A sentimental journey with retired tug skipper Gordon Petersen by Randi Svensen - Built in 1942 by Lars Halvorsen P/L, Valiant is still going strong.

In October 2009 I introduced Afloat readers to our Compass Southerly, Viking II – nicknamed The Floating Bathtub, ‘The Bathtub’ for short. And she is indeed short: only 23-feet, but every inch beloved.
As I write this, I’m below in her small but comfortable cabin, listening to the halyards flexing in a fresh summer southerly. I’m sure I can hear them playing the notes C and G as sweetly as a well-tuned cello. The wind is so brisk that the boat sways and the waves carry white caps.
But The Bathtub is still on her Sydney Harbour mooring … and the Skipper is taking a nap. Time to wake him. We’re expecting guests!
Gordon Petersen is a retired tug skipper who, with his wife Marilyn, abandoned Sydney for the warmth of Queensland some years ago. After months of email exchanges, I’m looking forward to finally meeting them. Gordon is one of my ‘Old Salts’ contacts I’ve made while researching my upcoming book on the history of tugboats in Australia. Their riveting stories bring tugs and their crews to life: the tragedies and hilarity and everything in between.
Our guests arrive on time, as I would expect of a former tug skipper. Punctuality is ingrained. Tugs must be on time or a very large ship can be left treading water at great cost. Fortunately the Skipper and I are also on time, having spent the previous night on board just to be sure.
I have an uncanny knack for getting lost and misjudging travelling times. I’d probably be late for my own funeral, except that presumably someone else will be driving. On a research trip to Newcastle, I was driving to join a tug job when I became hopelessly lost.
Gordon Petersen’s grandfather, the infamous Axel Petersen, 1930s co-founder of the iconic Sydney towage firm of Mackenzie & Petersen. The tug skipper, Ian Turton, was very understanding when I phoned in my location – a few times – until, obviously exasperated but still very controlled, he said, “Where did you say you are? I’m afraid we can’t keep the ship waiting any longer”. In a credit to Ian’s patience, he allowed me to board his tug the next day, and this time I found the base and arrived at the appointed hour. Ian exacted his revenge, however, by sorely testing my sea-legs when I least expected it!
Gordon Petersen is a guru when it comes to the history of what is referred to in the industry as ‘towage’. His grandfather was the infamous Axel Petersen, 1930s co-founder of the iconic Sydney towage firm of Mackenzie & Petersen.
As we prepared to set off, Gordon’s memories began to flow …
Gordon Petersen off to buy lunch at the Sydney Fish Market. Randi on board The Bathtub. Ex-pearling lugger Tribal Warrior in background.Axel and his brother Harald jumped ship on arrival in Australia not long after Federation. It was the brothers’ second visit from their native Denmark and, with little money, they walked the 100km from Newcastle to Sydney. Both worked as seamen until Axel met with an engineer, Harold ‘Mack’ Mackenzie, and in the 1920s they hatched a plan to establish their own steam-powered fleet. Harald Petersen worked for his brother and Mack until, in 1951 – while somewhat the worse for drink – Harald forgot to add water to the boiler of the steam lighter Gosford and was killed in the ensuing explosion.
From the start, the firm was known around Sydney Harbour as ‘MacPete’.
Axel and Mack first operated from Albion Wharf in Darling Harbour and then moved their base to the end of Erskine Street. Mack was in charge of the office, while Axel took care of the fleet’s operations. According to Gordon, Axel would stop at very little in his quest to make money and save on costs.
Among other things, Axel devised a cunning system of ‘accidentally’ dropping a portion of the coal delivered to Goat Island into the water and then returning once a month or so – under cover of darkness – to retrieve it. For many years not one lump of coal for the Mackenzie & Petersen fleet was paid for.
The 1898-built steam tug Lena bobs up and down on her mooring in Berrys Bay. (Randi Svensen)When the tugs of Goat Island were converted to diesel, Axel realised his game was up and in 1958 he ordered a diesel tug from my uncle, Bjarne Halvorsen, who had left the family firm and was building boats in Berrys Bay. The 150bhp, 46-foot (14m) tug was appropriately named Macpete, (later called the George H. Weyerhauser). The tug is still afloat and named, simply, George.
At the age of 15, Gordon Petersen felt the lure of the sea and went to work for Axel. Eventually known as ‘Tugboat’, the private-school boy was impressed with his title, ‘Assistant Fireman’ on the SS Gosford – until his grandfather set him to work shovelling coal and bagging ashes in the depths of Gosford’s coal bunker.
