It is easy to stare in awe at the giant freighters which occasionally make their way along Gravesend’s riverside, but one man remembers when such traffic was commonplace.

Roger Bowen, 88, of Dene Drive, New Barn, has been linked to the shipping industry his whole life, whether it was working for the Orient Line across the world or as a clerk in Tilbury Dock.

However, it was the Messenger River Views column, written weekly by Gravesham mayor Cllr Mick Wenban, which prompted him to come into our offices in High Street and discuss his family links to a Gravesend Riverside icon – the Royal Terrace Pier.

Mr Bowen’s grandfather, Charles, and his father, Alec, ran their shipping agents firm, C.P. Bowens and Sons, from the pier, detailing the comings and goings of vessels on the river for Lloyd’s shipping journal.

The father-of-two has fond memories of working alongside his father and delivering telegrams three times a day, all of which contained detailed lists of ships and other vessels.

He said:“I felt very important because I didn’t have to queue up when I got to the post office at the bottom of Harmer Street. I just said ‘I’m from Lloyd’s’. I was only about 14 at the time.”

Mr Bowen’s family links did not stop with his father and grandfather. His mother used to run a cafe on the pier where tugmen would warm their hands on a cup of tea or agents would tuck into buns.

Mr Bowen said the traffic on the river now is incomparable to the hey-day of his father’s company and often foreign crews would kick their heels ashore in Gravesend before they were called back aboard their ships.

He said: “There used to be about 18 ships passing in about 20 minutes, it was absolutely a different world. There were ships of many different nationalities.

“The crews would come ashore and would go shopping at places like Marks and Spencer and buy clothes to take back with them.”