Report - A.C.W. 10 - surviving WW1 concrete barge

[Thecretefleet]

Abutting the banks of the Thames, resident there for the past 68 years, is a very special concrete barge.

Launched in 1918 at Brentford, it was THE first completed of the concrete ships built in WW1 in response to the loss of merchant shipping due to the UBoat campaign combined with an acute shortage of steel.

Originally she was 150’8” long, 24’5” wide but here’s something else that makes her special ..in 1933 she was purchased by John Mowlem & Co and converted into a crane barge. This involved cutting off her bow at the point of the first concrete bulkhead

John Mowlem & Co were major contractors and one project they had a big piece of was the building of Battersea Power Station…

In 1954, A.C.W.’s registration at Lloyd’s was closed. She was subsequently purchased by Greenhithe based Shipping and boat building company F. T. Everard & Sons. She’s still there now, at Bendigo Wharf…

Her crane was only removed about 10 years ago, by Port of London Authority, over safety concerns. Kids would climb up it and dive off. Also concerns that they would get sucked into the holds through the holes punched in her side to keep her in position.

Not a lot of people know this !!! Often mistaken for a WW2 FCB as F.T. Everard & Sons did in fact have six built in WW2 by W & C French at Grays…Found this on FB page

These are two of Everard’s WW2 FCBs…. Much shorter at 107’6” than A.C.W. 10 was and indeed still is.

Amazing, her sister A.C.W. 11 also survives, in the Orkney Islands. She was wrecked 1936 having been used as a coal hulk for steam herring drifters..

There’s a lot more to the stories but if you fancy swimming in the Thames, doing a bit of fishing off the ideal platform or just chilling 120’ off the banks of the Thames, there’s a wall to clamber up and any number of dangers to navigate!

 

[Mikeymutt🐶]

Nice interesting report that. Sort of thing I like.

 

[albino-jay]

Yeah i like stuff like this too. Top report.

 

[Lndnpdd]

Lovely stuff, found this really interesting

 

[westernsultan]

Very nice and thanks for including all the history

 

[DaveFM]

You wouldn't think something made of concrete could float, given how thick it needs to be to be strong enough. The only such thing I've been on was the old Mulberry harbour section off Pagham in West Sussex, me and my dad rowed out to it in the eighties when I was about 14.

 

[Calamity Jane]

Nice and interesting this. A concrete boat! how rare is that. Greenhithe is 10mins from me. I may take a mosey when this damn cold shifts.

 

[Lndnpdd]

There are a whole bunch (around 10 or so) of these at the purton ship graveyard

 

[Thecretefleet]

There are a whole bunch (around 10 or so) of these at the purton ship graveyard

A.C.W. 10 is First World War and often confused with the FCBs of the Second World War. There are now 7 FCBs documented at Purton, placed there in the early 1960s as part of the measures to defend the bank between the Severn and the Gloucester & Sharpness Canal from erosion. Before 1990, there were 8 FCBs - actually all the rarer Stem-headed ones, that had once worked in Bristol Docks and then on the canal. In 1990, one was dragged off the bank and refloated - FB52 - and taken up the canal to the National Waterways Museum for display. Then they got bored with it, ran out of room whatever, and it was then dumped in a tanker graveyard at Marshfield. It was subsequently allowed to sink - about 2012....So A.C.W. 10 was launched in 1918 and the FCBs were between 1941 and 1944. So the FCBs are much younger whilst still being about 80 years old !

 

[Thecretefleet]

You wouldn't think something made of concrete could float, given how thick it needs to be to be strong enough. The only such thing I've been on was the old Mulberry harbour section off Pagham in West Sussex, me and my dad rowed out to it in the eighties when I was about 14.

Archimedes principle . . .but concrete ships did weigh a lot more than equivalent steel ships of the same capacity.

 

[Thecretefleet]

You wouldn't think something made of concrete could float, given how thick it needs to be to be strong enough. The only such thing I've been on was the old Mulberry harbour section off Pagham in West Sussex, me and my dad rowed out to it in the eighties when I was about 14.

Archimedes principle . . .but concrete ships did weigh a lot more than equivalent steel ships of the same capacity.

You wouldn't think something made of concrete could float, given how thick it needs to be to be strong enough. The only such thing I've been on was the old Mulberry harbour section off Pagham in West Sussex, me and my dad rowed out to it in the eighties when I was about 14.

The Outer Pagham Phoenix caisson comprises the only confirmed A-1 type, (6000 tons) the largest of all of the original Phoenix Units built, anywhere in the UK. The Inner Pagham Mulberry unit is one of only twenty-four Intermediate Pierhead Pontoons were built and the unit off Pagham comprises the only known Intermediate Pierhead Pontoon in UK waters. There's a famous one on the beach at Arromanches

 

[DaveFM]

Archimedes principle . . .but concrete ships did weigh a lot more than equivalent steel ships of the same capacity.

The Outer Pagham Phoenix caisson comprises the only confirmed A-1 type, (6000 tons) the largest of all of the original Phoenix Units built, anywhere in the UK. The Inner Pagham Mulberry unit is one of only twenty-four Intermediate Pierhead Pontoons were built and the unit off Pagham comprises the only known Intermediate Pierhead Pontoon in UK waters. There's a famous one on the beach at Arromanches

I think the Outer Pagham caisson was originally much bigger, I read that it was used for target practice after the war - the caissons were about 200ft long but the Pagham structure is about 50ft x 50ft.