The Harvest of the Sea / A contribution to the natural and economic history of the British food fishes

by James Glass Bertram

The following is a summary of the evidence given by William Dawson, a very intelligent fisherman of Newbiggin, who spoke from fifty years’ experience:—“He had fished cod, ling, turbot, and several kinds of shell-fish, but not oysters. He was still engaged as a fisherman. He fished with a line for soles. The number of fishermen and boats had increased. In 1808 there were eight boats, and there are now about thirty boats. Fifty years ago the boats were about one-third the size. The boats carried just about the same lines as now. The boats now carry about three times as much net as they did. The number of white fish is falling off a great deal. In 1812 every boat brought in more white fish than they could carry. We do not go much more frequently to sea now. In the size of the fish now there is not much difference—a little smaller. The haddock and herring fisheries had decreased. He had not noticed much difference in the size, only in the quantity. There was a greater number of boats engaged now in the herring-fishing—the number of herring having decreased within the last ten or twelve years. Little mackerel was caught there. Large quantities of mackerel were off this coast at times, but they had no nets to take them. Although a good many sprats were seen, they did not try to catch them. The cause of the falling off in the quantity of fish he considered was their being destroyed farther south. No trawling vessels came here till last summer. They went about twelve miles from land, and trawled in the fishing-ground. The lines of the fishing-boats were parallel, and about a quarter of a mile apart. When there was a south-east storm they got plenty of fish, but it was not so now. With a north-east storm they had plenty of fish. In his recollection, fifty years back, there was plenty of fish with a south-east storm. There had been no interference with their nets, and no one had regulated the times of fishing. There might be some advantage if the government made a law to prevent either the English or French fishing from Saturday morning to Monday night. That would give time for the fish to draw together. That alluded to herring. They should not allow the trawl-boats to fish on the coasts. The French boats often came within three miles of the land. Herring are caught within three miles of the shore. The French boats shifted with the herring along the coast, and have caught a great quantity. There should be a rule that herring-nets should not be shot before sunset. When the Queen’s cutters came the French boats made off to more than three miles from the land. Lobsters had diminished, but not the crabs. He believed they had caught too many lobsters. The boat’s crew is not so well off now as thirty years ago. Lodgings were better. They do not earn so much money now. In the course of a year (about 1825) he made £126, and a few years back he made only £78. The average for the last five years at the white fishing was about £50. Other £50 might be made at the herring-fishing. The buoys of the lines were large enough for the trawlers to see them, and they could see where the nets were. They destroyed both the fish and the lines. A line boat with fittings costs about £40, and a herring-boat with nets not less than £100. The men bought the boats with money saved. Little fish was destroyed on their lines, except what was eaten by the dogfish. There were herring there in January and February, but were not caught. Their boats fished between Tynemouth and Dunstanborough castles. He could remember when there were no French boats on the coast; they first came about 1824. The French boats fish on the Sundays. Their boats did not. A young man ought to earn £100 a year. It would cost a full third to keep his boat and tackling up. The boats lasted about fourteen years.”

I need not go on repeating similar evidence, but the witnesses were nearly all agreed that the beam-trawl did not do the injury to the fisheries that was charged against it, especially as regards injury to spawn. I may perhaps, by way of conclusion to this contradictory evidence, be allowed to quote from the Times a portion of a letter on trawling, written by a “Billingsgate Salesman:”—“Seven years’ experience in Billingsgate, and my lifetime previous spent among the fishermen in a seaport-town, may enable me to offer a few remarks, which through your able abilities may be sifted, and perhaps leave a portion of matter which you may consider of some value and turn to some account. My personal interest is not only in trawl-fishing, but hook and line, seined-net, drift-net, and other kinds; for, being a commission agent, it is all fish that comes to my net. I cannot speak of the qualities of trawl-net fishing, either for or against, not having been connected with that branch of the trade, but after a remark or two on the information received by Mr. Fenwick, and which is conveyed in your columns from certain gentlemen professing to have a knowledge of the trade, I will give you my information as briefly as possible. The fact is this—it never will be possible to catch what we consider trawl-fish in sufficient quantities to meet the demand but by the trawl, the principal kinds being turbot, brill, soles, and plaice. A small quantity may be taken by other means, but more by accident than otherwise. As for trawl-fish being mutilated and putrid before landing, how does it happen that so many spotless and pure fish, out of the above kinds, are not only sold in London but all over the country, and exhibited on the tables both of rich and poor? Yourself and every nobleman can speak on this point; and when informed that they are all caught by the trawl (a fact undeniable), you will consider it wrong on the part of any one to mislead the public on a matter of so much importance. Advise him to fathom the secrets of the ocean, and discover a better mode to obtain them.”

