[MUSIC PLAYING]
[BIRDS CHIRPING]
[BELLS RINGING]
The sun rises over an English harbour.
Each day the rising sun looks down on the same scene.
And with each dawn, hard-handed weather-beaten men
follow the winding lanes that their fathers and grandfathers
knew down to the sea to fish.
Then their boats discharge a simple duty.
But from time to time, they sail into the pages
of English history on another and higher mission.
Twice have the little ships of England left their nets
and lobster pots ashore and sail the seas for bigger game.
Once, when the beacons flash the news of the great Armada,
and again, they sailed 300 years later
to the beaches of Dunkirk.
[AIRPLANE WHIRRING ABOVE]
[EXPLOSION]
[GUNFIRE]
Tired men gathered on the bullet-swept sand.
While the little ships--
fishing boats, yachts, motorboats, barges, canoes,
anything that floated streamed to the rescue.
[GUNFIRE]
[EXPLOSION]
That strange fleet came somehow back to port.
But all along the coast of England were harbours with
moorings that lay empty and unclaimed.
Just as the fishermen answered the call to Dunkirk,
so the age-old craft of shipbuilding
rose to the nation's call, and on Britain's hillsides,
in her woods the sound of axes echo.
[THUMP]
[THUD]
[THUMP]
[SAWING]
[THUD]
When the demand for wooden ships,
and indeed for timber of all sorts, suddenly became urgent,
a tremendous burden was placed on an old but tiny industry.
Now oak was needed for the frames and planks
of the new fleets and elm for their fittings.
The plodding timber dray and the laborious crowbar
gave way to giant tractors and mechanised monsters that tossed
tree trunks about like matches.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
The closer the timber comes to its destination,
the stronger is the accent on machinery,
until at last, the caterpillar grab heaves it
onto a lorry that will carry it to a sawmill
where the machine is everything.
On arrival, the lorry is run under a wooden gantry that
carries the travelling cranes, which stack and pile the great
trunks with smooth efficiency.
No time is wasted as the crane lowers its steel grab
and swings the four-tonne tree up over the piles
of seasoning timber below and away to the top of the gantry.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
The other foreman is waiting for it.
And before the unwieldy mass has even touched down,
he measures it and chalks it into length,
and the iron grips of the conveyor
bear it to the waiting saws.
Exit an oak tree and enter job number umpteen
for the shipyard.
[MACHINE SAWING]
[THUD]
[MACHINE SAWING]
As the screech of the saw dies down
and the roaring tempo of the day slows
into the peace of the evening, our tree
is already rolling away through the dusk, cut, planed,
and measured to its final home in a West Country shipyard.
Morning finds a stream of workers crowding
through the shipyard gates, and not far behind them,
comes the timber truck.
On this quiet backwater in the west,
a handful of skilled shipwrights have
trained hundreds of new workers in the mysteries
of their craft.
Let's listen to the foreman on how it's done.
10 17 is 55, and 21 is 76.
Hi, there.
Where are you going to?
To the officer, sir.
Starting today is a learner.
Well, you won't learn nothing there.
You haven't worked in the shipyard before?
You know what this is?
Well, a bit of wood.
A bit of wood.
And you gain to work out my wages.
That's a grown meat.
Grown by nature to build ships' frames the way
they ought to be built. Come with me, my son,
and I'll show you the way we build boats.
You can muck about your figures afterwards.
See them fellas over there.
Well, they're using axes.
That's the oldest woodworking tool in England,
and still the only one for the job
of shaping up frames and keels.
That'll be part of the keel when they're done with it.
So we're starting at the right place at the beginning.
After the keels lay down and the moulds--
that's the big curve.
That's what gives the shape to the frame--
is put up, we get on with the frame and the ribs
and the rest of it.
They mostly go into shape, and they
got three times the strength of any bank or cut stuff.
When the frames' about finished, the moulds are taken out
and pass it on to the next job, so we
don't have to bother cutting new ones, and at the same time,
we make sure that every boat got the same lines as the one that
went before him.
Well, I reckon you can see for yourself now just how it goes.
You keep your eyes open and your mouth shut,
and you can't go wrong.
As the foreman leaves us on his round,
we move off to another minesweeper where
the frames are already finished, and the tricky job
of laying the planks is well advanced.
Both sides and deck planks are shaped on the job
and secured direct to the oak frame.
As fast as men with long electric drills
border holes and move on, their places
are taken by others who beat home
the great boats with sledgehammers
and plug the holes with tar and oak.
Meanwhile, another gang are boarding
a tunnel for the stone tube that will carry the propeller.
Without careful and expert caulking,
a wooden ship is useless.
Every seam in the planking, both the sides and deck
is carefully packed with oakum, which
is hammered home with long beak hammers and special caulking
chisels and covered with a layer of boiling tar
that will solidify into an imperishable watertight joint.
Lastly, the painters apply the final coat of battleship grey
to her side.
Down under the bulging sides, the launching gang are at work.
And as the last block flies out, the launch is on.
[CLINK]
[HISS]
Down at the fitting-out basin, where the thousands
of feet of wiring the deck houses,
armaments and numberless accessories of a ship
must be mounted.
Preparations for the new arrival are in full swing.
Packed together along the quay, a wooden craft of all kinds--
minesweepers, fishing vessels, fire-floats, and the long motor
launches for the air rescue search.
The other funnel is being swung aboard a half-finished launch.
And even as it is eased down into position,
the fitters in the engine room will be connecting up
the copper exhaust pipes, and before long, the hull will
quiver to the drumming of the engines
as they are turned over for their first trial.
Inside the men's quarters, the carpenters are busy with
the furniture at fo'c'sle and cabin.
It hardly seems possible that this tangle of men, tools,
and equipment will ever be sorted out
in time for the incoming crew to take over.
But it always is.
And a few hours after the men have come down the gangplank
with their loaded kit bags, they will
have the ship shining like a new pin for the not-so-old old men
to come aboard.
And now, at last, the end of the road is reached.
A signal of distress from a damaged aircraft
is received by a launch on patrol.
And out into the cold rain-washed morning, it heads.
From the crow's nest, the lookout
sweeps the surface of the water for a dinghy.
But the plane is still airborne.
And as the launch sweeps up, the pilot bails out,
and all eyes are fixed on the white gleam of his parachute
as it floats down.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
No sooner has the parachute touched down,
then the rescue begins.
No easy job with a tired or perhaps injured
man in a choppy sea.
Think of it.
The long fight with a burning plane.
A 2,000-foot parachute jump into an icy sea in half a gale.
And he can still smile.
But his troubles are nearly over now
as he has helped below where hot drinks, expert attention,
and dry clothes await him, while the launch
swings around and, with engines roaring full ahead,
makes for base.
For them, it is just another job done.
But a great job.
And one of the many that are being tackled day and night
by Britain's little ships.
[MUSIC PLAYING]