The Invergordon Archive

Built by Samuel White in Cowes Isle of Wight, launched in 1955 for JP Knight of Rochester transferred to Caledonian Towage at Invergordon in the 1970s and based here until scrapping in Kent in 1983.

My name is Hector Bell and I was mate aboard the Kestrel in this photo and Munro Fraser the captain. Many happy memories of all involved at the time.

Hello you, good to see you are still around.

I was an apprentice at J. Samuel White & Co. (referred to locally as Sammy Whites) from 1953 to 1958. By 1955 I was working in the Fitting Shop and made a couple of "Clinsol Strainers" for Kestrel. They must have been used somewhere in a fuel line as they were designed to collect any gunge in oil and could be easily removed and flushed out in about 30 minutes flat.

I vaguely remember her going to Portsmouth where she was hitched to a huge horizontal Salter scale to test her pulling power.

J. Samuel White built good ships, including the ones I worked on.

Great to see this picture of M.T.Kestrel. I was briefly employed by Caledonian Towage in 1975 after my time in the RFA and was 2nd Engineer on board her from February through to May. I lived in Garve at the time which was some way away and I spent many a cold night on board her alone with no shore power and just the sound of her and the lapping water. Pretty sure Munro Fraser was the skipper then too. Fond memories.

Also worked on Kestrel early seventies; Steve Parsons was skipper then Fraser Forbes. Nice to see her again. Not heard from you Bruce for along time, last I heard you were in Australia.

The Kestrel along with the Kenley were both scrapped at Sittingbourne, Kent in 1983.

I spent my school holidays on the kestrel with my uncle in the 60s who was the chief engineer.

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