VIC 96 in Admiralty days as No C668. Seen at LimehouseWharf on the River Thames in the late 1970s. VIC 96 TRUST

Restoration work on this vessel isn’t just a matter of popping out to the shed during the evening. It requires some serious planning to bring man and woman-power, materials and resources together at the same time. Much of the work has been carried out over long weekends and short holidays with specialised services being contracted in at the appropriate time.
VIC 96 is technically a steam coasting lighter, sometimes known as a ‘Puffer’ and is one of 98 Victualling Inshore Craft (VIC) built between 1941-1945 to the order of the Ministry of War Transport. They were a small but essential part of the extensive wartime ship-building programme established by the Government. The craft under construction were numbered in their thousands and included warships, ocean-going merchantmen and coastal craft of various designs.
The first of the VICs built were based on the design of the traditional Scottish ‘Puffer’, which had been carrying cargo around the western isles of Scotland since the late 19th century. Incidentally, the term ‘puffer’ came from early canal craft, which had engines with no condensers and steam was exhausted into the air in much the same way as a steam locomotive or traction engine.
There were two series of VICs built during the war. The first version had a length of 66ft with a cargo capacity of 100 tons, the engine controls were in the small wheelhouse and there was cramped accommodation for three or four crew members. The funnel was directly in front of the wheelhouse and the vessel was powered by a simple five-tube boiler. The second type of VIC was 85ft long with a 120-ton cargo capacity and was fitted with a much more efficient Cochrane multi-tube boiler. It could accommodate six crew members and even had the luxury of a small galley. The hull design had been changed to the more austere hard rectangular lines used on wartime craft and the familiar sheer and rounded hull of the original ‘puffer’ had been lost. The engine controls were no longer in the wheelhouse and this made the larger craft more difficult to handle.

It seems unusual that this whole series of small craft was built to be powered by steam as the diesel engine had by this time already become standard for vessels of this size. However the reason is simple. With the war effort producing pressure on all manufacturers, especially diesel engine builders, it made sense to use the skills and capacity that was available among the steam engine builders. Small yards could handle construction of the VICs and all but one of the ships were built in England with the main production coming from Dunstons of Thorne who built 40 and Isaac Pimblott who turned out 25. The others came from small yards around the country including two built by Pollocks of Faversham. This firm had originally received an order for four VICs but two were later cancelled and eventually the hulls, which had been half-finished, were used as motor barges by the London & Rochester Trading Co. One of the Faversham-built vessels was VIC 56, which survives and is now berthed at Trinity Buoy Wharf near the East India Dock, London.