
Time Capsules
Bristol, Wapping WharfLoading or unloading a freighter? With the passage of time and absence of notes I'm not certain now. It would make sense if the freighter was unloading cargo for St Anne's Boardmills, accessible by barge upstream. But the stance of the figures on the barge suggest perhaps they are unloading the barge. Whichever procedure, it demonstrates the labour-intensive dockside activities in the days before containerisation. The barge would have to be unloaded or loaded again, and the same procedure possibly adopted at the end of the freighter's voyage too.
Picture added on 28 February 2010