A great deal of obloquy has been thrown on the trawl, because it hashes the fish; but the destruction of young fish—that is, fish unfit for human food because of their being young—is not peculiar to the trawl. When the lines are thrown out for cod the fishermen cannot command that only full-grown fish are to seize upon the bait: the tender codling, the unfledged haddock, the greedy mackerel will bite—the consequence being that thousands of sea-fish are annually killed that are unfit for food, and that have never had an opportunity of adding to their kind. But this mischance is incidental to all our fisheries, no matter what the engine of capture may be, whether net or line. Look how we slaughter our grilses, without giving them the opportunity of breeding! The herring-fishing is a notable example of this mode of doing business: the very time that these animals come together to perpetuate their species is the time chosen by man to kill them. Of course if they are to be used as food, they must be killed at some time, and the proper time to capture them forms one of those fishing mysteries which we have not as yet been able to solve. We protect the salmon with many laws at the most interesting time of its life, and why we should not be able to devise a close-time for the cod, turbot, haddock, and sole of particular coasts—for each portion of the coast has its particular season—is what I cannot understand, and can only account for the anomaly on the ground of salmon being private property.

The labour of the Scottish fishermen is greatly augmented by the want of good harbours for their boats. Time and opportunity serving, the men of the fisher class are really industrious, and this want of proper harbourage is a hardship to them. It is curious to notice the little quarry-holes that on some parts of the Moray Firth serve as a refuge for the boats. There is the harbour of Whitehills, for instance: it could not be of any possible use in the event of a stiff gale arising, for in my opinion the boats would never get into it, but would be dashed to pieces on the neighbouring rocks. I have witnessed one or two storms on the north-east coast of Scotland, and shall never forget the scenes of misery these tumults of the great deep occasioned. Even lately (October 1864) there was a storm raging along these coasts that left most impressive death-marks at nearly all the fishing places on the Moray Firth. I was not an eye-witness of this last gale, but I have gathered from various sources, oral and written, one or two passages descriptive of its violence and the loss of life it occasioned.

At Portessie, one of the Moray Firth villages, a boat called the Shamrock, containing a crew of nine men, was numbered among the lost. It had sailed on a Wednesday morning in October 1864, for the fishing-ground known as “the Bank,” about twenty miles off. John Smith, the principal owner of the boat, an old man, was not at the time able to go to sea; but he had seven sons, and five of these, with four near relatives, sailed in the ill-fated Shamrock from Portessie harbour on that fatal morning. The Shamrock was accompanied by some other boats belonging to the same place, and the little fleet left as early as three A.M., keeping together more or less until they reached the fishing-ground. On arriving at the Bank the Shamrock, it appears, had separated from the others, the crew preferring to go some distance in order to cast their lines; and she had not been seen by the other boats after parting from them. About seven o’clock on the following morning, some of the people of Whitehills, on going round to the spot known as Craigenroan, a quarter of a mile to the westward, were alarmed at seeing a boat lying high and dry among the rocks, as if it had been tossed up at high tide and left perched there on the receding of the waters. The mast, some oars, and other articles, were seen lying here and there beside her, strewn among the rocks, and there were holes seen in her sides—evidence only too conclusive that the boat was a wreck. A closer inspection discovered her mark and number—“B.F., 743,” and then was also seen the name and unmistakable designation, “Shamrock, Pt. Essie—J, Smith.” On examination it was conjectured, from the way in which the mast had been wrenched off, that the boat had foundered, either some distance at sea, or among inshore breakers, righting again as she was beaten up on the rocks, where, as we have said, she was found sitting high and dry on her keel. It was at once felt that all the crew had perished, and the bodies of the men were eagerly sought for by their friends and relatives. On Friday, the lifeless body of John Smith, “Bodie,” was found washed up on the beach. On the same day the corpse of his son, a young man who was to have been married in a week—and whose house, like that of a friend and namesake, was being furnished at home—was cast ashore at Whitehills, and one of the first to recognise the body was the father of the betrothed. Another body was got at the mouth of the little burn at the further end of the Boyndie Links. This also was on Friday: it was found to be the remains of one of the five brothers—namely John, aged twenty-five, the namesake alluded to, who was to have been married on the morrow. The body of another of the five brothers—namely William—was found floating in the bay, off Banff Harbour, lashed to a buoy, to which the poor fellow had attached himself, probably in the boat, for safety. At one time the body was seen in this position at Whitehills, suspended from the buoy, and so close to the shore that had a grappling-iron been at hand it might have been secured. It would have been of no avail, however, as the vital spark had long since fled; but the passage of the body, drawn back with the tide and carried round to Banff, served to reconcile certain apparently conflicting evidences as to the history of the wreck, or rather as to the spot where it occurred.

