Songs about Hull

[Roadkill]

I think Green Day got in on this as well: Boulevard of Broken Dreams.

That might just have been Hull FC, come to think of it, though...

 

[the button]

On a slightly more serious note, there's this one: -

LAMENT FOR THE HULL TRAWLERS
(Ewan MacColl / Frankie Armstrong)

Mist hangs heavy over the land
Over the estuary
Shrouding the ships that move from the docks
Down the Humber to the sea
Bitter the winds and heavy the billows
And freezing the hail and rain
When three fishing trawlers sailed out on the tide
And never returned again

Off to the coast of Iceland they steered
In the first month of the year
When winter gales blow bitter and cold
And women must wait and fear
For no matter the storm, no matter the danger
The profits have got to be made
When the owners give orders the boats must go out
Though they sail to a fisherman's grave

For two weeks and more no signal was heard
From the Saint Romanus crew
At length the owners ordered a search
By the end of a week they knew
The Romanus was gone, the Peridow too
Lost in the cold Northern grounds
Pulled down by the ice on the rigging and deck
Forty brave seamen were drowned

The owners refused to meet with the wives
They said they weren't to blame
When the news came in of a third trawler lost
Ross Cleveland was her name
The cold Northern ice had captured and drowned her
The ice of the north was her grave
Eighteen good trawlermen followed her down
Only the one man was saved

Mist hangs heavy over the land
Over the estuary
Shrouding the ships that move from the docks
Down the Humber to the sea
Cold roll the waves on the graves of the seamen
Warm flow the tears of their wives
But frozen the hearts of the men who have built
Their fortunes on fishermen's lives

Which was written about three boats going down in 1968, within a matter of weeks of each other. My dad was working on the docks at time, doing "running repairs" on the trawlers so they could go out to sea again. He jacked his job in because he didn't like the idea of sending men out to their deaths.

 

[the button]

Having turned the thread all sombre, there's also this one: -

Three Score and Ten

Methinks I see a host of craft
Spreading their sails alee
Down the Humber they do glide
All bound for the Northern Sea
Me thinks I see on each small craft
A crew with hearts so brave
Going out to earn their daily bread
Upon the restless wave

Chorus: And it's three score and ten
Boys and men were lost from Grimsby town
From Yarmouth down to Scarboro
Many hundreds more were drowned
Our herring craft, our trawlers
Our fishing smacks, as well
They long defied that bitter night
And battled with the swell

Methinks I see them yet again
As they leave this land behind
Casting their nets into the sea
The herring shoals to find
Me thinks I see them yet again
They're all on board all right
With their nets rolled up and their decks cleaned off
And the side lights burning bright

October's night brought such a sight
Twas never seen before
There were mast and yards and broken spars
A washing on the shore
There were many a heart in sorrow
Many a heart so brave
There were many a fine and hearty lad
That met a watery grave

Hull being fairly well-off for drowned fishermen throughout the ages. This particular one is 19th century, although the events described happened in February rather than October ("February" doesn't scan).

 

[Roadkill]

I think that might have been written after the 'Great Gale' of March 1883, which doesn't scan all that well either. No-one knows quite how many people died, but it could have been well over 300...

 

[the button]

Plenty of gales around in the 1880s: -

'In memoriam of the poor Fishermen who lost their lives in the Dreadful Gale from Grimsby and Hull, Feb 8 & 9, 1889' is the title of a broadside produced by a Grimsby fisherman, William Delf, to raise funds for bereaved families. The song passed into oral tradition, lost six verses and gained one - the last, which refers to October instead of February. It also acquired a chorus and a new tune. This oral version was collected from a master mariner, Mr J Pearson of Filey in 1957 by N A Hudleston. A copy of the original broadside is held in Grimsby Public Library.

It was reported like this:


As day after day passes and no tidings arrive of the missing Grimsby smacks, it is beginning to be realised that the gale of the 9th ult. will prove one of the most disastrous to the Grimsby fishing trade on record. Altogether nearly a dozen fishing vessels, carrying between 60 and 70 hands, are missing. Most of these vessels were only provisioned for eight or nine days, and many of them have been out over a month. Of the safety of seven of them all hope has now been abandoned. The vessels are:
Sea Searcher, trawl smack, owner Mr Joseph Ward; five hands.
John Wintringham, cod smack, master and owner Mr John Guitesen; eleven hands.
Eton, iron steam trawl smack, owner Mr H. Smethurst, Jun.; eight hands.
British Workman, cod smack, owner Mr Thomas Campbell; seven hands.
Sir Frederick Roberts, trawl smack, master and owner Mr W. Walker; five hands.
Kitten, trawl smack, owner James Meadows; five hands.
Harold, trawl smack, master and owner Mr Blakeney; five hands.

