d (about £150,000 today) and in the 1911 census she is a lodging housekeeper.

The Cambrian King was wrecked in 1901 in the Orkneys with all lives lost, but none of the 1897 crew appear to have been on her.

The history of Welsh wives who went to sea is sparse; there is Ellen Owen from Pwllheli, whose diary of her experiences on a sister ship, the Cambrian Monarch, have been published, but much more needs to be done on studying these intrepid women.