Stevedores by Bush House, The Grove, Bristol
Old Sepia Photographic Postcard pre 1914 by local publisher Guillon & Sons of Fishponds.
Stevedore, dockworker, docker, dock labourer, wharfies and longshoreman can have various waterfront-related meanings concerning loading and unloading ships, according to place and country.
Old Sailors’ Home, The Grove
The last residents moved out about six year ago when English Heritage took over the lease from Bristol Council.
The three hundred year old listed building has now been converted into offices.
The Sailors’ Home was originally a warehouse belonging to the Bright family of merchants whose mansion, No 29 Queen Square, adjoined it.
In 1851 the lease was bought by a group of Bristol clergy and businessmen in order to provide accommodation for seamen arriving in the City Docks ( Floating Harbour.)
Sailors were thought to be in need of protection from dishonest boarding house keepers eager to take advantage of men who had just been paid.
The Home was to be, said the promoters, "an institution for raising the character and promoting the comfort of seamen.”
One well known resident was the late Erik Ilott, a Bristol shantyman who played the bones around the city’s folk clubs.
Britain’s first Sailors’ Home opened in London in 1835, followed by one in Liverpool.