Well, in those days of course the Cunard sailing from
Southampton, the two great liners, the Queen Mary, Queen Elizabeth,
it was a hard job to get a job on those because everybody wanted to
do that. It was going to the States, everything was going on
in the States, there was money about, good clothes, good food, and
of course bearing in mind that we were still in the ration period
in here in England, I then took whatever I could. The first
ship I went on was a ship called the Almazora. I came back
into Southampton after doing a couple of months away, did a
trip...a couple of trips on the old Winchester Castle down to
Capetown, that was quite good, quite an experience, and then I came
off that and went for a job on the Queen Mary. First job I
had on there was a cabin steward in Cabin Cass, 'cos there
was three classes on the ships in those days. There was First
Class, there was Cabin Class, and there was Tourist Class. I did
one tour which was about...you did five trips if I remember
rightly, five trips and one off in those days...
Question: What days are we talking about here?
Talking about [19]49, around about '49, and I then worked
my way up if that's the vernacular, up to First Class restaurant as
a First Class waiter, and then I finished up as the Captain's
steward, that was the Staff Captain Steward in those days, which
was called the Captain's Tiger, generally looking after him, and
serving drinks when he was ….had guests or visitors in his cabin,
and serving dinner and meals when he was in the restaurant.
