The Queen Victoria Seamen’s Rest (known to seamen and locals as the “Queen Vic”) on East India Dock Road, London, has been a refuge for merchant seamen since its founding in 1843. It is now the largest seafaring residential programme left in the United Kingdom.
As the shipping industry has changed over time, so has the demographic of the Seaman’s Rest. In the nineteenth and early twentieth century, transient seafarers stayed whilst docked in London before sailing on. Now, those that call the Queen Vic home are in the main homeless tenants and elderly, retired sailors of which there is a large contingent of former Somaliland merchant seamen: The Fortune Men.
All come from the former colony of British Somaliland and became sailors to escape the poor economic conditions of their homeland in the mid-twentieth century. Once in the United Kingdom, they gravitated to Somali communities that were in close proximity to ports and the shipping industry. Immigrants from Somalia were legally restricted to working in the shipping industry until the 1950’s and often paid 25% below the pay of average British workers.
In Somaliland, they were nicknamed “The Fortune Men” because they promised to bring wealth back home. However, many have become either too old or accustomed to life away from their own shores, and will probably see out the remainder of their lives at the Queen Vic.
