MANX SEA FISHING @ 1 0 0 19II nO st RESOURCE BOOK CONTENTS K RESOURCE BOOK Acknowledgements 4 Introduction 5 Part One Manx Sea Fishing Before c 1750 6 Beginnings Early Evidence 6 Possible Norse Influencees 6 The Water Bailiff theAdmiral 7 Early FishingVessels 8 The Castle Mazes 8 Fishing Outside Manx Waters 9 William Blundellon Manx Fishing 9 Seventeenth Century Fishermen 10 Fishing Trade 10 Varying Fortunes of theFishing 10 The Church theFishing 10 Two EighteenthCentury Fishing Regulations 11 Part Two Manx SeaFishing c 1750 c 1850 12 The Herring Fishery Trade 12 Manxmen Strangers at the Fishing 13 New Types of Fishing Boats 14 The Fisherman s Life 15 Vicissitudes of theHerring Fishing 16 Numbers Involved inHerring Fishing 17 The Role of the Farmer Fisherman 17 Herring Fishing Legislation 1750 1840 17 Other Forms of Fishing 18 Part Three Manx Sea Fishing 1840 1920 19 Overview of thePeriod 19 Specialisation inFishing 21 Fishing at Kinsale and Lerwick 21 Luggers Nickeys and N obbies 22 Nets 23 Uses fortheCatch 25 The High Point ofManx Fishing 25 Fishing Other than Herring 27 The Decline of Manx Fishing 27 Part Four Manx Sea Fishing 1920 1990 29 Herring Fishing GeneralTrends 29 Changes inTypes of Fishing Boats 29 Disposal of Herring 30 Conservation of Herring Stocks 31 Other Fisheries Pre 1940 32 New Fisheries 32 Conservation of theNew Fisheries 33 Part Five Sources and Suggestions 34 IT ID INFORMATION CARDS 1 Early Manx Herring Boats 2 Herring Boats c 1830 1940 3 Herring Fishing in Manx Waters 4 Manx Fishermen in Irish and Scottish Waters 5 Nets Equipment for Herring Mackerel Fishing 6 Uses for the Herring Catch 7 Longlines Shorelines 8 Some Further Types of Fishing 9 Scallops Queenies 1O Customs Traditions of the Manx Fisherman 1 1 Some Fish Molluscs Crustaceans of Manx Waters A H 12 Some Fish Molluscs Crustaceans of Manx Waters I Z 9 DOCUMENTS A Seventeenth Century Manx Fishing Regulations B The Lord of the Isle s Herring Customs 1687 C Fishermen Fined for Not Attending the Herring Fishing 1705 D The Complaint of the Whitehaven Fishermen 1754 E Richard Townley s Journal 1791 Extracts on Fishing F The Press Gang Seizes Fishermen Douglas 1811 G Great International Fisheries Exhibition 1883 IT ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I and documentary No 7 contains a reproduction of a Manx fisherman material is principally derived from the making a buckie pot on a Valentine Post Card resources of the Manx Museum The avail PHOTOGRAPHIC No 9 all the drawings are after Mason J Scallops ability of these resources and the co of operation and Fisheries in the British Isles the staff of the Manx Museum and National Trust Queen Fishing News Books 1983 The maps on this card are have been of inestimable help after Brand AR Scallop Biology Culture 1991 Individuals who have kindly permitted the repro duction of photographs are Resource Book The illustrations ofthe Peel Lugger and the Peel are used by courtesy of the Mr P Hill Heaton of Ramsey Nickey Chairman and committee of the Peel Sailor s Mr T E Leece of Peel Shelter Two Valentine Post Cards have been Mr W Clarke of Ramsey reproduced as indicated in the captions The following additional sources for illustrations Dr A Brand of the Marine Biological StaLion are also acknowledged Port Erin and Mr Walter Clarke of Ramsey have Pupils Cards No 3 The English Herring Buss is willingly given oftheir expertise in connection with drawn after an illustration in Hooking Drifting matters of content and illustration Trawling National Maritime Museum 1986 The Irish Sea Herring Map is based on P Hills R J Line drawings are by Julie Ashby R Grainger s figure in The Irish Sea An Environ mental Review Pt 3 Liverpool University Press Graphic design work by Ruth Sutherland 1990 cg Manx Heritage Foundation 1991 Published by the Manx Heritage Foundation in co operation with the Manx Museum and National Trust Printed by Printagraphics Ltd Douglas IJ INTRODUCTION pack for schools prepared with found usable by pupils of roughly ten to four funding from the Manx Heritage teen years THISFoundation and in co operation with the Trustees of the Manx Museum and Some suggested lines of development oftopics National Trust is the second in a series which are included The precise uses of the materials aims to provide readily available materials for must be left to professionals but it will be those who wish to incorporate learning apparent that either cross curricular or single through or about the Manx environment into subject approaches may be adopted A variety their curriculum of emphases is possible since links can be made with the broader historical scene in The topic Manx Sea Fishing has been selec terms of the Napoleonic Wars and the Press ted for two main reasons Firstly because Gang the eighteenth century