Scarborough was the 5th largest herring port in the country at one time. The herring shoals swam past Scarborough in August and attracted fishermen from Scotland, the South Coast and Holland. The harbour was so full of boats that you could walk across the harbour wihout touching the water. Many other boats had to anchor in the bay. The herring shoals started in the Shetlands and swam south, as far as Yarmouth. Hundreds of 'Herring Lasses' followed the fishing fleet down the coast gutting and packing the herring into wooden barrels in their thousands. Scarborough families often turfed their children out of their bedrooms and rented the rooms to the lasses. They came back year after year so often got to know them well, even some marriages occured.
In 2022, the Scottish Fisheries Museum organised an online conference as part of women’s history month (March). The following text is notes taken from that event:
The ‘Herring Quines’ were described as robust, resilient, hardworking with camaraderie and humour. Margaret Ritchie was the first speaker and she has done much research and interviewed many women. The women organised themselves into groups, 2 gutters and 1 packer and signed seasonal contracts. Average age was 20 to 40 but started as young as 14 and as old as 80! They often took their children along and put them into schools in the ports they worked in from Shetland to Yarmouth. Some carried a ‘kreel?’ backpack made of wicker and ‘oilets’ rubber aprons. The Curer set the prices for fish which were graded into baskets by size before being put into barrels with salt. The barrels were not sealed for 10 days whilst they settled and were topped up and sealed. 10% were inspected by the fishing authorities and if not packed correctly would be rejected and emptied. Barrels had identification marks on the bottom so the team could be identified and paid a bonus on the number of barrels. They traveled by train or on foot ending up in Yarmouth in September where the Curers organised special trains to get them all back to home, taking several days and loaded with money! Some authorities were concerned about their children missing schooling. The women had strong relations with lodging families, Scarborough landladies allegedly put brown paper on the walls to stop the fish oil from their skirts soiling the walls.
Meg Hyland was the next speaker, an American PHD student, who has studied the songs and dances of the Herring Lasses. The women sang together in Gaelic with a rhythm similar to sea shanties. They could be working till 11pm at night in the rain so this kept their spirits up. The www.scotslanguge.com website has some old recordings on. The songs go back to the 1880s up to world war one. They sung about having having better houses as many lived in 1 storey stone crofts and dreamt of the big white 2 storey houses they saw in bigger fishing ports. They also sung about men. The Isle of Mann had Manx songs, herring was gutted for domestic use not commercial sale. The North East sometimes had hymns such as ‘Throw out the line’. Women might knit ganseys while they waited for the boats to come in. Gutting in the 1950s, 60s, 70s they begun to sing country and western or Beatles songs. Gutting ended finally in the 1970s in Shetland after machines took their place. The women still fed the machines but they were indoors and noisy so they could not longer talk or sing.
The final speaker was Emer Morris, an artist and cultural worker who cycled from Shetland to Yarmouth, 1700km, following the route of the herring lasses and interviewing folk along the way. There are still a few people in the fish processing industry. She has made a podcast and play. Many recurring themes were Brexit and how climate change will affect them. She said herring was exported to the colonies to feed slaves along with hemp sacking for plantations etc. Emer visited SMHC and thanked all the maritime museums along the coast for their great work and help.
Questions to research?
What happened to all those barrel makers, coopers, when the herring catches finally stoped? There must have been so many?
Can we link any of our herring lasses photographs to Scottish families that still exist?
Are there any 1st accounts by lasses of their time in Scarborough?
The 'Guts Galore' online conference was organised by the Scottish Fisheries Museum – 9/3/22
Scottish Fisheries Museum, St Ayles, Harbourhead, Anstruther, Fife, KY10 3AB
