Spring herring fishery at Espevær in the 1850s
Spring herring fishery at Espevær in the 1850s. drawing by G.Stenersen. (in private ownership).
A True Gold Mine
THE GREAT HERRING ADVENTURE FROM THE 19TH CENTURY
In that year the adventure started at Christmas time. The scene is a rural district on the fjord in Sunnhordland, one winter’s day around 1850. We stand and gaze out over the sea, and suddenly the post boat comes into view around a headland: ”It was a six-oared boat with three men and they rowed so fast that they lay flat on the boards. In the prow stood an upright pole with a cloth or a piece of canvas, like a pennant. The course of the boat was making straight for the post opener’s house. ”Ahoy! Herring ahoy!” bellowed the shoemaker; suddenly he threw the board aside and leapt out in his woollen vest and his leather apron.
”So early, before Christmas. Now each and everyone of us is in a hurry. Now Nedrevaagen will have to manage their own seine nets. It was in this way that the boat with the strange pole at the front had wakened things up everywhere along the fjord. On farms and in open spaces folk came out of their houses and stood and looked with their hands over their eyes after it. There was no doubt. Ahoy! Herring Ahoy”
Suggevågen, Røvær 1909. When so many fishermen ere gathered together it was a tight squeeze. People lay packed like sardines on the floor in the lodging house. “We put straw on the floor, 25 men to a room (4 x 5 m.), so tightly packed that it was difficult to open the door. And the air quality was what could be expected. In still weather it happened that it was impossible to light the lamp in the morning before the door was opened.” (Johs.Tvedt 1899). (photo: unknown, owner: Riksarkivet (Havnedirektoratets arkiv)).
Fishing from the land with seines at Tælavåg in Sund as Losting portrayed it in a coloured lithography from the 1840s. (Unsigned lithography, probably Losting. owner: University Museum in Bergen (B 5421)).
Net fishermen at work on the fishing grounds. The killer whales follow the herring and were a common sight on the fishing grounds in the winter when there was little herring on the coast. When the killer whale was not so commonly seen, the fishermen took it as a sign that the herring would soon be back. Drawing from the 1880s by L.Haaland. (in private ownership).
During the herring fishery it was teeming with life at the trading station of Engevikhavn in Fusa; herring salters, fish cutting girls, freight men and buyers. This picture is from 1894. (Th. Selmer, owner Picture collection, University Library in Bergen (Bs 5430/3a)).
“The fish gutting girl” is the name given by the photographer to the picture from Espevær in the winter of 1863. The gutting girls had an important job during the salting of the herring. (Marcus Selmer, owner: University Museum in Bergen (Rep. neg. 5099)).
“Silver from the sea” is a telling description of the herring in the years that one could ladle up riches along the coast. Many farmers from the mountains came out to the sea to take part in both the riches and in the nutritious food. The picture is from the great herring fisheries at Fedje in the 1930s. (Atelièr K.K., owner: Picture collection, University Library in Bergen (3246)).
The sea house at Trellevik in Sund is full of equipment and old tools At one time this big and well-built house belonged to the trader in Glesvær. The fish trap in the foreground tells of a new form of activity in the sea (aquaculture). (Svein Nord).