Stop 4: Affinity

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I worked as a fisherman. That was the main dock scene where we used to land our fish and everything. I started in 1970 when I was 15 year old. I followed in my father's footsteps, my three uncles' footsteps and my two grandfather's footsteps. They were all fishermen.

So I started fishing in 1970, age 15, first trip was to Iceland, and it was on that trawler there, the Arlander. Sailed November the 28th, we got there December the 2nd, and I'd been going to sea, oh, I'd been going to sea as pleasure tripping with my, father, grandfather, and uncles but only in the summer months, summer holidays, which was always nice weather. So you can imagine December 2nd? Getting chucked out of your bunk in that kind of weather, you know, it was a big wakeup call. It was just horrendous and with not having proper sea legs. You was all over at place for the first four or five days. So, but I stuck at it and then I was Skipper at 21. I left school at 15, well, I was 15 and a half, first trip and I bought my house when I was 17 and a half. My mother had to be guarantor for the mortgage. They call us three day millionaires. So that was me.

Well population Fleetwood, 25-26,000, average, say there was 2000 fishermen, they worked, sailed out of Fleetwood, for every one fishman that went to sea that would employ six people on the shore. It's unbelievable, like init, for a small town. So everybody was employed. The women used to braid the nets, you'd have people repairing trawlers because it was only in from sea for three days. So people fixing radars, getting nets ready, everything, ice, fuel stores.

After three weeks at sea you'd come in and you'd be all showered and just wanting to get off that vessel, cause you only had 72 hours at home.

So you'd get off the vessel and then it'd be unloaded by the lumpers, during the early hours of morning, you'd go down at half past seven, you used to get a fry of fish, and then that was you done. You never went back to that trawler again till for 72 hours later. And you did, you hated it. You did not want to step back and go through what you'd just gone through.

Some of the crew used be actually sick, physically sick with nerves, because they've been working in an environment and they just worked together as a family of 22, so that when they were ashore there was thousands of thousands of people. It's like people who stay inside too got get nervous of going outside, don't they?

And then when we got on the shore, I remember 16 year old, me and two of me other mates who both landed that day and this old couple walk past us - well, they probably weren't old about 40 or some’it - and they said ‘Typical fishermen drunk at 10 o'clock in the morning.’ And I thought, what a thing to say? Because we didn't even drink. Oh, might have sneaky can of beer somewhere, but that'd be it. And do you know what it was, when I thought about it? Cos in bad weather you're permanently like this. We haven't got our shore legs, still moving with the boat, cause we'd only been in port 12 hours.