LAST week I wrote about a fugitive whose plans were dashed when his Canada-bound ship, the Allan liner Hesperian, broke down west of Ireland and was towed to Greenock for repairs.

Upon the vessel arriving at the Tail of the Bank in April 1910, the man was arrested on a charge of deserting his wife and four children.

In November of the following year, the Telegraph told the story of an 11-year-old boy, who was only referred to as Willie, whose disappearance had caused great concern.

A police detective found Willie in the vicinity of Greenock’s Westburn Square in the early hours of 15 November 1911. He had been missing since 10 October. Willie was taken to the house of his grandmother. She was his guardian and greatly relieved to have him safely home.

His simple explanation for going missing was: “I wanted to go to sea.” On the evening he disappeared Willie managed to sneak on board the City of Dortmund at Princes Pier. He hid in one of the ship’s lifeboats for three days and nights.

Happily his plight was discovered by the steward who came across the stowaway, who was by now more dead than alive, when looking out some stores kept in the lifeboat.

A warm drink brought the boy round and he was taken to the crew’s accommodation.

With the exception of the first few days, he was in good health during the voyage and spoke highly of how he was treated by the officers and crew.

He was given some work to do assisting the cook and steward.

The ports of his five weeks away from home took in Oporto, Cadiz, Malaga, Liverpool, Dublin and back to Glasgow.

A member of the crew had managed to get a message to the boy’s grandmother that he had stowed away on the City of Dortmund but the vessel was unable to let him off at Greenock when returning to the Clyde.

Willie left the ship in Glasgow but was initially afraid to go home to Greenock — a fear that proved groundless.

He spent the night sitting beside a tar boiler, which had likely retained some heat from its day’s work, in the company of some other wanderers. The Telegraph story did not advise how Willie finally made his way back to Greenock.

The paper said Willie was of a bright and healthy appearance but had shown himself to be of a somewhat headstrong and wayward disposition, having been guilty of playing truant and “such-like escapades”.

Willie’s uncle, for whom he was named, was the carpenter of the Greenock ship Amazon and among 20 crewmen who lost their lives when the four-masted barque was driven ashore at Port Talbot during a gale three years earlier. There were only eight survivors.

The Amazon had been towed out from Port Talbot docks and was due to set sail with Welsh coal for Chile when she was lost.