The ''Daniel Adamson'' also known as ''The Danny'' is a historic

steam-powered A steam engine is a heat engine that performs mechanical work using steam as its working fluid. The steam engine uses the force produced by steam pressure to push a piston back and forth inside a cylinder. This pushing force can be tra ...

tugboat A tugboat or tug is a marine vessel that manoeuvres other vessels by pushing or pulling them, with direct contact or a tow line. These boats typically tug ships in circumstances where they cannot or should not move under their own power, suc ...

History

Steamer Daniel Adamson having just passed the Barton Road Swing Bridge and Barton Aqueduct

The boat was built as a tug-tender in 1903 for the Shropshire Union Canal Company and named the ''Ralph Brocklebank''. Between 1903 and 1915 it towed barges, and carried passengers, along the Mersey, thereafter it only towed freight. The boat was bought by the

Manchester Ship Canal Company The Manchester Ship Canal is a inland waterway in the North West of England linking Manchester to the Irish Sea. Starting at the Mersey Estuary at Eastham, near Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, it generally follows the original routes of the rivers M ...

in 1921 and used as a tug, however it was also operated as a cruise boat between Manchester and Eastham that included a return train-trip from Ellesmere Port to Manchester. In 1936 it was converted into a luxury passenger vessel and renamed after the first chairman of the Manchester Ship Canal Company,

Daniel Adamson Daniel Adamson (30 April 1820 – 13 January 1890) was an English engineer who became a successful manufacturer of boilers and was the driving force behind the inception of the Manchester Ship Canal project during the 1880s. Early life Adamson ...

. In 1986 the boat was at the

National Waterways Museum The National Waterways Museum (NWM) is a transport museum, at Ellesmere Port in the English county of Cheshire, which concentrates on the history of Britain's navigable inland waterways. Until 2010, the Waterways Trust operated three sites, incl ...

in Ellesmere Port. By 2004 the boat was in disrepair and under threat of being scrapped, a rescue plan was initiated that resulted in a £3 million award from

The National Lottery The National Lottery is the state- franchised national lottery established in 1994 in the United Kingdom. It is regulated by the Gambling Commission, and is operated by Allwyn Entertainment, who took over from Camelot Group (who had been runni ...

that enabled ''The Danny'' to return to service as a cruise boat.

Construction

''The Danny'' was built in 1903 by the Tranmere Bay Development Co, of Birkenhead. It is propelled by a coal powered steam engine. It has a beam of 7.47m, a depth of 1.83m, a length of 33.53m and has a gross tonnage of 173.

Listing

''The Danny'' has been listed on the UK's national register of historic ships.

Usage

Since 2017 ''The Danny'' has operated as a cruise boat along the Manchester Ship Canal.

External links

Official website of The Danny

References

{{reflist Steamboats Tugboats of the United Kingdom