On an old cornish working boat I sailed you had the wheel behind you.
Even on that boat the wheel turned the head normally.

Cheers

DSK wrote:

Joe wrote:

Bull Feathers!

When the conning officer says hard to Starboard...He wants the ship to
turn hard to starboard.


That is true now, and has been since some time around 1910 in the U.S.


There is no wheeled ship in the world that ever set op the helm ass
backwards.
That would be confusing and dangerious.


This is an issue of some contention among old time boat enthusiasts.
I've heard a lot of people, inclduing a few that knew a lot about
maritime history, say that backwards steering used to be fairly common.
However I don't think it was ever "the standard" and I don't think that
it's the reason for "reverse helm orders." For one thing, there are too
many boats & ships surviving from that time period with their steering
intact. For example, Edson has been in business for a long time and they
never made any "reverse" or "tiller-order" steering mechanisms. OTOH who
knows wether some crusty old geezers rigged their wheels to steer like a
tiller because they liked it that way.

DSK