The Human Element in Power-Driven Merchant Ship Propulsion Since 1850: The British Case

This essay addresses the engine room staffing of power-driven merchant ships from c. 1850 to the end of the twentieth century, both engineer officers and engine/boiler room ratings. Constituting a new department aboard ships when the industrial revolution took hold afloat, the personnel needed comprised the most significant addition to ships’ companies in centuries. To set a context for the staffing discussion, the first section offers an overview of the advances in ship propulsion technology over a century and a half. A second section addresses the provision of the senior staff in charge roles in ships’ engine and boiler rooms, their training and licensing, employment, remuneration, living conditions and changing status as marine engineers moved from casual employment to professional engineer status. The third section turns to the boiler room labourers, the unskilled coal trimmers and the narrowly skilled firemen who tended the boilers, who would disappear with the dominance of oil fuel after World War II. The future pointed to completely unmanned engine rooms.