Origin of Code Names for Engineers' Wagons

[StevieG]

Does anyone know, or ever heard, of the reason why engineering train wagons are code-named on an aquatic theme?
Arising from some general conversation recently, we drifted into postulating on why the majority of these vehicles over decades have been given names of aquatic creatures etc., e.g., Whale, Tench, Grampus, Sealion, Mermaid, Shark, Seacow....
A little 'Goggling' on the 'net has not produced much.

But then someone with past military transport corps connections offered a passed-down account that, during the Great War, planning by the military for moving men and machines included needing the ability to specify types of wagon for types and quantities of equipment, munitions, materials etc., , but it proved very difficult owing to greatly varying means of vehicle referencing used amongst the many private railway companies. And as a result, the idea of some sort of common reference terms was developed (presumably by someone with a marine interest), adopted and imposed.

Has anyone any support for this or alternative explanations?

[Bill Bedford]

Does anyone know, or ever heard, of the reason why engineering train wagons are code-named on an aquatic theme?
Arising from some general conversation recently, we drifted into postulating on why the majority of these vehicles over decades have been given names of aquatic creatures etc., e.g., Whale, Tench, Grampus, Sealion, Mermaid, Shark, Seacow....

When the GWR civil engineers asked the wagon shops to produce a small wagon to help moving sleepers, bits of rail etc it was called a skate, as in rollerskate. Later when other engineers wagons were needed they were punningly given fish names for their telegraphic codes.
You might as well ask why brake vans had the telegraphic code TOAD.

[StevieG]

Good point, and interesting information.
Thank you.

[Bryan]

Reminds me of the confusion in the chippy on Holgate Rd during York Remodelling when someone went in with a radio.
Next thing over the air comes "4 Salmon, 10 Mermaids and a Shark wanted now."

[StevieG]

Ha ha. Good one.

On "The Signal Box" 's forum, someone has offered the, perhaps not too obscure, theory that, as most engineers wagons were involved in trains for trackwork, and before welded rail, as all short rails were joined by 'fish'-plates .....

[redtoon1892]

The military theory sounds plausible as during WW11 the allies used code names for enemy aircraft to avoid confusion, the Nakajima became the "Kate", there was a Jill and a Frank and so on, this was carried over into the cold war when Soviet Bloc aircraft acquired similar NATO code names, Foxbat, Flogger etc so everyone was reading from the same hymn sheet so to speak when it came to identifying the aircraft.

[52D]

Slightly off topic but carrying on from last post Aircraft with code names starting with the letter F were fighters, B were bombers, C were cargo and H were helicopters.

[Belvoir]

The origin of code words goes back a long way, pre-dating the use of the telephone - and has most to do with the use of the telegraph system. Remember that telegraph messages were paid for by the word (and in some cases long words were charged extra.)

Somewhere in the loft I have some owners handbooks for cars of the late twenties - and in each there is a list of telegraphic code words for spare parts, and a telegraph address for the manufacturers spares department. Thus an order from, let us say, Messers Fudge (Motor Engineers to the Nobility and Gentry) of Galshiels for a gearbox mainshaft gear cluster, a clutch replacement kit and crankshaft timing sprocket for a Bogle Sporting Sixteeen could go something like

BOGLESPARES COVENTRY STOP ONE BALK ONE BIKE ONE BERK STOP FUDGEMOTORS GALSHIELS STOP

I have a vague memory of reading that the British Army used a similar system with heliographs in the late 19th. century.

[Bryan]

I have a copy of the BTC and BR Standard Codes for Telegraphs dated 1958.
The index for code words runs to nearly a 1000 words from A through SPROUT to ZINC
Including ARTICHOKE, HOPSODASH, INSIXFISH, WARNPASS, WHEELWAG and WINGAGEX

Answers on a postcard.

[manna]

G'Day Gents

Try this one--- DIDYABRINGTHEGROGALONG
manna

You know is summer in South Australia when everyone has dragged the TV into the front garden to watch it in the cool of the evening

[52D]

Funny enough we often used to see what we called the whiskeys running north through Alnmouth in the sixties but i assume this was grain and or malt heading for Speyside rather than the finished product. The thing i remember most was that the colours of those wagons enlivened a rather dull freight scene in those days.

[StevieG]

G'Day Gents

Try this one--- DIDYABRINGTHEGROGALONG
manna

I think I once saw this one in a very specialised phrase-book, in the same section as -- "WHEREAHELLZABOOZE?"

[StevieG]

" The origin of code words goes back a long way, pre-dating the use of the telephone - and has most to do with the use of the telegraph system. Remember that telegraph messages were paid for by the word (and in some cases long words were charged extra.) " ....

Railway telegrams looked very similar, though I doubt that the bulk of them, being rail-internal, involved charges (unless the many pre-grouping companies charged each other for receiving them), but of course, the shortened messages made possible by codewords also made the telegrams quicker to send/receive, so more telegrams could be dealt with by a telegraphist in a certain period than if they were more of a 'long-hand' nature.

[redtoon1892]

I think we are going back along that road with mobile phone texts, my grandson texts me and I dont know the half of what he is on about.