AS A 16-year-old lad from South Shields, I signed on as mess-boy with the Southern Venturer whale factory ship operating from the port of North Shields. At that time in my home town, it was every young seaman's dream to become a whaler, where, in relative terms, a fortune could be earned on a six-month expedition to the Antarctic.

I was to complete three expeditions to the Antarctic and the memories I carry from those three years still trouble me. I cannot forget, in the cold inhospitable waters of the Southern Ocean, walking out on deck of the factory ship in the blackness of the night shift. Floodlit by rigging lamps, a 90ft blue whale, its left flank of nine inch thick white blubber peeled away to expose 80ft of scarlet flesh and blood. Whalers with flencing knives, in oil skins and leather thigh boots, wading around amidst screaming whales, in three-four inches of warm, coagulating blood. On one occasion, cast aside and lying in its mother's blood, I saw a young whale foetus, no more than five-foot long, its umbilical cord still leaking life-giving fluids and blood.

These memories should grow dimmer as I have got older, but somehow, the reverse is true. The graphic pictures of what I saw have become more distinct, more horrific and the guilt has deepened over the years.

As the look-out on the catcher vessel, 30ft up the mast, my job was to sight the whales and give directions to the gunner as to where the whale was during the hunt and up to the moment of the kill.

From the moment the whale is sighted, its mental processes are tested and torn beyond description. Its acute hearing will have picked up the whine of the propeller of the catcher and its engine from as far away as three to four miles and it starts to dive and flee. But the whale's pace cannot match its hunter and gradually the catcher draws within shooting distance. Her only option now, to evade this terrifying noise in her ears, is to dive. She dives to 1km and stays there. The noise above her ceases, the gunner waits, he has plenty of time and patience. She changes direction under water. The noise above her recommences. The ship's basic sonar has her position. She surfaces 200m ahead. The gunner brings the catcher about - she is now dead ahead and swimming furiously - her flukes raising mountains of spume. Thirty-foot high, I now see her below and can also see red excreta streaming behind her, colouring her wake a deep orange. She is petrified and defecating with fear. Seventy metres, the gunman is shouting instructions - degree to port, degree to starboard, hold in. More speed, he barks, 50m. The gun, on a hair-trigger balance, is sighted on the huge grey-black mountain of blubber rising and falling ahead, while her tail flukes thresh the water in more and more panic. The bang of the gun shatters the quiet of the early morning. The 150lb solid steel harpoon snakes off across the white turbulent water with metre upon metre of sizzling red-hot nylon rope following it. The harpoon buries itself deep into the back of the whale's blubber. The catcher reduces speed to take the tension. The rope snaps taut and her 90-ton weight reduces the rope to half its diameter. For a moment the whale is quiet, then slowly she disappears below the surface.

The rope follows her into the deep, then stops. Everywhere is still, everything is deathly quiet. The sea is now flat calm, ice floes nudge the hull. Suddenly, the rope tightens, the catcher starts to move, slowly, but the engines remain quiet. The whale is now pulling the 400-ton catcher from a harpoon buried in her flesh. After what seems an eternity of probably 20-30 minutes, the black mountain once again rises from the sea. She is now threshing madly and blowing a mixture of vapour and blood through her blowhole. Slowly but surely she is reeled in to the forward end of the catcher and the rope is cut.

Alongside the catcher, she is now turning slowly onto her side exposing the beautiful white-grey speckled fluted belly, still slapping the calm sea with her fail flukes, she lies mortally wounded, deep in the middle of her own scarlet sea. She is dispassionately marked with a 14ft pole and left completely alone, her eyes glaze, following the catcher into the distance. It could take up to eight hours for her finally to die. She will be collected within 24 hours by a corvette, which will transport her to the whale-factory ship.

These are only some of the memories I've had to live with and, by talking about them, I'm attempting to expiate some of the guilt I have harboured all these years.

And what was I paid for my endeavours? In my first year, I received £85 clear. In my second season, I earned £125 and on my third trip, I earned £325. A fortune in those days to a young lad from the North-East. I didn't realise it at the time, but it was pure unadulterated blood money.

When I think about it, I feel that the whales were the most pitiable ones. Whales reproduce and grow by themselves without causing any bother to humans, but humans have selfishly massacred them repeatedly year after year. And so here, I give my prayers for the repose of the whales' souls, and hope that my writings can do even a little to preserve the record of their past.

What I have recently come to understand is that, in the not so distant past, I was part of a cultural heritage in the North-East of England, linked to whaling and going back almost exactly 200 years, during which time the region prospered from the profits of whaling. It provided extensive employment, based on whale oils and bone, in industries as varied as mining, tanning, cloth-making, metal-working, soap manufacture, saddlers, haberdashers, even watch-making.

And when whaling ended? We adapted, we did without. No one now can imagine whaling coming back. And, as for any loss of identity associated with the end of whaling regionally? Anyone here in the UK will tell you the North-East is far short of losing is cultural identity. Nobody misses it now - if anything, the very idea of recommencing whaling would be a non-starter.

As a final word, I would like to re-iterate the fact that the threats to whales today are ominous enough as the oceans become ever more degraded - chemical pollution, over-fishing, noise pollution - and their blubber is now contaminated. They have enough to contend with from man-made threats without the incredible demand by a few nations for the resumption of commercial whaling.

So we must continue the fight to see the sanctuaries agreed and hope we will not have to wait much longer for the time where whales are free from the exploitation of man.