Swansea Docks-Tugboats page 1

Tugboats.

When sailing ships first entered the Port of Swansea, longboats would have been lowered over the side so that the ships could be pulled up the river and berthed at their designated wharves. Although these ships would undoubtedly have entered on a making tide, they still had to deal with tidal currents within the harbour itself and also with the direction of the wind. The invention of the steam engine put an end to all this, however, as by the middle of the nineteenth century steam-driven paddle tugs, whilst primitive by today’s standards, had been introduced to pull these sailing vessels into the harbour and onto their riverside berths.

      More modern steam tugs and eventually diesel-powered tugs followed these early paddlers, and the towing companies who operated tugboats at Swansea within our working lives were the Britannia Steam Towing Company, the Alexandra Towing Company taken over by Howard Smith Towing Company in 1992 and, in more recent years, the West Coast Towing Company. These days, however, all towing activities at Swansea and Port Talbot are carried out by the international towage and salvage company Svitzer Wijsmuller A/S

       In the early years of towage at Swansea there had been many individual tugboat operators and companies operating at the port, as can be seen from the following lists which go back as far as 1889.

        We thank retired Alexandra captains D Jones and T Lewis for their help in supplying photos and information.

       Anyone with Information or Photos they would like to contribute to this site can contact us on the link on the Home Page

Notes on Towage – Swansea Docks

When the GWR took over Swansea Docks in 1923 it claimed priority over all in-dock towage within the port, allowing private tug companies to work only when the GWR tugs could not fulfil operational requirements.

Alexandra Towing first established its presence at Swansea in 1924 with the tug “Canada”, which was shortly followed by two more, the “Albert” and the “Herculaneum”. An office in Somerset Place was opened in 1925.

In 1933, ship owners won the right to make their own towage arrangements at the port and, as a consequence, the GWR suffered a serious reduction in the demand for its in-dock towage services.

The last remaining GWR tug at Swansea, the ‘Trusty’, was transferred to Barry in 1940, when it was agreed that the Alexandra Towing Company should be granted the right to carry out all towage on behalf of the GWR, subject to a commission of 7.5% of the towage fee. Shortly afterwards a similar arrangement was entered into with the Britannia Steam Towing Company, which had operated at Swansea since 1895.

The two companies entered into a joint service arrangement in 1962, after which the Britannia Steam Towing Company was taken over by the Alexandra Towing Company. Howard Smith Towage took over the Alexandra Towing Company in 1992.

History of The Alexandra Towing Company

Founded at Liverpool in 1887, after the take-over of G B Cowl's towage firm of 1882, and with the Mack family and Alexander Bicket (Athel Line) among the major shareholders, the Alexandra Towing Company became one of the major towage firms on the River Mersey. In 1908 it took over W. & T. Joliffe & Co. of Liverpool, a tug company founded in 1854, and in 1919 it followed the Cunard Line's transfer from Liverpool to Southampton.

By 1925 it had established its base at Swansea, and in a series of take-overs between 1962 and 1975 - including Britannia Towing Co. (Swansea) in 1962, Liverpool Screw Towing in 1967, J.H. Lamey in 1968 and London Tugs in 1975 – it became a major national concern. It also diversified into deep-sea towage, offshore service, ship repair, aircraft and road transport. In 1992 the company was sold to Howard Smith Industries of Hull. Later they were taken over by Adsteam in 2001. The Adsteam fleet at Harwich and other UK ports was taken over by Svitzer in the spring of 2007. Tugs were rapidly repainted in the new colours.