I’d warned Gordon that The Bathtub isn’t exactly glamorous. She has beautiful lines and is fully watertight but she’s a boat to be enjoyed, not toiled over – at least not until The Shipwright (our son) returns from his overseas jaunt. I hoped Gordon would be happy in anything with natural light and fresh air! (Gordon did finally make it out of the bunker and spent many years as a tug master with Mackenzie & Petersen, and later with Harbour Lighterage.)
Van still operating almost 70 years after she was built.The gods favoured us with fair weather as The Bathtub slipped out of the bay and headed west, past Woolwich Dock and to the moorings off Woolwich Marina, where we’d previously spotted George (ex-Macpete).
Sadly, the tug was nowhere to be seen. She has a special place in Gordon and Marilyn’s hearts. After they had attended a ball on one of their first dates in 1963, Gordon decided to take Marilyn and some friends out on Macpete to take a look at the visiting aircraft carrier, the USS Enterprise. The midnight spin in Macpete attracted the attention of the Water Police and Gordon had quite a time convincing them that, despite their formal attire, he was indeed Macpete’s regular skipper and was authorised to take the tug out.
George.Our sentimental journey looked up when we found two more of Gordon’s commands from his Harbour Lighterage days: Van, and her sister tug, Valiant.
These two 39-foot (11.9m) V-series tugs were built in 1942 by Lars Halvorsen Sons Pty Ltd, the company formed by my family after the death of Lars Halvorsen – my grandfather – in 1936. The tugs were two of six built during WWII for the now-defunct Harbour Lighterage Pty Ltd, then a division of Sydney Ferries.
Gosford & Macpete.The first, Vivian, was built by Cockatoo Island Dockyard in 1937 but the other five came from the Halvorsen yard. The series was named for their Canadian-built ‘Vivian’ diesel engines and their design was based on Canadian lumber tugs, with thick, solid transoms. The first two Halvorsen-built V-series tugs, Vision and Vixen, were built in 1938 and were sent to the middle-east. They were lost within a day of each of each other in June 1942. Of the remaining three, Vim is believed to have been broken up in about 1970, and Van and Valiant are still going strong almost 70 years after they were built.
On the way to our next stop, Berrys Bay, we circled around yet another old Harbour Lighterage tug Sydport which, like Valiant, sports the Harbour Lighterage livery of green hull and buff superstructure, still the livery of Sydney ferries.
Vim & Van built during WWII for Harbour Lighterage.Berrys Bay is a virtual museum on water. There are old ferries, launches and yachts, some sparkling with fresh coats of paint and others looking the worse for wear.
The 1898-built steam tug Lena bobs up and down on her mooring like the grand old dame of the harbour she is. Lena was one of many small steamers on Port Jackson around the turn of the twentieth century, when the vessels took whatever work came their way, including towing smelly garbage barges out to sea for dumping. Sydney Harbour Trust tugs picked up dead animals from the harbour – rats, sheep and even sharks – and transported them to Goat Island where the carcasses were burnt. Towage isn’t always the glamour of ship-handling.
We motored past the historic boatyards of the bay – Stannards, Holmes and Woodleys – and it was then on to Rozelle Bay, where Harbour Lighterage had its base. A boardwalk was constructed when the area was gentrified in recent years, but the old shipbreaker’s crane was left in place on the southern shore.
The Sydney Heritage Fleet’s collection of historic vessels lies on the northern shore of the bay and if you mentally blot out the ‘super-yacht’ marina, it’s not hard to imagine Rozelle Bay when it was a busy part of the maritime and commercial life of Port Jackson. But by 1966, Rozelle Bay was described as “a backwater of Sydney Harbour … fast becoming the graveyard for many small Australian ships … in the process of being dismantled”*. The ships included the famous old Fenwick tugs Heros and Heroine.
Trawler Seaport at Sydney Fish market. Seaport was originally a Harbour Lighterage tug assigned to ‘outside’ work.
Our wander complete, we headed across Blackwattle Bay to the Sydney Fish Market, where we savoured the delights of briny Sydney rock oysters and sweet, juicy prawns and got to know our new friends better. Well-dressed tourists ogled the boats and watched the gulls and pelicans in wonder, while wizened fishermen prepared their vessels for the night’s catch, the odd profanity punctuating the air. Watching the hustle and bustle of the Sydney Fish Market is a great spectator sport and – with much still to talk about – our time there passed quickly.
Finally, after an enjoyable and informative day, it was time to say farewell to the Petersens and in the setting sun we headed back to our mooring on our home-away-from-home, the Floating Bathtub.
* The Log, 21 July 1966