On the occasion of this storm there was deep wailing at Buckie, for in that town there was more than one woman who was widowed by the tempest. Of necessity a fisherman’s wife is extremely masculine in character. Her occupation makes her so, because she requires a strength of body which no other female attains, and of which the majority of men cannot boast. The long distances she has frequently to travel in all weathers with her burden, weighing many stones, make it essential for her to possess a sturdy frame, and be capable of great physical endurance. Accordingly, most of the fishwives who carry on the sale of their husbands’ fish possess a strength with which no prudent man would venture to come into conflict. Then the nature of their calling makes them bold in manners, and in speech rough and ready. Having to encounter daily all sorts of people, and drive hard bargains, their wits, though not refined, are sharpened to a keen edge, and they are more than a match for any “chaff” directed towards them either by purchaser or passer-by. So long, however, as they are civilly and properly treated, they are civil and fair-spoken in return, and can, when occasion serves, both flatter and please in a manner by no means offensive. Altogether, the Scottish fishwife is an honest, out-spoken, good-hearted creature, rough as the occupation she follows, but generally good-natured and what the Scotch call “canty.” She does not even want feeling, though, it may be, her avocation gives her little opportunity to show it. But who is so often called upon to endure the strongest emotions of fear, suspense, and sorrow, as the fisherman’s wife? Every time the wind blows, and the sea rises, when the boats of her husband or kinsfolk are “out,” she knows no peace till they are in safety; and not seldom has she been doomed to stand on the shore and look at the white foaming sea in which the little boat, containing all she held dear, was battling with the billows, with the problem of its destruction or salvation all unsolved.

To return to the history of the storm. No less than twenty-seven boats belonging to Buckie had left for the fishing, some of them as early as two o’clock in the morning. Some hours previous to the boats leaving, there were indications of the coming storm. A heavy surf was rolling on the coast, but almost unaccompanied by wind, only slight airs now and again coming from the north, but the barometer had fallen considerably during the night. With these indications of bad weather, the men on duty at the Coast Guard station hailed the Portessie men when on their way to join their boats at Buckie harbour, and warned them of the likelihood of a storm overtaking them. Little heed, however, appears to have been given to this warning, and the boats left the harbour with more than usual difficulty, the sea at the entrance being so rough. The boats pursued a north-east course, but from the absence of a breeze the oars had to be resorted to, and nearly twelve hours elapsed before they got to the fishing rendezvous. In ordinary circumstances, with a good wind, the boats would have reached the fishing-ground in about three hours, and would have returned by the next tide—about mid-day. About six P.M. the storm broke upon the fishermen with great violence. The majority of the boats kept close together, and as the first of the gale was succeeded by comparative calm, the crews, imagining that they had seen the worst of the storm, began to finish their fishing. This would have occupied about an hour, but, before it was half accomplished, the wind, veering rather more to the north, blew a perfect hurricane, and the sea became so disturbed that it was hardly possible to manage the boats. The sails, which had been hoisted when the wind first sprang up, were reduced, some of them by as many as six reefs, but the experience and energy of the hardy fishermen seemed scarce sufficient to battle successfully for existence among the warring elements. Some of the crews in this strait made for the Banff coast; others made up their minds to endeavour to ride out the storm, and a good number ran for Cromarty, or the ports on the opposite side of the Firth. The attainment of either of these three alternatives was a work of peril, for there is no harbour of refuge on either side of the Firth to which boats may with safety run from a storm; and the broken water is about as plentiful and dangerous in the centre of the Firth as it is along the shore. While the brave fishermen were encountering the severest perils attending their calling, the anxiety and suspense of their relations were heartrending. The storm in its intensity, though its coming had been foreshadowed, was not felt on shore till about nine P.M. on Wednesday evening. From that hour, however, the wind, now from the east, and again from the north, came in terrific gusts, and the whole bay at Buckie boiled and moaned as it had been seldom known to do before.

