Plaque to celebrate community links to city's fishing industry

A memorial celebrating a Hull community's links to the fishing industry will be unveiled next month.

Despite once being home to the biggest deep water fishing fleet in the world, Hull has previously had little in the way of a formal reminder to those who worked and died in the industry.

Between 5,000 and 8,000 men and boys are believed to have died while sailing from Hull since the mid-19th century.

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The black granite plaque will be dedicated in a ceremony in Hessle Road on Friday, September 10, with a short service of commemoration led by the Rev Tony Cotson.

The stone was donated by Walton Street-based monumental masons WH Wriglesworth and will say in gold leaf lettering: "To commemorate the special relationship between the Hessle Road community and Hull's lost trawlermen."

The company said it had long-standing links to the city and wanted to give something back to its people.

Marketing director Anna Buckley said: "Wriglesworth has been serving the Hull community for over a century and as the trawlermen and their families are the backbone of these communities, we felt that it was important for the community to be able to commemorate both the lives of the lost trawlermen and the way of life that was so instrumental in shaping these communities.

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"We wanted to donate the plaque as it enabled us to make a small gesture towards thanking the Hull community for the support and business that they have given us over many decades."

Mr Cotson, vicar of St John the Baptist's Church – known locally as the fishermen's church – said he was delighted to be taking part in the event.

He will be speaking from personal experience when he makes his speech, having being born and raised in Hessle Road and also having had 15 years experience of working in the trawling industry.

Mr Cotson said: "More than any other, the Hessle Road community bore the grief and pain of their fishermen lost to the sea, the many who sailed from the port of Hull never to return.

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"The plaque will commemorate the special relationship that existed between those men and that community."

Hull fishing historian Alec Gill is attending, and invitations are being sent to Hull West and Hessle MP Alan Johnson, the Lord Mayor of Hull, Coun David Gemmell, and city council leader Carl Minns.

The project is being backed by Hull fishing heritage group Stand, which is creating a memorial to the city's lost trawlermen on St Andrew's Quay.

Stand chairman Charles Pinder will speak at the ceremony to unveil the new memorial. He said: "We felt it ought to be there and we are delighted we can contribute to its placing of."

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Elsewhere in the city, a coping stone and plaque dedicated to lost fishermen was funded and set up at the bullnose on St Andrew's Dock by the Royal Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes some years ago.

A statue in Hessle Road also pays tribute to victims of the "Russian Outrage" of 1906, in which Hull trawlers were attacked by the Russian navy off Dogger Bank.

Stand believes a more significant tribute to the whole of the city's fishing industry is needed and has spent years raising funds for its project.

It is hoped the memorial will act as a focal point of remembrance for bereaved families, as most fishermen lost at sea have no grave. Some of those who perished were boys of 15 making their first trip to sea.

The Stand memorial will be close to the Sailmakers pub overlooking the River Humber and west of St Andrew's Dock, the former home of the city's once mighty fishing fleet.

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