All keels and sloops had a cog boat as a tender, it would have been impossible to work a sailing vessel on the Humber without one.

Cog boats were used to run out the kedge anchor and warping line across a dock or canal, or to move crew about if the parent ship was at the wrong side of a waterway. In times of distress, they acted as the lifeboat or rescue vessel.

A full sized cog boat was twelve feet long and five feet six wide, clinker-built of larch on oak, made with copper fastenings.

Cog boats were always sculled standing up, by a single oar over the stern. Cog boat sculling races were a keenly contested feature of the keel and sloop water sports events.

Depending on the Skipper, some were also fitted with a mast and sail, either a standing lug or sprits’l.

Cog boats typically took a lot of wear and tear and neither COMRADE or AMY HOWSON’s original survived. The HKSPS commissioned new, traditionally built cog boats for their ships to put in use from the 2004 sailing season.