Portions of wreckage from the Kitten have been picked up at sea and brought into port, and the British Workman was seen to be reduced to a mere wreck by a heavy sea on the morning of the gale. Many of the men who have been lost leave wives and families, and an immense amount of distress will be caused amongst the fishing population. The total number of vessels lost will, it is feared, be near 15, and of lives between 70 and 80.


Hull Times, 2 March 1889.

http://www.folkinfo.org/songs/displaysong.php?songid=104

I'm looking for the words to Three Day Millionaire at the moment, but I suspect it's still copyrighted. It captures something of the "I might die tomorrow, but I don't give a fuck" of a lot of trawlermen. It starts something along the lines of: -

I left school Friday, and started work on Saturday
To put myself to sea and be a gally-boys my plan.
On the fishing grounds to roam,
Eighteen hundred miles from home,
I couldn't give a bugger, I'm a man.

Written by one of Hull's finest, Mike Waterson.

 

[Roadkill]

Plenty of gales around in the 1880s: -

http://www.folkinfo.org/songs/displaysong.php?songid=104

Ooh, cheers for the link. That looks interesting.

Meanwhile, I've found this bit of truly dreadful bit of Victorian balladry:

Kind friends if you will listen, a sad story I will tell.
The murder of a fisher lad of Hull that has befel.
His name was Joseph Rowbottom, 16 years of age,
It must have been dreadful to be murdered whilst at sea.
Nicholene [sic] and Hadisty must have been of stone
To take the life of that poor boy whilst he was all alone
No mother to caress him upon the raging sea,
The boy's been cruelly murdered, it's plain enough to see.

Nicholene and Hadistry their wild career have run
Their life they have to forfeit for the crime that they have done
Hanging is too good for them, with me you will agree,
For cruelly murdering that poor boy whilst out upon the sea.
On the 9th day of January the Sterling went to sea
And every hand upon the deck seemed happy as could be,
The lad was taken seasick upon the raging maon,
But now he'd never see his friends or home again.

The third hand and the captain cruel men must have been
To kick the lad with their seaboots on, it was a dreadful thing,
He asked them to have mercy, when down below he cried,
They gave him another shaking and sent him stupefied.
May God protect these fisher lads when out upon the main.
Their task is hard and never know when they return again.
They should be treated kindly and well protected,
From villains such as these two men either on land or sea.

They will soon be brought to justice for the crime that they have done
Not a word of sympathy, their race has nearly run
They should have shown some mercy to the wear lad before,
But now they'll suffer the penalty of the strong arm of the law.

In fact, Nicholson and Hardisty got twenty years apiece for the manslaughter of Joseph Rowbottom, in 1884.

 

[the button]

My GP in Beverley was called Hardisty. I knew he was a wrong 'un.

That's a fine example of 19th century doggerel, btw.

In an effort to be on-the-ball with the news of the day, the broadside ballad producers often double-guessed the outcomes of high profile trials. There are many examples of ballads entitled "So-and-so's last words from the scaffold," which were on sale before the hanging took place. So not unlike today's tabloids, in fact.

You've got me onto a subject that I can bore for England at, I'm afraid.

 

[Roadkill]

Go ahead - I think it's fascinating!

IIRC, weren't 'gallows confessions' usually pretty much made up anyway - as in, if a bloke didn't actually say anything, words were put into his mouth for the sake of an interesting read? I seem to remember reading too that they tended to die out a bit later in the century, probably because of the end of public hangings and the fact that journalists could get the facts more quickly by telegraph. Tbh I'd rather have the 'confessions' than the ballads, though. I've a few more lying about here somewhere, connected with a couple of murders in Hull in the late nineteenth century. I'll see if I can dig 'em out...

 

[Tambala]

Having turned the thread all sombre, there's also this one: -



Hull being fairly well-off for drowned fishermen throughout the ages. This particular one is 19th century, although the events described happened in February rather than October ("February" doesn't scan).

October may be a confusion with the Eyemouth Disaster of Friday 14th October 1881, when 189 men and boys were lost in the biggest storm in living memory.