Could my floor timbers be part of an old ship?

[michael]

I own an old Baptist chapel on the south coast which is pretty much in its original form. It has a sunken baptising font (full emersion) and balconies at first floor level on three sides complete with box pews. According to the records The chapel was built in 1817 but having carefully removed a few t&g panels here and there to expose sections of brickwork, I am lead to believe that the gable end stucco frontage of this building with its neo classical features was built sometime later not only to give the building a fancy frontage but to also form a full height front extension creating a new entrance lobby and an extended balcony above.

I’ve just been lifting sections of floor boards in the “extended” balcony to clear debris and dust from under the floor voids and to check the timbers and I think my suspicions about the later extension have now been confirmed. I found an off cut of wood under the floor with what I can only presume is the carpenters name scribbled in pencil and dated May 23rd 1873. So it would seem that the frontage and balcony extension were built some 56 years later.

What I’ve also discovered below the balcony floorboards is one of the supporting beams which is a solid piece of timber about 6”x 6” square and about 20ft long held at various points from the ground floor below by a series of painted metal columns probably cast iron. Whilst most of the timber in the chapel is pine, including the wall plates, this wooden beam under the balcony floor is rock hard so I suspect it is probably oak.

One of the curious aspects of this beam is that it has a regular series of square holes in its top face each 2”x 2”square x 2”deep spaced approximately 1ft apart and there seems to be no apparent purpose for them. Considering I’m in a south coast location, I did wonder if this might be a piece of salvaged ships timber installed in 1873.
If so, are there any shipwrights out there who might know what part of the ship or boat this might be?

I’ve noticed just a couple of small areas of what might be woodworm (dart board holes) in the top face of the beam, so I’m thinking that I should perhaps treat it just to be on the safe side. Any advice on what to use?

 

[Raylea]

Hi there,

I have prevously posted about this before so I will not go into to many details.
We have two stud walls and having to replace a floor we found to lumps of wood under these with rectangle shapes cut out and yes I believe them to be off a ship. This part of the house goes back to 1740 and I believe this is ship wood because in them days they used what ever they could get there hands on and yes it has its fair share of said woodworm (I not undually worried)

Hope this helps
Raylea

 

[Nemesis]

Wood was often re-used from previous buildings though - while there are documented cases of ship's timbers, it's thought that these are quite rare.

Architectural salvage isn't a modern fad.

 

[MdB]

We have old mining hand drills holding one of our chimneys up. What ever came to hand got used.

 

[Nemesis]

It's surprising how many buildings, especially in ancient settlements, are on the site of a previous one.

Wood was not easy to saw - top dog bottom dog etc - and in some areas not easy to come by either.

If a good chunk of sawn and seasoned oak was to be had, it would be re-used.

Indeed, many farms where I live are built from good chunks of dressed stone, re-used from what is now the World Heritage Site of Hadrian's Wall.

 

[stickybeak]

.

 

[Penners]

I believe this is ship wood

I've lost count of the number of people who have pointed out "old ship's timbers" to me, in their houses.

So from anecdotal evidence, it seems that the great majority of period timberframe houses were built with ships' timbers.

It therefore follows that several entire navies of very expensive ships have over the centuries been systematically torn apart so that their timbers could be re-used to build houses.

signed
S. Keptic

 

[piper]

I quote from "Discovering your family history" by Don Steel (BBC 1980)
"In the eighteenth century it was the custom in the shipbuilding trade inside and outside the Yard to permit workmen to carry home quantities of waste wood known as 'chips'. The term became purely nominal, and the 'chips' became longer and the bundles larger each day. Eventually, the maximum length of the 'chips' was limited to three feet and this led to doors, furniture and fittings in the houses of the workers assuming dimensions of this order. George Dicker believes that in the guise of 'chips' enough wood was removed from Plymouth Yard in a month to build a sloop of war. This was bad enough, but first-class timber was ruthlessly cut up to provide the 'chips' and in the centre of many of the bundles were often secreted other items such as copper bolts. In desperation the privilege was stopped in 1803 and a monetary allowance was made in lieu. Labourers received an additional 3d a day, sawyers 4d and shipwrights 6d."

 

[michael]

Interesting piper but my piece of timber beam is 20ft long

 

[Penners]

Piper - that's an interesting snippit.

But the inference is that new timber was being removed from the yards.

When people point out old ship's timbers in their homes, the timbers in question invariably have random mortices, peg holes and such features in them.

I've also been shown curved wind-braces and crucks in this context.

It is these features that people interpret as being "ex-ship". Whereas, as Nemesis has pointed out above, in reality they are simply beams that have been reused from earlier building applications, or wind-braces/crucks that are curved for a structural or decorative purpose.

 

[Flyfisher]

If ships timbers were routinely re-used for houses, wouldn't they be expected to be found more often in coastal areas, given that moving large quantities of large beams around the country would not have been easy. I've no idea if there is such a correlation though.

 

[Nemesis]

This was featured in a past Cornerstone (SPAB):

http://calvin.st-andrews.ac.uk/external_relations/news_article.cfm?reference=363

 

[piper]

Interesting piper but my piece of timber beam is 20ft long

I wasn't implying your piece was a 'chip' Michael. Just thought it was an amusing bit of history following on from Penners' contribution. Of course, three feet was just what they were ALLOWED to take out! Though 20 feet would be difficult to conceal down the trouser leg.
When my parents bought an old house in Shrewsbury - a long way from the sea - they were told that there were "old ships timbers" under the oak hall floor. However, all this scepticism doesn't mean there are not examples which could very likely really be from ships. I'm sure they would be near the coast though. In our house there are some old purlins in the roof which have regularly spaced old square mortice holes too.

