johnalison
Well-Known Member
I don’t know about poor childcare. More a case of wanting to avoid emotion I suspect. In any case, my mother hated going to sea thereafter. When we did channel crossings she would retire to a cabin with a double brandy.
Etymology of Posh
- Thread starter TiggerToo
- Start date
Neeves
Well-Known Member
Which is why I mentioned HK and India. The Empire did not have many outposts in the Med, other than Malta, and Gib.
Jonathan
Frank Holden
Well-Known Member
You come from a theatrical family?School in the late 40s - you must be very very old - good on yer!
Of course it could be used as a descriptive word for the rich as only the rich could stencil POSH on their cabin trunks.
I'm not sure that many boarders would have transferred to India or Hong Kong by sea during the summer holidays - it would simply take too long - most of the holiday (at sea) would be spent enjoying the benefits of POSH.
However my great, great grandfather, Trouper KDG, and his son would have enjoyed the benefits (if there was any enjoyment to be had) as they came back from India in the mid 1860's under sail but I suspect troupers did not stencil POSH on their cabin trunks and babes in arms would not have noticed....much at all.
Sailing is obviously genetic.
Jonathan
The passenger trade to and from the East African colonies died a far earlier death than most other routes. Most were killed off by the 747 and cheap airfares.
East Africa was served at the end by BI's 'Kenya' and 'Uganda' along with the two Union castle 'Intermediates' the Kenya and Rhodesia Castles.
Prior to Kenya,Tanganyika, Zanzibar and Uganda getting independence the deal was that when a civil servant went on leave that leave didn't start until they stepped ashore at Tilbury.
With independence the rules changed. Your leave started when you stepped out of your office.
The passenger trade vanished on the instant.
Bajansailor
Well-Known Member
I remember reading some years ago about a proposed amalgamation of P & O Containers with the Dutch shipping company Royal Nedlloyd. Logically their new abbreviated name should have been PORN, but they were known instead as P & O Nedlloyd.
Nedlloyd - Wikipedia
Nedlloyd - Wikipedia
Neeves
Well-Known Member
The 747, which possibly underpinned cheap long haul airfares was introduced in 1969, long after recollections of school days in the 1940s. Possibly another influence was the DH Comet - which had a sadly chequered birth in 1952 and subsequent (and other than the losses - could not have been cheap)
For school children of tea planters, rubber farmers in India or Malaya - this might be more relevant
How long did it take to travel by ship from India to England in the pre-aeroplane era?
Not giving much time with Mum and Dad in Darjeeling or Simla in an 8 week summer holiday.
Jonathan
TiggerToo
Well-Known Member
that is definitely an acronym to remember (@sarabande ) ;-)
sarabande
Well-Known Member
Several military and FCO stations in the Med in 1950, inc Cyprus, Suez Canal zone, plus wherever we had a consulate even down to the Aden Protectorate and the Condominium Sudan and and round to the Trucial States. Time to Suez from Southampton was under a week. One of the big users of steamships for families was Cables and Wireless who had hundreds of stations round the world, and generous conditions of education for families.
Frank S's mention of the Comet changing steamship commerce reminds me that several months after one of the planes crashed into the Mediterranean, one of the boarders, Sam Williams, had a slightly waterlogged letter delivered. It was in an envelope marked "Retrieved from wreckage of Comet xyz and delivered by Royal Mail" A most poignant souvenir of a sad accident and loss of many lives.
Frank S's mention of the Comet changing steamship commerce reminds me that several months after one of the planes crashed into the Mediterranean, one of the boarders, Sam Williams, had a slightly waterlogged letter delivered. It was in an envelope marked "Retrieved from wreckage of Comet xyz and delivered by Royal Mail" A most poignant souvenir of a sad accident and loss of many lives.
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newtothis
Well-Known Member
Passenger services were still running strong in the 60s. I went to NZ on a P&O ship in 1965. Flying would have been way to expensive for my family back then.
DownWest
Well-Known Member
Had dinner with a Danish airforce guy many years ago and he was part of the team that found the Comet that went down in the desert. The last part of the trip was on camels.
Biggles Wader
Well-Known Member
I remember seeing the last two Union Castle liners in Durban and Capetown back in the mid 70s. I saw the Pendennis Castle off the Cape on her final voyage and the Windsor Castle about a year later on what must have been her last or penultimate trip.
