# Silver Gem and Watchful



## Peter Dryden (Apr 14, 2006)

Hi all out there,
I was wondering if anyone can help me. During the mid to late eighties we in Blyth, Northumberland played host to the Scottish prawning fleet. During that time I got to know two of the boats and crew fairly well. One boat was the "Silver Gem" skippered by John Watt of Gardenstown and the other was the "Watchful" skippered by another John possibly West. Does anyone know the whereabouts of these boats and skippers now, I heard a rumour that the Silver Gem had been sold to make way for a bigger boat.


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## grahamtowa (May 27, 2006)

theres a Lancashire owned boat, Glen Carradale CN90, which used to be Watchful PD239, 40 feet, built 1958 by tom summers, listed in FVBI. Don't know if that's the one you're looking for?


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## Gavin Gait (Aug 14, 2005)

Peter Dryden said:


> Hi all out there,
> I was wondering if anyone can help me. During the mid to late eighties we in Blyth, Northumberland played host to the Scottish prawning fleet. During that time I got to know two of the boats and crew fairly well. One boat was the "Silver Gem" skippered by John Watt of Gardenstown and the other was the "Watchful" skippered by another John possibly West. Does anyone know the whereabouts of these boats and skippers now, I heard a rumour that the Silver Gem had been sold to make way for a bigger boat.




The Watchfull BF107 was skippered by John Watt and i've a suspicion that she was scrapped in the late 1990's. John's son still fishes out of Fraserburgh with a 60ft twin rigger tho.

_The Silver Gem was last heard of by me fishing out of the Arbroath area. I was onboard her for 4 months in 1989 at the prawns out of Fraserburgh. She had been "fully modernised" in the 1960's which meant a new wheelhouse!! She still had the original 6 cyclinder Gardener 125hp engine , a drive shaft forrard to a pully drive to work the winch and chain steering. The radar you only switched on long enough to get a fix on what was happening around you and you had to switch it off or it used to break down, they still had a very old version of the Decca ( no fancy plotters here all you had was a roll of Decca paper with the tows on it that you had to check your position by hand on ) and an ancient VHF lol. The skippers name was George Watt and sadly he passed away in the early 1990's after having a heart attack. Best paying boat i've ever been onboard. We burned less than a ton of fuel for a 5 day week so if we grossed £1200 for a week the 4 of us would get £200+ each !!. As for her fate it looks as if she was decommisioned in the late 1990's._ 

Ooooooooopsss the boat i'm describing is almost certainally the Silver Harvest BF , got to make sure I have my brain in gear before posting I guess lol. The Silver Gem BF27 was sold to another Fraserburgh sklipper and was scrapped 2 years ago.

Davie Tait


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## dennis48 (Feb 4, 2007)

James Alec Reid was skipper of Watchful until he took ill,his son went skipper after he died.
I started the sea with him, a good skipper, was 5 years starting with drift net


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## herringringerman (Mar 22, 2008)

david tait.
having trouble getting onto trawlers web site are they something wrong at present if not can u help me reset to get onto site.
cheer,s.
herringringerman.(Applause)


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## K urgess (Aug 14, 2006)

You'll have a long wait for a reply, Davie hasn't logged on for over a year.


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## Dwatt110 (Jul 6, 2015)

*Silver gem*

Hi Peter Derek here johns son, i remember you coming down to the boat. We sold Silver Gem to john Hepburn who built the Antaries BF 27. Silver Gem was sadly scrapped. We bought the Ephraim FR 3 ( now Elshaddai FR 285) then Dad stopped and myself and my brother carried on after changing boats name to Excel.
That one was sold and a further 3 Excel BF110 were built in macduff 1999, 2003 and 2010.
My brother stopped also and now myself and my Son philip work Excel BF 110. Dad has taken this one away on oil work when ive been on holiday.
We were wishing beside Bluth December 2014 thats forst time been back for almost 30 yrs..


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## gamriestu (3 mo ago)

I worked aboard the auld Watchful with the original and new wheehouse under Skipper James Reid (jr). Spent two seasons at the prawns out of Blyth. Crew was James Reid (skipper), Jimmy Burnett, Ben McLean, Arthur Davidson and myself. One memory of that time was coming in at night with a massive haul of prawns on deck to be tailed. By the time we'd cleared a table and I went to put another basket on, my boots had frozen to the deck it was so cold. (Fresh water from the donkey pump in the harbour/river.


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