A short walk from the Headland in Tynemouth over looking the Estuary and Tyne Piers, back up the river past the Coast Guard Museum and Collingswood's Monument which over looks the North Shields Fish Quay.

The fish merchants still offer a wide variety of fresh caught fish straight from the boats, as well as the traditional English Fish & Chips wrapped in paper to eat as you wander along the quayside.

There are a few bars famous Worldwide among sailors on the Quayside, one is the Prince of Wales outside of which stand the famous Wooden Dolly, from which another Pub overlooking the Quay has taken its name.  

The original Wooden Dolly has long gone and been replaced many times, due to the sailors cutting a piece of to keeping it in their pockets for good luck while at sea.  Their is another Wooden Dolly in Northumberland Square, in the town centre of a Fisher Woman on whom on close inspection a number of mice can be found.

The Move from Sail to Steam Trawlers

Fish and Chips are an integral part of British life and many would identify them as the national dish yet few people consider the risks, the human endurance required to catch the fish and the human cost in lives over the years to provide such a nourishing and universally popular meal. What many people are also not aware of is that North Shields led the way in pioneering the application of steam to fishing.

The fishing industry at North Shields came of age with the advent of steam, grew, prospered, and died all within a time period of less than a century – one hundred years The large steam trawling fleets have sailed into history and are in danger of being forgotten.

During the 1860s the fishing fleet of North Shields comprised of sailing smacks and luggers. Steam powered paddle tugs had made their mark by this time and were frequently employed to give the sailing smacks and luggers a pull out of harbour when the wind conditions made it impossible for them to sail out. These steam tugs, all of which were at this time paddle driven, were powerful beasts and it was not unknown for them to cross the North Sea to ports such as Amsterdam and tow large sailing ships back to the River Tyne when the winds prevented them from making the passage eastwards.

North Shields Fish Quay before steam changed the fishing industry. note Hi Light Building

The business of steam towage on the River Tyne was fickle and the arrival of sailing ships unpredictable. The owners of the steam paddle tugs were constantly searching for work in the North Sea but many of the tugs were laid up with nothing to do.

In 1873 there were 145 steam tugs alone registered on the River Tyne so it can be appreciated, busy though the river was at this time, that competition was fierce and the returns small.

           The Paddle Tug Stag, one of the first tugs to be converted for use as a trawler.  In this poor photograph her fishing registration, SN 12, can be seen and the fishing derrick on her stern.

In November 1877 a sailing smack of 50 tons gross called the Zenith and registered as SN 944 became becalmed off the mouth of the River Tyne having shot her trawl. The skipper James Kelly, reputedly a native of Hull, requested the tug Messenger, captained by William Purdy, to tow him into harbour. The trawl was left down. It is reported that the Zenith landed a good catch of fish in excess of that which was anticipated. It was this experience that prompted Purdy to wonder at the logic of towing a trawl using steam for power. No doubt prompted by the lean times Purdy fitted out the Messenger with second hand trawl nets and gear much to the derision of the local smacks men and lugger men. The trawling equipment made up of gear sourced from Grimsby, North Shields and Sunderland cost a total of £19.10 shillings plus the installation of a small derrick.

On 2^nd November 1877 Purdy together with two crew members Thomas Tomlinson and a man called Fryall left the North Shields Fish Quay on his maiden fishing trip to cries of ridicule about him wasting his money and that his venture was bound to fail. Jeers and catcalls abounded together with the throwing of rotten fruit as they sailed away from the quay.

Within two voyages the prophets of failure were silenced. His first voyage netted a catch worth £7 10 shillings plus an additional £5 for towage of a sailing ship into the River Tyne and upon his return from his second voyage Purdy had made a modest profit but he had proved his point. Purdy quickly capitalised on his achievement by declaring on his billheads

“William Purdy of North Shields. Pioneer of Steam Trawling 1877”

The example of North Shields was quickly followed by other ports up and down the North East coast and Scotland and within a year 50 paddle tug masters had followed Purdy’s example. Steam in the fishing industry had come of age and had proved that it could catch fish.

A period picture depicting how it all started, showing Sail & Steam.

The face of the fishing industry was changed. The rush to put paddle tugs into service as trawlers was not without its problems. These old wooden vessels were not fit for the daily grind of towing a heavy beam trawl along the seabed. The attrition rate was high. In the first six months of 1880 eight tugs converted for trawling were lost.

Now larger steam paddlers built of wood and iron were specially constructed for trawling but this form of propulsion only lasted a short period. Paddlers, whilst at home on the inshore grounds were unsuitable for the turbulent seas around the Dogger Bank and beyond. Thoughts turned to the propeller as a more efficient means of propulsion. However Scarborough remained faithful to the steam paddlers until 1904 when the last of the paddlers SH 1237 Hartland, formerly registered as SN 1516 ceased fishing.

The first steam screw trawler appeared at North Shields in 1881 as SN 1168 Bonito but she had left the North Shields registry by 1887. Throughout the fishing industry the screw steam trawler proliferated especially on the North Eastern ports where coal was in abundance and the coalfields were only a short distance away. Cheap coal in abundance was reflected in cheap fish in abundance. The railway lines, which carried the coal to the fish docks, transported the fish to the inland industrial towns.

Noel Coward could well have coined the phrase  "they caught the cod that fed the miners that dug the coal that powered the ships that caught the cod that........"

The application of steam powered engines to propel fishing vessels came surprisingly late in the 1800s and not without its fair share of sceptics. Whilst the British Isles were covered with a network of steam railways during the reign of Queen Victoria this new form of motive power was much slower in reaching the fishing fleets. Yet North Shields was at the forefront of this change and the man who is credited with the introduction and application of steam to trawl fishing is William Purdy, a native of the town.

Steam was slower in coming to the smaller drifters but was no less inevitable. The first registered steam drifter is believed to have been the SN 1492 Pioneer.

The explosion in the birth of the steam screw trawler brought further benefits to North Shields and its surrounding area ‑ that of building the vessels. The shipyards on the River Tyne turned them out at an amazing rate.            

Steam Trawlers jostling for position at North Shields Fish Quay circa 1910, note Low Light Building

It was not unknown for a steam trawler to be built from keel to maiden voyage in less than forty days. Small yards, now long defunct, such as the Union Cooperative Shipbuilding Society at Cowpen Square, Blyth turned out nine ninety-ton trawler/drifters in a three-year period.

By 1904 the port of North Shields was in its heyday with registrations of vessels at a high of 143, 135 of which were steam driven. 60 years later total registrations had collapsed to only 22, only one of which was a steam trawler.

The glorious age of the steam drifter and trawler is over and the ships have all gone, most of them to the breakers yard but many of them to the cold murky depths of the sea. The men who sailed in them are now either approaching or are in the twilight of their lives. We need to remember them, their contribution and the place in history that North Shields deserves.

SN 118 Chris, the only known surviving North Shields registered steam trawler, which was in private ownership in Germany in 2000. Built in 1910 she was owned for a long time by Richard Irvin’s of North Shields.

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