GMI Events – Page 5 – Greenwich Maritime Centre

Greenwich Maritime Institute Open Day

We are pleased to announce that staff of the Greenwich Maritime Institute (GMI) will be available at the Univeristy of Greenwich Open Day on Saturday 23rd February 2013 to discuss the following:

• The Importance of the Sea
• GMI Taught Masters Programmes: Maritime History; International Maritime Policy; Maritime Security; Short Courses
• GMI Research: Staff research projects and Mphil/PhD research
• Networking and Employability

If you are passionate about the sea and interested in finding out more about the GMI, we would love for you to come along to Greenwich and have a chat with us at our stand. All you have to do is register and we will see you on the day!.

We will also be available for online chat from 10am – 3pm GMT on Saturday 23rd February 2013 via the instant message facility on our facebook page:

If you are unable to attend one of the planned open days then we would also be very happy to make an individual appointment to come and meet with staff and students at other times.

Maritime Law Seminar on Chartering Tankers at Difficult Times

‘Chartering tankers at difficult times: description and the Waller Test’

25th February 2013, 18:00, City Univeristy London

The speaker, Filippo Lorenzon, is one of the most prominent names of the current maritime circle. He is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Law at the Univeristy of Southampton and has been Director of tyhe Institute of Maritime Law since March 2010. He is an editor of ‘Shawcross and Beaumont on Air Law’ and he is a member of the following organisations: ICC (UK) Committee on Transport and Logistics; the Italian Maritime Law Association (AIDiM); the British Maritime Law Association (BMLA); the European Maritime Law Organisation (EMLO) and the International Bar Association (IBA).

His recent publications include:

Lorenzon, Filippo and Coles, Richard (eds.) (2012) The law of yachts and yachting, Zug, CH, Informa (Maritime Transport Library)
Lorenzon, Filippo; Baatz, Yvonne and Nicoll, Chris (eds.) (2011) Sassoon on CIF and FOB Contracts, Andover, GB, Sweet & Maxwell British Shipping Laws). (In Press).

Location: Room DLG08, Social Science Building, City University London, Whiskin Street, EC1R oJD

The seminars are free to attend and everyone interested is welcome to attend.

The London Universities Maritime Law and Policy Research Group (LUMLP) is a non-profit making collaborative network of London academic institutions with research interests in Maritime Law and Policy, to discuss, disseminate and develop research in Maritime Law and Policy. LUMLP members are drawn from a wide range of academic and research institutions, professional groups, commercial organisations and individuals sharing a common interest in maritime law and policy. The Directorate includes representatives from City University London, London Metropolitan University and the Greenwich Maritime Institute (University of Greenwich).

Public Seminar – The Legacy of the Thames Tideway Tunnel

The next GMI Research Seminar of the 2012/13 series will take place at 6pm on Wednesday 23rd January 2013.

‘Maximising the Legacy of the Thames Tideway Tunnel’ will be presented by Phil Stride, Head of Thames Tideway Tunnel at Thames Water.

The River Thames has become an environmental and public health hazard with untreated sewage regularly overflowing into it from London’s Victorian sewerage system. Built by Sir Joseph Bazalgette over 150 years ago, for a population of four million, this network of sewers still works today but is at capacity, unable to cope with the demands of a population that has now exceeded eight million. The Thames Tideway Tunnel will, if given approval, greatly reduce the amount of untreated sewage currently discharging into the tidal River Thames.

In addition to a cleaner, healthier river, the Thames Tideway Tunnel will secure long term benefits to the capital; providing a river fit for modern day London, whilst attracting business and tourism alike. The creation of 9,350 jobs will support local businesses and communities and create a training and skills legacy that will help inspire a new generation of engineers. In building the tunnel, new permanent public spaces along the river will add to the vitality of London.

For a map and a copy of the full seminar programme please see our website: http://www2.gre.ac.uk/about/schools/gmi/about/events/seminars

Location: Room 075, Queen Anne Court, University of Greenwich, Old Royal Naval College, Greenwich, London, SE10 9LS

Time: Tea and coffee will be available from 5.30pm, the seminar will begin at 6pm and a glass of wine will follow.

The GMI Research Seminars are open to everyone, they are free and no booking is required.

Public Seminar – African Piracy: Is the Medicine Working?

The next GMI Seminar of the 2012-13 series will be taking place on Wednesday 7th November 2012 at 6pm in Room 075, Queen Anne Court. http://www2.gre.ac.uk/about/travel/greenwich

African Piracy: Is the medicine working?

In this seminar, guest presenter Ian Millen will address the current status and trends in both Somali and Gulf of Guinea maritime crime; the different models, the approaches used to mitigate the risk and the possible future outcomes. He will contrast the various types of crime practised either side of the African continent and look at how the risk is treated by regional and international actors. His talk will focus on the operational aspects of Somali piracy and Gulf of Guinea maritime crime, outlining the complexity of tackling the problem from the perspective of a commercial intelligence company.

