Loading Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Company passengers' baggage at Berth 31 in Tilbury Docks, Essex. The photographer is on board an unidentified P & O cruise ship looking forward and down over the starboard side rail of the aft promenade deck showing stevedores transferring luggage from a railway luggage van into a cargo net full on the quayside which will be hauled aboard using the ship's own derricks. Three bowler hatted gentlemen and a man in a peaked cap, possibly one of the ship's officers, are watching the stevedores at work. Two gangplanks are set up and passengers are boarding, assisted by some of the ship's crew and watched by two dock policemen. A motor lifeboat is on the quay in the background. A vertical format negative.