pattern of trade inquiries into the types of local topics cur and the export of cured fish to the West Indies rently covered by schools suggested its useful or the age of steam which made possible rail ness Secondly because of the fact that for transit of fresh fish and also brought powerful centuries the fishing was a pillar of the Manx steam trawlers to the Irish Sea economy and intimately bound up with tradi tional ways of Manx life It was asserted in The current issues of fisheries conservation 1883 that In the Isle of Man one person out of and territorial waters will be seen to have his every five depends on fishing for his daily torical perspectives The revolution in Manx bread and one person out of every four is fishing which replaced the herring by the directly or indirectly dependent on fishing for scallop in the second halfof the twentieth cen a livelihood tury associated measures for conservation and the researches at the Port Erin Marine A precursor produced by the Teachers Local Biological Station link current Manx fishing Studies Group entitled The Nineteenth Century with future issues world wide Crofter Fisherman included a section on fish ing for the period c 1850 1900 The intention Some information on the fish of Manx waters in planning this pack has been to trace the is provided for those who wish to develop bio story of Manx fishing from the time of the first logical aspects of a fishing topic Geographical recorded information until the late twentieth dimensions are afforded through following the century routes ofeighteenth century cured fish traders and the Irish and Scottish destinations of The production ofmaterials for schools has its mackerel and herring fishers in the later nine inherent problems particularly in deciding teenth century Whatever approaches may be whether to have teachers or pupils primarily adopted it is hoped that the pack will stimulate in mind This pack consisting of a Resource investigations whether through drawing on Book Pupils Cards and Documents is the memories ofolder people through explor designed partly for teachers use and partly for ing documentary material including old pupils use The Cards and Documents have photographs looking at old buildings in the been aimed at pupils and the Resource Book at fishing towns or finding out about current teachers It is hoped that the Cards will be trends in fishing I PART ONE MANX SEA FISHING BEFORE c1750 importance of the herring to the Herrings in a Boate taken and Halfe a Maze Island since ancient times is reflected in out of two Maze and a Halfe in a Boate gotten THEthe portion of the Deemster s oath as oft as they go to Sea and gotten soe and that where he promises to execute the laws of the is our Law by Custome and Usage and the Isle betwixt party and party so indifferently Lord to pay vjd for a Maze thereof provided as the herring bone doth lie in the midst of the that the Bringers ofthe first Maze shall for the fish same have iijs iiijd i Beginnings and Early Evidence An entry in the Spiritual Statutes of the Isle of Man under the date 1577 gives details of how A lead sinker from a hand line was found the fish tythe shall be collected by the Proctor amongst the grave goods in an early Norse both for white fish and for herring burial at Knock e Dooney in Kirk Andreas According to a tradition preserved in the ii Possible Norse Influences writings of William Sacheverell who was Governor of the Isle of Man 1693 94 it was The herring fishing around the Isle of Man an earlier Governor named Brennus a Scots was very much a directed activity almost like man in charge of the Island 1282 87 who a military operation The Manx Statute Book taught the Manx people the art offishing Per under the date 1610 contains a lengthy list of haps this tradition grew from the close links regulations concerning the herring fishery between Scottish and Manx ways of fishing in These regulations seem to be a declaration of later time the common law though some of them seem to reflect a later period There was a require The first written reference to Manx fishing is ment for the more substantial or quarter contained in the Synodal Statutes of Bishop land farmers to provide eight fathoms of nets Mark dated 1291 and concerns the fish tithe fitted with corks and buoys in readiness for the fishing The date to start fishing was pre The Chronicles of the Kings ofMan and the Isles scribed year by year The Coroner or the tells us that Thomas Bishop of Sodor c 1330 Lockman of each sheading was to inform 1348 was the first to exact from the rulers of masters of boats when to muster with their Man one tenth of all the taxes paid to them by vessels Discipline within the herring fleets all the strangers in the herring fishery This was maintained through the offices of Water