RMS Caronia Timeline

Caronia “Crew Quarters”

Welcome to the Crew Quarters of the “Green Goddess”. There are upwards of 200 pages devoted to Caronia's former Officers and Crew. They carry a host of photograph and text contributions from many sources, as well as fully transcribed Crew Manifests up to June 1958.

If you are “good with names”, I'd especially like to identify the many folk shown here as “unknown”. Contact links are provided locally. Please ensure you mention the Photo Reference.

A new feature is the Crew Correspondents section where the letters home from a former Caronia musician form a group of consecutive Virtual Cruises with a difference. Alan Stewart was a musician and his travelogue began as letters to his wife nearly 70 years ago

Crew Photographs

The largest collection of photograph scans of crew members and their exploits has been provided by the late Ave Quin, who spent the best part of 16 years aboard the Caronia. As a photographer himself, he was a friend of Caronia's team of 3 on-board photographers.

Several more crew photos have been contributed by Peter Jelley who joined the “Green Goddess” at Glasgow in December 1948. His photographs of the early period aboard Caronia are a treasure. Pete has also provided several photographs of a more recent time, illustrating the Caronia Reunions.

Where the quality of the photograph has allowed, I've placed as large a scan as I can on these pages. A lot of crew activities involved “dressing-up” and much of the driving force behind that was the gay community; several pages illustrate this, including the Annual Bergen Parade.LGBT

Photograph Contributors

Below is a list of crew photo contributors to this section. Sadly, many of these people are no longer with us, which makes their contributions all the more valuable!

• Fred Barnes
• Margaret Bell
• Roger Birch
• Alex Bulloch MBE
• Jim Caslake
• Robin Chalmers
• Neil Clarke
• Alan Dalton
• Len Danson
• Pete Davison
• Stan Dingwall
• Billy Flaherty
• Reginald Gabbe
• John Gerrity
• Dave Gregory
• Chris Griffiths
• Ron Griffiths
• Alan Hargreaves
• Peter Heath
• John Higgins
• Frank (Spike) Hughes

• Brenton Jenkins
• Phil Jones
• Cliff Mattingley
• Don Miller-Watt
• Ken Mugridge
• Peter J Murphy
• Sean O'Bierne
• George Peterson
• Wally Pritchard
• Pete Read
• John Redhead
• Geoffrey Rout
• Terry Ryan
• Richard Steed
• Colin Stephens
• Peter Stevens
• Brian Taylor
• Gordon Wright

Can You Help?

I do need your help if you can give it, because there are many crew photographs where I have little or no information that identifies whom is depicted.

If you have any information, and especially a story to tell about any picture here, I'd be delighted to hear from you!

Wareham & Bergen Cup Pictures

This has provided the richest seam of photographs which the people of Bergen are soon to be reminded of. A local museum is featuring the history of its port and among the exhibits will be photos of the colourful parades that Caronia crews once arranged.

The driving force behind the effort was a proactive number of LGBT gay men who for so many years lavishly entertained both crew and local folk alike.

If you're a former Caronia crew member, then it's good to see you here. As this page testifies, there have been several people who have contributed to these pages and I'd be delighted to hear from you also!

Whether you spent months or years aboard Caronia is immaterial, the really important aspect is that your story adds value to this fabulous ship's history. From the wonderful feedback I receive, I can assure you that there are a great many visitors here who enjoy reading about what brings that history to life. Don't for a moment think that your own memories are worthless - they truly aren't!