Here are extracts from some of the letters Molly sent to her parents about her application for the job with Daphne March and the skills she had to learn, before boarding the Heather Bell in 1941. Then the letters move to 1942 and the start of the Boatwomen Training Scheme.
By the time of the next letter she had learnt that it is a narrow boat, not a barge:
8th Feb 1941
A letter from the 17th February 1941 opens with:
No further news as to our movements except that the girl has had flu, & the 17th is today & I have not been summoned for the trial run.
Undated, but probably circa end of February 1941?????, and are generous to the last penny.
Much detail in this letter about the trip with the Sibleys, undated:
January 20th 1942 – Molly is itching to start training her first batch of women for the Boatwomen Training Scheme:
I have got digs in Southall, c/o Mrs. Hunter,
Undated, but probably 24th February 1942, six days before the first training trip:
This next letter is dated Easter Monday, possibly 6th April 1942:
Her second trip started on 15th April 1942. This letter, dated 1st May 1942, was probably from this second trip:
This photograph, courtesy of the Eily Gayford Archive [thanks to Mike Constable] is fairly certainly from the trip described in the letter above. Brigit Macnamara is on the right, on the butty Saltley. Molly Traill is standing next to her, and Rosheen Ormsby [we think] is pictured sitting on motor boat Bainton. Eily Gayford took the photograph. It is, incidentally, the only known photograph of Molly from the war period; there are none in her photo albums.
Copyright: Eily Gayford Archive
There follows a long gap in the correspondence to April 1st 1943 when, during a training trip, she is laid up with the measles:
Another long gap to the final letter, 6th December 1943, around the time of her dismissal by Philip Noel Baker, Minister of War Transport. His letter was dated 29th November 1943, so perhaps a little more than a “terrific argument”:
Website by Crispin Partridge – Grandson of Molly Traill.
The Heather Bell was chartered by the company [Severn Catchment Board] to carry stone and drop it at specified points, to stop bank erosion caused by the Severn Bore.
Heather Bell, Minsterworth, River Severn – unloading stone into a ‘bay’ caused by bore erosionHeather Bell, Minsterworth, River Severn – the same showing the piles that were driven in to hold the stones in place
This project meant a considerable degree of danger for the boat. She had to be taken over the weir, into the river at Gloucester at the top of the bore level, to a tie-up made especially for her at Minsterworth, where she was based. As can be seen in the photographs below the tie-up consisted of two riding poles allowing for a 15ft rise as the bore came up and passed, and to drop the boat about twenty minutes later when a far gentler wave came down. We had riding chains and cables to the posts and poles, as well as fore and aft anchors. It was the first time a narrow boat had been known to come over the weir – on purpose.
Heather Bell, Minsterworth, River Severn – at top of bore level showing almost complete disappearance of piles in water and length of riding piles left exposedMinsterworth, River Severn – Severn Catchment Length boat and Heather Bell at bottom of bore level
The work had to be done in three weeks to allow for our return at the top of the next high bore. Anchor watch was kept during the highest phase and the return. You could hear it coming from half a mile away, and we stood by on the gang planks with shafts at the ready. Unfortunately we underestimated the length of the highest phase and one night I was awakened by the sound of the anchor chain dragging – I slept in the fore cabin. It was useless to waste time trying to wake Daphne, she was the heaviest sleeper I have ever known. The bore on its return had carried away the fore anchor and I spent the next twenty minutes hanging onto the opposite bank with a long shaft, holding the boat against the force of water, to prevent the stern anchor carrying away. If this had happened we would have been swept onto a shelf of rock only a few yards below. When the force had swept I awoke Daphne and in pitch darkness we got out the dinghy and I rowed the anchor back and dropped it in its original position upstream.
Heather Bell, Minsterworth, River SevernMinsterworth, River Severn – Heather Bell, alongside FM&C boat
From account given by Molly Traill to E.V. Wakelin in January 1965. He was the owner of Heather Bell at the time. Incorporated as part of an article he wrote about Heather Bell, published in Hospital News, Vol.7 No.1, March 1965 – Northern Ireland Hospitals Authority. Only the third and fourth of these six photos were published in that article.
Website by Crispin Partridge – Grandson of Molly Traill.
The two ‘girls’ were Daphne March and Molly Traill. The following is Molly Traill’s account of that time:
“Heather Bell carried 23 tons and drew 3ft 2ins. Her weekly round trip was from Townshend’s Mills, Worcester
Heather Bell – loading flour at Worcester, 1941
into the Severn via Tewkesbury, passing the branch of the Lower Avon Navigation to Gloucester, into the Berkeley Ship Canal through the Framlode Lock passing the branch of the Stroudwater Canal, to Sharpness Docks. There we loaded grain direct from the ships. Clothed up and back to Townshend’s. Unloaded. Loaded flour. Clothed up. Left Worcester for Birmingham via the Worcester-Birmingham Canal. This is the cut of the famous ‘thirty and twelve’ locks. There are a total of 58 locks in 16 miles from the River Severn at Worcester to the 420 ft level at Tardebigge.