 

[K8]

I have an old mast as my main beam, it tapers quite a bit from one end to the other, don't know what the wood is, could be Elm and it is as hard as nails

 

[middi]

Unless there is clear evidence that the timber in question is from a ship one has to presume that this " reclaimed" timber has been, most likely, been reclaimed from an earlier building.

As already mentioned by Penners, Flyfisher and others, there are a number of valid reasons why " that building made out of old ship,s timbers" is a misguided belief.

True, there is recorded history where ships timbers have been utilised in some buildings, mainly along estuaries along the English coast, either from dimantled vessels or shipwrecks. Trasporting any sizeable timber(s) overland into the countryside wouid have made no economic sense.

1) transporting a piece(s) wood 10/20 miles across a pot holed muddy road with a horse and cart or similar would have been the equivalent of purchasing a ton of sand from a building yard 100/200 miles away by today's standard.

2) It would have been a lot easier to cut down the nearest oak tree to the building site.

3) Green oak is extremely easy to work and " interlocks" the building during the seasoning process.

4) "ship's" timbers are usually the incorrect shape or dimension that can be used in quantity from a single vessel or shipwreck

I have lost count the many times I overheard people comment, usually in public houses, " just look at those beautifull ship's timbers", I just despair, as these comments are usually directed at a pub 50 miles inland, the re-used timbers put together in a mixed up shamble that follow no logic vernacular building pattern.

The directors or breweries owners should be arrested for misleading the public.

Having said my lot on this subject, do not despair, your could well have a genuine ship's timber.

 

[Penners]

20 feet would be difficult to conceal down the trouser leg.

Rumour has it that Errol Flynn managed this somehow.

 

[Gareth Hughes]

I own an old Baptist chapel on the south coast which is pretty much in its original form. ....According to the records The chapel was built in 1817 but having carefully removed a few t&g panels here and there to expose sections of brickwork, I am lead to believe that the gable end stucco frontage of this building with its neo classical features was built sometime later .....but to also form a full height front extension creating a new entrance lobby and an extended balcony above.

I’ve just been lifting sections of floor boards in the “extended” balcony .....below the balcony floorboards is one of the supporting beams which is a solid piece of timber about 6”x 6” square and about 20ft long held at various points from the ground floor below by a series of painted metal columns probably cast iron. Whilst most of the timber in the chapel is pine, including the wall plates, this wooden beam under the balcony floor is rock hard so I suspect it is probably oak.

One of the curious aspects of this beam is that it has a regular series of square holes in its top face each 2”x 2”square x 2”deep spaced approximately 1ft apart and there seems to be no apparent purpose for them. Considering I’m in a south coast location, I did wonder if this might be a piece of salvaged ships timber installed in 1873.
If so, are there any shipwrights out there who might know what part of the ship or boat this might be?

It would be interesting to know whereabouts in relation to the probable original (pre-extension) plan of the building this timber now sits. Rather than being a ship's timber, from your description it sounds like the bottom (or, if it has been relocated, the top) rail of a stud partition (or maybe the base of the dividing partitions of a set of box pews, though it's a bit beefy for that).

 

[K8]

to answer an earlier post in the 1800s there was a ship building facility less than half a mile from my cottage so I suspect that the beam is a mast.

 

[Penners]

to answer an earlier post in the 1800s there was a ship building facility less than half a mile from my cottage so I suspect that the beam is a mast.

Is the beam round? If so, then perhaps you could be right. But if it's roughly square section, then I don't think the taper is irrefutable evidence of its having been a mast.

Trees taper too!

 

[Nemesis]

This place is well worth seeing, but:

The eight pillars in the church, seven of which are of wood, have led to great controversy as, according to tradition, they were made from the masts of vessels in the great Spanish Armada. This has been proved to be untrue, as a document in the British Museum dated 1575 states that the masts and yards of the ships were to be of the best Prussian pine from Flanders. Upon examination by experts from the Kew Botanical Gardens, of samples bored from the columns, they were discovered to be made of oak; further, the ships of that great fleet were much too small to carry masts of such weight and size.

http://www.mernick.co.uk/thhol/stmatthi.html

See also

The coherence of the plan is sustained by the Classical interior (plates 14b, 15a, 15b). The columns are neither correctly Doric nor Tuscan. That the intended order was Tuscan is suggested by the plain entablature and comparison of the mouldings with early seventeenth-century 'Tuscan' orders. (fn. d) The entablature was not returned into the transepts, reinforcing the east-west axis. The oak columns stand on low ashlar plinths. (fn. e) There is no evidence for the tradition that the columns are re-used ships' masts; their mortices and patching are explicable in relation to galleries that carried across the transepts, and the repair of stress cracks. It was presumably stress that made replacement of the north-west crossing column necessary, perhaps in 1722. The other columns have castiron cores, presumably inserted in 1867–8 in preference to further replacement. (ref. 29) The north-east crossing column has iron braces at its base, a repair method more characteristic of shipbuilding than of architecture. (ref. 30) The column timbers continue above the capitals and are evidently tenoned into the entablature beams. The integration of the plan, the columns and the roof structure suggests that these features, with the depressed, almost elliptical, vaults and flat-ceiled aisles, are all contemporary. The plan, the 'Tuscan' order and the ceilings can all be paralleled at the Broadway Chapel. There is no reason to ascribe the basic form and structure of the church to any date other than 1642–54.

http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.asp?compid=46473