Drayman on:
[Wikipedia]
[Google]
[Amazon]
A drayman was historically the driver of a dray, a low, flat-bed wagon without sides, pulled generally by horses or mules that were used to transport all kinds of goods.
Transport occupations
Port infrastructure
A drayman was historically the driver of a dray, a low, flat-bed wagon without sides, pulled generally by horses or mules that were used to transport all kinds of goods.
Modern use
The word "drayman" is used in U.S. ports as the over the road highwaytruck driver
A truck driver (commonly referred to as a trucker, teamster, or driver in the United States and Canada; a truckie in Australia and New Zealand; a HGV driver in the United Kingdom, Ireland and the European Union, a lorry driver, or driver in ...
s who delivers containers
A container is any receptacle or enclosure for holding a product used in storage, packaging, and transportation, including shipping.
Things kept inside of a container are protected on several sides by being inside of its structure. The ter ...
to and from the port.
A drayage
Drayage is the transport of goods over a short distance in the shipping and logistics industries. Drayage is often part of a longer overall move, such as from a ship to a warehouse. Some research defines it specifically as "a truck pickup from ...
company and draymen provide carriage from or to a port or railway ramp. The items hauled are either ocean or rail containers. The contents are either cross docked for outbound long haul carriage or the container is drayed to the receiver who unloads it. The drayman then hauls the empty back to the ocean port or rail yard.
The term is also used for brewery
A brewery or brewing company is a business that makes and sells beer. The place at which beer is commercially made is either called a brewery or a beerhouse, where distinct sets of brewing equipment are called plant. The commercial brewing of bee ...
delivery men, even though routine horse-drawn deliveries are almost entirely extinct. Some breweries still maintain teams of horses and a dray, but these are used only for special occasions such as festival
A festival is an event ordinarily celebrated by a community and centering on some characteristic aspect or aspects of that community and its religion or cultures. It is often marked as a local or national holiday, mela, or eid. A festival c ...
s or opening new premises. There are some breweries still delivering daily/weekly using horses, Hook Norton in Oxfordshire and Sam Smiths in Tadcaster being two of them.
''Punch Almanac'' (June 24, 1908) published a cartoon, making fun of a social distinction between omnibus drivers and brewery draymen, as one of two cartoons ridiculing city transport.
Transport occupations
Port infrastructure
References