Herring Girl
Statue North Shields Tyne And Wear

Herring Girl, North Shields

Statue In North Shields, Tyne And Wear

A Corten Steel sculpture by Ray Lonsdale to honour the Herring Girls.

You can spend a nice couple of hours around North or South Shields and we decided to use the foot ferry which was fun. We went from South Shields to North Shields and our first stop was the Herring Girl by Ray Lonsdale.

The super images above and below are by Dave Chalcrart, who took on a special Fabulous North mission to capture them.

North Shields Heritage Project championed the idea to honour the lasses that gutted, salted, and packed the Herrings that the fisherman caught along the coast. Ray Lonsdale was commissioned for the work in his distinctive 3D mosaic of Corten Steel and it is life size. It certainly is 'craft with meaning.'

Here she is in the warmth of Ray's workshop.

The Fish Quay in North Shields thrived from the 18th Century to the 1960s. Initially salted herrings were exported to the West Indies to feed the enslaved people as it was cheap. In 1807 slavery was abolished and a new market was sort. Due to political situations after the Wars and reduced Herring stock the trade diminished.

We are going to explore the White Herring affectionately known as Silver Darlings here.

Herrings were caught from around May to October along the east coast from Stornaway, Scotland to Yarmouth, England. Herring girls would follow (by train) the fisherman along the coast, gutting, salting, and packing the Herrings into barrels for export to Germany, Eastern Europe and Russia. This changed after the Wars.

Netting the Herrings started in Scotland, so most of the girls and fisherman were Scottish, Their ages ranged from Teenagers to girls in their 20's and older, some were family groups. They had the gutting skills and with very little other work available, this was their life. The biggest boom was around 1907 when 2,500,000 barrels were exported. There were 10,000 boats involved in the Scottish herring industry in 1913.

The super atmospheric image below is by kind permission of Eric Bell.

Herring is an oily fish and requires curing as soon as possible after being caught to prevent it from rotting, becoming offensive to the nose, and unconsumable. It only stayed fresh for a day.

A barrel took between 900 and 1200 herring, depending on the size of the fish. The herring had to be sorted into sizes from 9 ½ “ to 11 ¾ “, and there could be 7 categories.

Ray's son helped to create the barrels, that add authenticity to the art.

The girls worked in teams often the same family. The girls who did the gutting wound the tips of their fingers with washed flour sacks. They would bend down to pick herrings up from shin height. It took until 1918 to raise the working height with thigh-high troughs called farlans. This sped up the process. The girls stood in a line at the trough with their sharp knives called cutags/futtles. It was always best that all the girls were right-handed (unlikely to get all left-handers) so that no one got cut from the girl next to you.

With a quick twist and a turn of the wrist, the gills and long gut were removed and the fish was put into the basket for that sized fish. Another girl, preferably a tall girl, as she had to reach inside to the bottom of the barrel, lay the fish in a certain manner, belly up, all tails or heads to the middle on alternate layers with salt. The barrels were left a few days to 'pine' as the herrings shrunk in the brine. The brine was drained off and checked for flavour, if acceptable, the barrel was topped up with more herrings and the brine poured back in. The lid was secured and then it was ready for export.

The work speed and the knives' sharpness meant there were accidents. The salt would show no mercy and the cuts would sting. At least salt has antibacterial properties. The girls could gut over 40 fish a minute, some 60 a minute. Can you imagine the smell that would permeate into your skin and all that gooey fish intestines and fins!

From Rigby's Encyclopaedia of the Herring AKA The Herripedia (Yes there is such a website):

'..the sellers of fresh or 'caller' herring could be considered exemplars of a strong and independent minded beauty in their youth, but became proverbially coarser the older they got.'

Ray Lonsdale has certainly captured the emotion of the Herring Girl Ray said to ITV news

"From what I gather, they were a very characterful bunch of lasses who weren't meant to be messed with," he said. "You wouldn't think it, but they seemed to be a very joyful bunch. They would come down and be singing, they'd be carrying on, but they weren't to be crossed. That's what I tried to get across."

The prose echos this.

The model is Lisa Eagleton-Muir and the pose is similar to one from an old photograph, that when it was seen it was said 'That's the one!' Lisa wore the typical clothes of the Herring girl. The aprons were originally leather and later oil skin. The headscarf I believe is tied in a 'Peasants knot' at the nape of the neck. It is a most practical arrangement and keeps the hair out of the way.

Ray has added nuances like the way the girl's foot dangles gently, and there's an errant little finger. The knife and knitting on the barrel indicate their tools and that there was never an idle moment. The knitting of a gansey which was a fisherman's jumper with a pattern that was unique to that family. Especially helpful when identifying dead seaman.

See if you can find Two Red Rubber Things 'trade mark' of two red dots.

North Shields Heritage Project was the group that brought the Fiddlers Green sculpture to the harbour side and both of these sculptures are a great way to learn about the heritage of fishing. Go and explore more of North Shields.

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How To Find Herring Girl

Where Is Herring Girl?

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Lat / Long

55.007802, -1.439358

What three words

gained.apple.unions

Where To Park For Herring Girl?

It is situated at the edge of a car park.

Contributed by Rosalind Parker

Thanks for reading through and getting to the end of this post. I enjoy exploring the Fabulous North (Especially as a Southerner residing up North). I like 'snippets' of information, and more so, if they are obscure, amusing or meaningful. The photographs are taken on a mobile phone, without any enhancements.

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Rosalind Parker

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Herring Girl was listed in Statue // Tyne And Wear // North Shields