Long before the storm was at its height, the wives and sweethearts of those at sea had become alarmed for their safety; they could well remember the desolation that a similar tempest, which occurred on the 16th August 1848, caused in their households. They left their homes to wander along the sea-beach, and peer through the storm for any sign of the approach of the boats containing their relatives. A huge fire was kindled on the top of the braes in the hope that its glare might attract those at sea, and beacon them to a safe shore. During the early part of the night the suspense and fear of the whole inhabitants of Buckie were extreme, and while this anxiety was being endured the boats that had first left the fishing-ground were nearing the land. Some of the boats for a considerable time were allowed to run before the wind, the crews not knowing whither they went, as they were not within sight of lights. When at length they got within sight of the lights very great caution had to be exercised, and a little confusion was occasioned by the unusual number of fires exhibited. Shortly after eleven o’clock a boat was seen approaching Buckie harbour, and getting a favourable opportunity of crossing the bar, it entered the harbour in safety. Two other boats followed, but these had much greater difficulty in gaining the port. The tide was at its height about two o’clock A.M., when a fourth boat approached. At the entrance to the harbour she shipped a sea, and it was thought by all on the shore that she had been upset. The same wave, however, carried the boat a considerable distance into the harbour, and as she continued in an upright position she was soon pulled to the beach, and her crew landed in safety. When the tide was fully in, it stood about twenty feet above its ordinary point, the waves breaking almost on the foundations of the Coast Guard watch-house. On the pier the water fell so heavily that it was often some feet deep, and the spray from the waves mounted to a height of about forty feet above the lighthouse. The people kept watching on the shore till daybreak, but no sign of any of the other boats was visible, and as no known casualty had occurred to the boats that made for Buckie and Portgordon, keen hopes were entertained that the remainder of the boats had found shelter on the opposite side of the Firth, or would be able to ride out the storm. The anxiety in Buckie continued during Thursday, and was rather intensified towards the afternoon when the wind, veering round to W.N.W., again heightened almost to the pitch it had reached during the previous night. Several people from the villages on both sides of Buckie came into that town in the afternoon to ascertain whether the post should bring tidings from their missing friends. With great consideration the captain of one of the boats that got into Cromarty wrote by first post to say that no casualty had occurred within his knowledge, and that a number of boats (some eight or nine) had entered Cromarty in safety, and others were approaching the harbour.