Heather Bell in all her glory in Tardebigge Summit Lock. She is clothed up, the tie ropes are blancoed and the spare end curled in a spiral. The long shaft is tucked handily under for winding round in the basin. Painted in the traditional manner by Mr. Nurser of Braunston, she has roses, cornflowers, daisies, anchors, diamonds and hearts on cabin slides and side and on the cratch board and stands. And in the cabin on the doors and walls the castle picture with its turrets, red roofs, water and boats. There are brass bands round the chimneys and brass rods above and around the cooking range. Her tippits and ramshead decorated with turkshead knots are also blancoed, and on the cabin top is the rose covered 4 gallon can which carried our only water supply.
Here at the Summit Lock is the deepest narrow canal lock in England, it has a fall of 14ft. Besides this feat of ‘locking up’ we had to get through five tunnels before reaching Birmingham: Dunhampstead 230yds, Tardebigge 580yds, Shortwood 613yds, Wast Hill 2726yds and Edgbaston 105yds. We carried a ship’s copper oil lamp on the bows. Showers of water came through the roof in unexpected places. Often the tunnels were full of smoke, if other boats were passing in it or a tug had been through pulling a string of we used to meet L.T.C. Rolt when he was tied up at the middle lock basin of the Tardebigge flight. On his motor boat Cressy he was writing ‘Narrow Boat’.
At King’s Norton the Heather Bell branched left for Birmingham, leaving the Stratford Canal on the right and made our way through filthy water to Tipton Green. If the weather was fine one of us would steer while the other unclothed ready for unloading.
Heather Bell – unloading flour at Tipton, 1941
It was in this stretch that we experienced one of our worst air raids in the war. Being balanced on water when buildings tumbled gave you a carefree sense of safety.
Gas Street was one of our favourite tie-ups. The 15 miles to Cannock in Staffordshire was full of snags. Motor tyres, wire and dead cats wound themselves round the prop, and stopped the engine. Once we had to borrow a pair of industrial shears from a wire factory to cut off the yards of heavy stuff that had come from their own works, and this standing in mud up to our thighs, and water to our armpits. The canal had not been dredged for sixty years, and it was the passage of the boats that kept the channel clear.
Heather Bell had a Petter engine which, once it started, never stopped except in cases such as this. It was a ‘cold’ starter, that is you heated a nipple on the top of the cylinder with a blow lamp, and then swung by hand a vast brass and steel flywheel. If you put your strength into it at the wrong moment it would go in reverse and you had to begin all over again. The base of the flywheel was an inch clear of the bilges. Heather Bell leaked and had to be pumped out frequently. If you failed to do this, on starting the engine the wheel picked up the greasy coal water and sprayed it all over you and the engine room.
Heather Bell – loading slack at Cannock, 1941
At Cannock we loaded ‘peas’, a very fine coal that was essential for the type of furnaces at Townshend’s. This was dropped direct from a chute at the mines. Curiously enough it was in the pools here that we used to wash our hair, the water was glass clear and mirrored the coal lumps in the bottom. We saved up for some of our finest meals, there was plenty of fuel at hand and, as long as we were on the Sharpness run, Seaman’s Ration Books were issued to us as it was the tidal waters. I believe we were the only two women in the country to have them.
The return journey of 63.5 miles took two and a half days and part of those two nights.”
From account given by Molly Traill to E.V. Wakelin in January 1965. He was the owner of Heather Bell at the time. A small part of the text on this page was summarised as part of an article he wrote about Heather Bell, published in Hospital News, Vol.7 No.1, March 1965 – Northern Ireland Hospitals Authority. However the majority of this text has not been published until now.
Reproduced below are the notes she made at the time about these trips:
For a first hand account of the trips see Molly’s Letters Home page.
On six pieces of paper there are various parts and versions of a poem that Molly wrote about Heather Bell. I reproduce them here, but it needs a poet to put them together into a coherent whole. And, I’m sorry to say, it is not a particularly good poem – I can see why she abandoned it!
Our boat was ‘Heather Bell’ As it should was built of wood With roses everywhere
‘Heather Bell’ she was named And girls we trained To carry bombs and butter
The girls we trained And girls were lamed Leaping from boat to lock
That name renowned in fullest view! Willy Nurser we loved and knew As wartime boaters
Through tunnels dripping dank ‘Footing’ on a plank And the puttering of the Diesel
We fell into the “bloody cut” Simply told “you are a mutt” Surfaced clutching treasured dock
How good it was to reach our dock To wash our clothes and hair And sluice down in the ‘bare’
Tarpaulin sheeted And carefully treated Ropes coiled and blancoed white
Our cargo was our wandering child From Limehouse to the West But London was the best
‘Heather Bell’ our boat was named When last we saw – How she was maimed No roses anymore
But she had come to Stratford From a far and Irish shore Loved and cherished as before And brought there in a tanker!
The last two verses refer to a chance meeting that Molly had with the owners [from Northern Ireland] in 1964 in Stratford, presumably at a boat rally.
Website by Crispin Partridge – Grandson of Molly Traill.
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