This summer, M-Shed is celebrating the 90th birthday of the Bristol City Docks’ fire float Pyronaut, launched from the Albion Dockyard in 1934 and still going strong as a working boat in the museum collection. This weekend (22-23 June 2024) has been set aside to celebrate
But did you know she has a sister, the Avonmouth Docks fire float Endres Gane, launched two years later in 1936.
Endres Gane was almost identical to Pyronaut and served in the same role of floating ‘fire-engine’ at Avonmouth Docks. Without the lowered ‘cockpit’ at the stern she was squarer, providing a flat non-nonsense fire-fighting deck. She worked right through World War Two and continued in service until 1967.
She worked hard for a living in the ever-busy port. In May 1944, during the build-up to D-Day, two explosions on an American cargo ship, the Pan Massachusetts carrying fuel and ammunition, caused a major fire and three fatalities. Endres Gane pumped for eight hours to help control and extinguish the blaze. Seven years later in September 1951, she was part of the team who took on Avonmouth’s largest ever fire when the Regent Oil Company’s storage compound ignited during the off-loading of a cargo of oil. Twelve tanks containing four million gallons of oil were alight, several of them exploding. It took 835 firefighters and 38 hours to extinguish the fire.
After retirement in 1967, Endres Gane started a new life as a houseboat. She is moored at Mud Dock the upstream side of the Prince Street Bridge – only a few hundred yards from her sister. No doubt they salute each other when Pyronaut goes up that way.
Why Endres Gane? In 1933 when the new fire floats were commissioned by the Fire Brigade Committee, the chairman was Philip Endres Gane owner of the well-known Bristol furniture manufacturer P E Gane Ltd. He died later that year and never got to see the floats launched.
Endres was Philip’s German uncle’s surname and his parents had chosen it as his middle name, a tradition he continued with his own son Crofton Endres Gane. Crofton was a Quaker, one of the founders of the Folk House and was often involved in charitable work including making donations to support the Fire Brigade. It’s possible the Fire Brigade committee wanted to name the boat Philip Endres Gane in his memory or that Crofton had made a donation to the project and specified using the family surnames.
Crofton Gane and P E Gane Ltd were important contributors to contemporary furniture and interior design in the 1930s and commissioned Bauhaus furniture designer Marcel Breuer amongst others to design for them. Their furniture was retailed through their own shops in Bristol and South Wales and nationally through prominent shops including Heal’s in London. The Stradling Collection in Park Row, Bristol has a collection of their work and there is more information on their website and on the Stradling Collection blog. After P E Gane closed in 1954, Crofton set up the Gane Trust. Still fully active, its aims are to support art, craft, design and social care primarily in the South West and South Wales, where Crofton had his businesses.
Thanks to Chris Fewtrell and Michael Ellery (https://bristolcitydocks.co.uk/the-grove/) and the late Andy King (formerly Senior Curator – Social, Industrial & Maritime History and Working Exhibits Bristol Culture, M Shed Museum) for additional information.
For more information see:
Pyronaut’s 90th Birthday, M-Shed blog. (accessed 19.06.2024)
Dennis Hill, 2007. Firefighting in Bristol, 1877-1974. An Illustrated History. Tempus
Colin Momber, 1997. Bristol Seaport. A pictorial history from the 1950s to the present day. Redcliffe Press
Ken Stradling Collection Blog 