I was a witness to some of the effects of the previous great storms that had raged in the Moray Firth about the close of the year 1857. A number of fishing-boats and their crews were lost at that time, Buckie again coming in for a large share of the desolation. I have preserved a few scraps descriptive of the storm, cut, I think, from the Banffshire Journal; and these, supplemented by what I gathered personally from the descriptions of those engaged in the contest, will give my readers a good idea of the scene at Buckie. Premising that before the storm attained its culminating point one or two of the boats had got safely into the harbour, I may state that as the sea increased in anger and the waves lashed the shore in ever-augmenting fury, the excitement of those on land became terrible. People seemed disposed to run everywhere, and no one knew where to run. It was nearly an hour—sixty minutes of terrible suspense—after the two first boats came into the harbour ere any others came in sight. By and by, however, they began to appear, most of them evidently making for the sands opposite and east of the new town of Buckie, some for Craigenroan, a place of shelter east of Portessie. The attention of the Buckie people was chiefly centred in the arrivals at their own shore, as other boats were scarcely seen; and while their own boats were every now and then, from two to three o’clock, dropping in at home, there was the chance that those running for Craigenroan belonged to other towns. At two o’clock the storm had about culminated, and as the boats came each in sight (they were only seen a short way off land) there was a shriek from those assembled on the shore, while the utmost anxiety prevailed till they were each ashore and the men landed, every one providing themselves with ropes and whatever could be supposed likely to be useful in putting forth efforts to save life. The crowd ran from one point to another along the coast to whatever place it was likely the boats would strike, and most enthusiastic were the exertions made by one and all to get the imperilled men out of jeopardy, so soon as ever they came within reach. The boats, as they arrived, were secured with mooring-ropes, and a hand or two left to take care of each, while the spare men spread themselves along the beach to assist in saving the lives and property of their fellows in distress. Four boats got safely in. Alas for the fifth! About half-past two o’clock this fifth boat, like the others, without a stitch of canvas, came in sight pretty far west, and was expected to land in “The Neuk,” opposite New Buckie. Tossed mountain high at one moment, and the next down between the gigantic waves, she came along in much the same circumstances as the others. Hundreds soon gathered at the point she was expected to reach. The boats had come so near the shore that the men on board were perfectly well recognised by their friends, among whom there were wives in the greatest anxiety to rescue their husbands from the angry deep, fathers to rescue their sons, brother to welcome brother, etc. But how sad was the scene beggars all description, for within a hundred yards of the shore a tremendous sea struck the boat on her broadside, and turned her right over, as quick as a man would turn his hand, the crew of course being all cast into the water. The crowd on shore held up their hands appalled, and cried and shrieked, many of them in perfect distraction. The scene was heartrending in the extreme; but the first manifestations of grief and alarm by and by toned down to mournful wailings, although, as was to be expected, the excitement and confusion were very great. Three of the men were never seen, having at once sunk to rise no more. Two seemed to get on the bottom of the boat, but one of them very shortly disappeared. The other one, however, stood up on his feet, and put his hands to his waistcoat near the buttons, from which act it was supposed he was preparing to strip and be in readiness to swim. The situation was heightened by the interest of those on shore in seeing him in this perilous position, and the grief of his friends was intensely unspeakable when they saw the first heavy sea wash him away from the footing he had gained, and, in its rolling fury, hide him perhaps for ever from human eyes. The remaining three of the eight who were on board (the crew numbered eleven, but three had not gone to sea that day) also disappeared for a little, but in a short time they were seen floating about on spars and pieces of the masts; and hope still existed that rescue might be extended to them. They were driven from one point to another with fearful velocity, and indeed were only now and again visible. Anxiety was felt in every breast still more acutely than ever, as these three were wafted nearer and nearer the shore; and so sorely did they struggle, that, even against every probability, hope whispered that their safety was possible. For full twenty minutes they floated about in this situation, latterly coming within about twenty yards of where the people were standing—so near that, had the sea been ordinarily calm, hundreds were there who would have considered it no difficult task to rush into the water and give them their hand. One man cried to his brother to put his hair away from his eyes, when, by the motion the latter made, it was evident he heard quite distinctly. Two or three different times he obeyed, putting up his hand, and rubbing his hair over his forehead. An anxious wife actually rushed into the tide nearly to the neck, in an endeavour to rescue her husband, but her heroic effort was completely unavailing. The tide was ebbing at the time, but the waves, in terrible force, rushed far up on the beach, and swept back again with fearful power. No one could keep his footing in the water. Attempts were made to join hands and thus extend help to the unfortunate men, but, besides the weight of the water itself, the backwash of the waves hurled the gravel beach from below their feet, so that to stand on it was impossible; and even while these vain efforts were being made at rescue, the men, worn out in the raging surf, sank, one after another, amid the cries and shrieks of their despairing relatives.

The number of men drowned on the north-east coast—i.e. at Wick, Helmsdale, and Peterhead—during the great storm of 1848, was one hundred, and the value of the boats and the nets that were lost upon that remarkable occasion was at least £7000. The gale broke upon the coast on the 19th of August, just as the fishing was being busily prosecuted. Most of the boats ran for shelter to the nearest haven, and it is melancholy to know that many of them foundered at the very entrance to their harbour. The whole of the mischief was done in the brief period of three hours. In that period many a poor woman was made miserable, and many a hearth rendered cheerless. It is gratifying to think that since the date of the great storm considerable improvement has been made in the Scottish fishery harbours, and that at Wick a great harbour of refuge is now in progress. The weather prophecies now published by the Board of Trade, and telegraphed to all important seaports, are also of great use to the fisher-folk, as are the large barometers which have been erected in nearly every fishing village. These are the elements of science which will ultimately chase away superstition from our sea-coast villages, if indeed we can honestly call the poetic fancies of these fisher-folks superstitions. We cannot wonder that, as the dark remembrance of some great bereavement escapes from the chambers of their memory, they see forms in the flying clouds, or hear voices in the air, that cannot be seen or heard by landsmen unaccustomed to the treacherous waters of the great deep.