Cdr Ian Millen RN (retired) is the current Director of Intelligence at Dryad Maritime Intelligence Service Ltd – a market leading commercial intelligence company that helps seafarers quantify and mitigate the risks posed by piracy and other waterborne crime. Ian has over 30 years’ of experience in the direction and conduct of national and multi-national intelligence operations. From strategic analysis, supporting policy and capability development, to direct operational support Ian draws upon a significant amount of intelligence experience and regional knowledge. After a 30 year career in the RN, Ian spent 4 years in the UK’s Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) where he was responsible for the development of information and intelligence systems. The combined experience of maritime intelligence and organised criminality made him a natural choice to lead Dryad’s intelligence effort in support of its wide shipping client base. Ian is a regular contributor to Lloyds List and other maritime publications.

Everyone is welcome to attend, the seminar will begin at 6pm, it is free to attend and no booking is required. Tea and coffee will be available from 5.30pm and a glass of wine afterwards.

http://www2.gre.ac.uk/about/schools/gmi/about/events/seminars

The GMI Seminar Series is sponsored by the Zhonghui Maritime Education Fund.

PUBLIC HISTORY SEMINAR: ‘The “Poor Decayed Seamen” of Greenwich Hospital, 1705-1763.’

UNIVERSITY OF GREENWICH PUBLIC HISTORY SEMINAR

Wednesday 24 OCTOBER 5pm in Queen Anne 063

‘The “Poor Decayed Seamen” of Greenwich Hospital, 1705-1763.’

Dr Martin Wilcox (GMI) and Linda Cunningham (University of Greenwich History Graduate and Discover Greenwich Yeoman)

The Royal Hospital for Seamen at Greenwich was founded in 1694, to house elderly and disabled seamen who had served in the Royal Navy. The first pensioners were admitted in 1705. The Hospital was established on a grand scale, and its buildings, now home to the University of Greenwich, remain one of London’s finest landmarks and centrepiece of the Greenwich World Heritage Site. The history of the institution, at least in its broad outlines, is well known, but until now little research has been conducted into the men who inhabited it.

The Poor Decayed Seamen of Greenwich Hospital was a one-year project funded by the University of Greenwich and conducted by Dr Martin Wilcox, who has constructed a database of admissions to the Hospital up to 1763. The database incorporates information from the Hospital’s Entry Books, which by the 1740s give details of every pensioner’s age, birthplace, place of last abode, time rank in the navy, marital status, number of children, and whether and how he was injured. The Entry Books are complemented by information drawn from the Hospital directors’ minutes and letters, and from petitions of pensioners seeking re-admission after discharge or expulsion. From these it has been possible to draw up a detailed profile of Greenwich pensioners in the first six decades of the institution, and also draw some wider conclusions about the eighteenth-century seafaring labour force.

Linda Cunningham, a Greenwich History graduate, has also undertaken research into the lives of the Greenwich pensioners using newspapers and other archival sources. Together, Linda and Martin will bring a new perspective to the life and times of the Greenwich pensioners.

The database, containing more than 8,000 entries, will shortly be placed online as a resource for family historians and academic researchers alike.

Shivering Sands

A not inappropriate name for one of the many constantly shifting sandbanks of the Thames estuary but no obvious shivering when viewed by a GMI group on October 7^th.

An autumn cruise on the Waverley , the world’s last sea-going paddle steamer, has become a regular feature of the GMI year and from Tower Pier there have been visits to the Medway, Whitstable and this year to the Thames estuary forts.

In 1942/3 a number of fortified towers were positioned to provide anti-aircraft protection for London and its sea approaches, some towers being controlled by the Navy (Rough Sand, Sunk Head, Tongue Sands and Knock John – each with two towers) and others by the Army (Red Sands, Shivering Sands and Nore – each a cluster of seven towers). Favourable tide conditions allowed Waverley to approach closely the Red Sands, Shivering Sands and Knock John towers giving us close-up views of these fascinating remains.

Effectively abandoned by government in the late 1950s the towers reflect the ravages of age and damage by ship collision with Nore dismantled as a hazard to shipping and Shivering Sands losing a tower. Several of the towers became homes for pirate radio stations – remember Screaming Lord Sutch? – and one for a time became the Independent Principality of Sealand!

Old Father Thames is far from dead and Waverley provides an unsurpassed picture of the estuary environment, navigation problems, the history and down-river migration of port activity, progress on the new Thames Gateway port project, the variety of shipping and trade and this year a security problem of great historical interest. On the return up river in the warmth of the restaurant an erudite discussion on the origin and distinction between terms such as quay, wharf, pier, berth and mooring – these GMI students! Altogether an enjoyable social and interesting academic day – why not join us next year?

Text and Image: Dr David Hilling

Public Seminar Announcement – ‘Managing Global Enterprises in the Late 18th Century: Anthony Calvert of the Crescent, London’

Camden, Calvert & King was one of Britain’s first truly global enterprises. In 1792, the firm had 8,300 tons of shipping at sea, on 25 different voyages to Africa, the West Indies, to Africa and the West Indies (in the slave trade), the East Indies, Botany Bay and the East Indies (in the convict trade) and the Pacific (in the whale trade). While none of the firm’s own records have survived, Gary Sturgess and Ken Cozens have reconstructed their business affairs from archives scattered across the world. This seminar will focus on the managing partner, Anthony Calvert, how he built the firm and the methods through which he created a global enterprise.

