'The want of sufficient men': Labour recruitment and training in the British North Sea fisheries, 1850-1950

Wilcox, Martin

Abstract

Between 1815 and 1950 the British fishing industry underwent fundamental and far-reaching changes. The industry expanded rapidly in the half-century prior to the First World War, before entering a period of stagnation thereafter. The technology of fishing was transformed by the spread of trawling, and the application of steam, and later motor power to the catching sector. All of this was driven by an expansion of demand for fish, consequent upon improvements in overland transport, which saw distribution and marketing arrangements transformed. This had major implications for labour in the industry. Fishermen became more numerous, and in many cases more specialised, as technological development introduced specialists such as the engineer and wireless operator into fishing vessels' crews. The period also saw the rise of tied labour in the industry, in the form of thousands of teenaged apprentices brought in to man the North Sea trawling fleets, before apprenticeship declined in favour of more informal training arrangements. The impact of all of this was highly uneven. Some sectors of the industry were rapidly transformed, whereas others developed more slowly. The rapid growth and evolution of trawling promoted the widespread use of apprenticeship, for example, whereas concomitant developments in the herring fisheries had no such ramifications. This article seeks to provide an overview of labour recruitment and training in the British fisheries between 1815 and 1950, highlighting the scale and scope of the most important developments, and setting the best known facet of the subject, the apprenticeship system, in context.

Citation

Wilcox, M. (2015). 'The want of sufficient men': Labour recruitment and training in the British North Sea fisheries, 1850-1950. International Journal of Maritime History, 27(4), 723-742. https://doi.org/10.1177/0843871415610504

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: May 29, 2015
• Online Publication Date: Dec 18, 2015
• Publication Date: 2015-11
• Deposit Date: Jun 11, 2019
• Publicly Available Date: Jun 12, 2019
• Journal: International Journal of Maritime History
• Print ISSN: 0843-8714
• Electronic ISSN: 2052-7756
• Publisher: SAGE Publications
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 27
• Issue: 4
• Pages: 723-742
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0843871415610504
• Keywords: Apprenticeship; Fishermen; Fishing industry; Labour supply; North Sea; Training
• Public URL: https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/1970901
• Publisher URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0843871415610504
• Additional Information: This is the accepted manuscript of an article published in International Journal of Maritime History, 2015. The version of record is available at the DOI link in this record.