Image of the day

Bosun Kuhlmann joined the staff of the School of Navigation in April 1944 and retired at the end of the 1962 Summer Term.  He was born in Leeuwerden in Holland in 1894.  His first trip to sea was as a deck boy in the German ship Lansbeck a four masted sailing ship.  He joined his first British ship, the Norman Monarch just before the 1st World War and during that war served as Bosun in numerous other British vessels, three of which were torpedoed. After the end of the war, he joined Blue Star Line.  He was on the Andora Star in 1940 which was sunk with the loss of over 1000 lives.  He was also on the Andalucia Star which was torpedoed off the West African Coast and was eventually rescued from the sea after spending 3 hours in the water, by one of the ships lifeboats.   The after effects of that were such that he was prevented from serving as sea any more and continued to serve as an assistant shore Bosun with Blue Star for 9 months before joining the School of Navigation.   I personally got on very well with him as before joining Warsash had been in the Boy Scouts and was well versed in tying knots and doing rope splices etc!    John Downs

This is a reminder of 50 years ago!! I got on well with him as Hohn - he taught me a lot about seamanship.
Not quite so keen on the 'mudlark' aspect though!

Bosun Kuhlman and I joined in the same term. He was immediately popular and was all that a bosun should be. A big man, big hearted, with a great sense of humour and an air of authority generated by his vast knowledge of seamanship. An ideal man for teaching young lads.
Two incidents stand out in my memory. He was giving us a test in which he would say a word and we had to write down the meaning. One of them sounded like 'overall' but, being a Dutchman, he was unable to pronounce the English 'h' and consequently, we wondered whether he meant 'overhaul'. But none of us would dream of embarrassing him with the question.
On another occasion, When Commander Stewart was discussing the cleaning of varnish brushes, someone blurted out that the Bosun used petrol. 'Oh does he?' Was Stewart's menacing reply. It was wartime and petrol rationing was very strict. We all hoped that our hero would not be in trouble.
On returning for 2nd. Mate, Kuhlman greeted me by name without the slightest hesitation, it gave me a very warm feeling

I can always remember his warning us of the results which would come to us all if we sat on damp canvass.