Speaker Gary Sturgess currently holds the New South Wales Premier’s Chair of Public Service Delivery at the University of NSW and the Australia and New Zealand School of Government, and has an Adjunct Professorship at the School of Government and International Relations, Griffith University in Brisbane, Queensland. His career has been spent in government, as Cabinet Secretary in the NSW Government in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and as Director of a corporate think tank in London, specialising in public service contracting.

Everyone is welcome to attend, the seminar on Wednesday 10th October 2012 which will begin at 6pm, it is free to attend and no booking is required. It will be held in Room 075, Queen Anne Court, University of Greenwich, Old Royal Naval College, Greenwich, London, SE10 9LS.

GMI Research Seminar – ‘The Secretive Billionaire: Sir John Reeves Ellerman’, 14th March 2012

Michaela Barnard of the Maritime Historical Studies Centre, University of Hull will presenting the next GMI Research Seminar of the 2011/12 programme on Wednesday 14^th March 2012. Her paper is ‘The ‘secretive billionaire’: Sir John Reeves Ellerman and the Ellerman Wilson Line, c.1916-1926.’.

A so-called secret rich list’ of Britain’s wealthiest private citizens produced in 1929 revealed that Sir John Reeves Ellerman (1862-1933) had accumulated assets well beyond those of his contemporaries. Indeed, with annual earnings totalling £389 million in 1929 and liquid assets of around £9 billion, Ellerman’s fortune, according to Rubenstein, ’was three times greater than the second largest British estate left prior to the 1970s’. It remains, however, that relatively little is known – either personally or professionally – about Ellerman who had an ‘almost morbid passion for secrecy’. Indeed, the extent to which he remained aloof from public life is encapsulated in one obituary describing him as ‘… the Silent Ford, the invisible Rockefeller’.

Ellerman’s business empire embraced a variety of industries including finance, newspapers and brewing. But shipping ranked as one of his earliest and leading concerns. In 1916, with a view to consolidating his position in north-west Europe, Ellerman bought the Hull-based shipping company of Thomas Wilson, Sons & Co., Ltd (TWSC) – reputedly the largest privately owned shipping company in the world at that time – for the sum of £4.1 million. This paper considers a number of sources relating to TWSC, re-styled Ellerman’s Wilson Line (EWL), during the period 1916-1926, including the extensive correspondence between Ellerman and the Managing Director of TWSC/EWL, Oswald Sanderson (1863-1926). This, it is anticipated, will serve to illuminate our understanding of both large-scale British business during this period and, more particularly, Ellerman – the ‘secretive billionaire’.

The seminar will take place in room 075, Queen Anne Court at 6pm. Tea & Coffee will be available from 5.30pm and a glass of wine afterwards. The seminar is free and there is no need to book, everyone is welcome.

GMI Short Course Programme 2012

We are delighted to announce that we are running an exciting short course programme again this year which covers a variety of historical and contemporary subjects.

• Maritime Crime: There’s Wreckers About – Saturday 9th June – £60

• Silencing the Silent Service?: Naval Propaganda and Censorship during the Second World War – Thursday 14th June – £60

• ‘Enemies of All Humanity’: Sea Piracy A Modern Perspective – Saturday 16th June – £60

• Caricature and the Navy during the Eighteenth Century – Thursday 28th June – £60

• Baroque Navies at War: Britain, the Netherlands and France 1688-1713 – Friday 29th and Saturday 30th June – £120

• China’s Rise as a Powerful Maritime Nation: Factors and Influences – Friday 20th July – £60

Everyone is welcome to register for these courses so please do feel free to register yourself or pass on to anyone else you think may be interested. You can find more information about each course and a registration form on our website: http://bit.ly/wATcht

Call For Papers – Maritime Law & Policy Postgraduate Research Student Conference 2012

Friday 23rd March 2012
City University, Northampton Square, London, EC1V 0HB

The London Universities Maritime Law and Policy Research Group are proud to announce that the Third Annual Maritime Law and Policy Conference for researchers and postgraduate students will be taking place on Friday 23 March 2012. We invite all researchers and postgraduate students wishing to present their research work to a friendly and supportive environment to join us at this conference. We welcome submissions in all areas of Maritime Law and Policy, including relevant interdisciplinary work.

Each speaker will present their research ideas or papers for 15 minutes and a 10 minute discussion will follow. There will also be invited speakers who will focus on a topic relevant to the maritime law and policy research communities. Researchers and postgraduate students who do not wish to give a presentation are also very welcome to attend.

You must prepare an abstract (250 words) and send to Mrs Suzanne Louail: s.louail@gre.ac.uk by 2nd March 2012.

To register your place as either a delegate or a presenter please complete the booking form: http://bit.ly/zxpOSg

For information about the London Universities Maritime Law and Policy Research Group please please email Mrs Suzanne Louail at s.louail@gre.ac.uk or Prof. Jason Chuah at Jason.Chuah.1@city.ac.uk or visit http://lumlpg.blogspot.com/