Name James Loader

JAMES LOADER is a narrow boat tug, built by Joseph Worsey in 1946 at Walsall. Her hull is carvel built of oak side planking, with an elm bottom and iron frames. She has a counter stern and a pointed bow with a plumb curved stem. Her current engine is a Gardner 2LW diesel, with two cylinders and twenty-four brake horsepower. She worked entirely on the Birmingham Canal Navigation between 1946 and 1964, towing coal barges in trains of up to six in number, each weighing twenty-eight tons. 

A correspondent who rode with the crew as a boy in 1961 recalled steering both the coal boats and JAMES LOADER, describing the tug at the time as grey with a red deck, fitted with a coal stove and two bench seats, and powered by her original 34hp Perkins engine. He recalled one journey towing four laden coal boats from the Hollybank railhead to Wolverhampton power station, during which the tug's propeller fouled on debris while negotiating the Wednesfield turn, requiring the vessel to be taken into the pound at Heath Town for clearing.

In 1964, she was sold out of the Leonard Leigh Fleet to Peter Freakly who converted her accommodation for leisure use. Over the next twenty-eight years, the vessel covered approximately 20,000 miles on Britain's canals and is still in use today. 

She has operated as a pair with the Small Woolwich butty BETELGEUSE. During the winters of 2004 and 2005, they traded retail coal and smokeless fuel on the Kennet and Avon Canal, having loaded at Buckby top lock during the summer. In 2006, they carried Tanya Kovat’s art installation ‘Meadow’ from Bath to London. JAMES LOADER has also performed several towing duties, including the delivery of day boat BCN N0108 to Uxbridge for sand carrying, the recovery of the butty LUCY, towing houseboat DRAGONFLY between the Basingstoke Canal mooring and dry dock, and towing BETELGEUSE from Braunston to the River Wey and return for a cargo of timber.

As of 2026, examination of the wooden hull during restoration work has found the planking to be largely rotten, including original material and later repairs. Earlier repairs to the stern and stem were also found to have weakened the structure. Following this, the owner has decided to build an exact replica of the hull in steel, with each original plank replicated by a steel plank and the hull shape recreated from measurements, lines, cross sections and plans taken from the original. The steel hull is under construction at MGM Boatyard, Thurmaston, Leicestershire. The original brass, iron and steel fittings, including the stem iron, rudder, skeg and T studs, are to be reused, along with the Gardner 2LW engine, cabin lining, stern cabin fittings and portholes. The cabin exterior is to be built in steel to its present dimensions, which date from a replacement in the 1960s. Some above deck timber in good condition is to be reused or replaced in timber.