Resolution
Well-Known Member
This talk of "summer holidays" is all wrong for the Far East expats of that era. My parents lived in Malaya both before and after WWII. They didn't do "holidays", they had "leave", usually 6 months every 3 years. So the 3 to 4 week voyage back by sea still left one with a few months back in the UK or wherever. I did the trip on the SS Canton in 1952 as a nipper. In 1955, returning to start school in England as a six year old, things had moved on and we flew in a QANTAS Super Constellation. I think that flight took 3 or 4 days itself.
savageseadog
Well-Known Member
I travelled to the Middle East in 1956 on a Super Constellation plane. An engine caught fire in flight which provided terror for my Mother and other passengers and fun for me.
Neeves
Well-Known Member
The reference to summer holidays was in terms of the children, Sarabande was talking of his school days. The children still had the same holidays as anyone else and would commonly spend those holidays with relatives of their parents - as the trip to the Far East took too long by sea and was too expensive by air.
The village in which I was brought up in Scotland had a number of children living sometimes with their mother or aunts and uncles while Dad was overseas. I worked with a Scot whose father ran a paper mill in India. He went to one of the more famous Edinburgh schools and seldom saw his father - but ended up working in the same industry.
The advances in aircraft design killed the much more romantic way of air travel - the flying boat. One grandfather worked for Shorts in Kent, Chatham or Rochester (I think).
Jonathan
Frank Holden
Well-Known Member
I recall retired friends from Melbourne turning up in London on two weeks hols in 1972. Thanks to the 747 the return economy airfare was **only** $A2000 - at a time when average 'Strayan punter was earning about $A3000 pa.
Through the 50s and 60s young colonials would buy a one way ticket - E deck - to the UK. Then they would spend a year saving up to buy a ticket home - unless they were Kiwis - in which case they would buy some chicken wire and cement, build a boat and sail home.
East African liner trade died in the mid 60s as mentioned above. All the P&O and Orient ships - except Canberra and Oriana but including Chusan - went to the breakers in about 72. That was when the Australian government decided that all £10 Poms would come by air and they canceled all contracts with shipping companies.
As pointed out elsewhere the 'Cape Mail' soldiered on into the mid 70's. Possibly because they also carried large amounts of general and refrigerated cargo. That was one reason for the 11 day turnarounds in Southampton.
Neeves
Well-Known Member
There was some kerfuffle in the 1990s in HK with Civil Servants who has been employed and contracted with transport to and from HK, at the commencement and end of the contract, by sea. When originally employed the obvious means of transport was by sea (too expensive for the Government to fund lowly employees to arrive by air). Later the situation was reversed and though the Civil Servants were now senior there was an attempt to alter the contract terms to return to the Mother Country (UK) at the end of the contract. by air. The Mandarins were having nothing to do with it - the return was by sea - which meant a long passage, 50 days, as regular sailings had disappeared to be 'replaced' only by cruise ships.
One may curl ones lips at the idea of a 'cruise ship' but I suspect passage home on a Cunard vessel would be a fitting end to a career in the Colony.
As the Empire contracted and the last of the Mandarins were shipped home the need for POSH, to be stencilled on the cabin trunk, had disappeared - as all cabins are air conditioned with curtains to keep the sun off. Air conditioning possibly is one major factor in the background to the word POSH having its derivation lost in the mists of time (along with the memories, this Forum excepted, of Empire).
Take care, stay safe
Jonathan
One may curl ones lips at the idea of a 'cruise ship' but I suspect passage home on a Cunard vessel would be a fitting end to a career in the Colony.
As the Empire contracted and the last of the Mandarins were shipped home the need for POSH, to be stencilled on the cabin trunk, had disappeared - as all cabins are air conditioned with curtains to keep the sun off. Air conditioning possibly is one major factor in the background to the word POSH having its derivation lost in the mists of time (along with the memories, this Forum excepted, of Empire).
Take care, stay safe
Jonathan
Resolution
Well-Known Member
My 1955 flight Singapore to Calcutta also suffered engine fire. Not one, but two, both on the same wing. My mother recounted in later years how the remainder of that leg was a little tense.
