Brooke Marine 2

After becoming part of the Dowsett Group in 1940, Brooke Marine built five hundred and seven craft of every kind, including ships destined for more than thirty countries across the world. They range through a 17 knot 3,000 ton Refrigerated Vessel and Passenger Cargo Vessels, Trawlers, Research Vessels, Ferries, Salvage Ships, Landing Craft and many other Naval vessels, including Minesweepers, Gun Boats, Lifeboats and Torpedo Craft; some of which are shown in the picture above.

At Brooke Marine, growth continued and new forms of welded aluminium construction were brought forward, initially for vessels up to about 100 tons. On the 1st January 1968 orders for shipbuilding totalled £14.5m and included four Survey Vessels for the Royal Navy, three Salvage Tugs for the US Navy Department and four Patrol Craft for Libya.

Among the many vessels built in 1970 at the shipyard for the Sultanate of Oman Navy, the 'Al Said' Ship No 370, was a 63m Vessel of State, to give her the correct title, and has a most interesting history. She was the Royal Yacht and flagship of the Sultanate of Oman Navy; her hull was of steel and her superstructure of aluminium to minimise top weight. There was accommodation for a crew of thirty-four and she was fitted out to a very high standard; the Sultan's quarters in particular. Her keel was laid in June 1969 and her completion was in November 1970. She returned to the Brooke shipyard in August 1976 for a refit and conversion, when a helicopter deck, among other things was fitted. Her departure to Oman being in June 1977, see photo bottom left. The photo bottom right shows a fire fighting vessel, one of four built in 1980 for Saudi Arabia with Ship No's 429, 430,431,432.

More on Brooke Marine can be found at http://www.oceanpirate.co.uk/pgs/brooke.html .

A man of great energy, Harry L Dowsett drove himself remorselessly to bring business to the UK and his shipyard at Lowestoft. He made personal high level contacts all over the world, indeed in 1967 he covered over 80,000 miles by air on company affairs, mostly in connection with Brooke Marine. His knowledge and interests were unusually wide and varied, indeed he was a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical Engineers reflecting his early work in power transmission using aluminium conductors over spans of three quarters of a mile.

He formed Dowsett Holdings Ltd and Dowsett Engineering (Australia) Pty Ltd as parent companies of groups of subsidiaries engaged in civil engineering and building contracts; plant hire and transport; pre-stressed pre-cast concrete units; mineral recovery; land investment; ship building and marine engineering.

He came from an engineering family and was born in New Zealand in 1907 where his father Harry Melville Dowsett was busy setting up the first Marconi wireless communication installation in the Southern Hemisphere; later in his career he was appointed Principal of the Marconi College in 1935.

by Brooke Archivist & Museum Secretary Peter Hansford.