The Portland daily press., 1886-07-13
TROUBLES OF FISHERMEN.
Seizures and Smuggling In the Eng
Iish Channel.
boston Transcript

Fishing scrapes have been common in Eu-
rope for a hundred years OF more. and Will
probably continue until all laws regulating
fishing are abolished. Every year may be
seen in the English papers notices of fisher
men captured ION the coasts of France Hol-
land, Germany or Britain, for fishing on for
hidden grounds, Snch cases are settled b
the courts of the respective countries
are rarely or never made the subject of ,na
tional controversy. Some sixty years az
the fishermen of Deal and Dover engaged
smuggling when they had a chance. I
regular smugglers were always fitted .as FISH
ermen, and had mixed crews of English and
Frenchmen and all could speak French and
English, so that they were at home on either
coast and could render reasonable reason
when caught in forbidden waters, The Brit
ish had sl00p cutters fully manned and well
armed, to protect the fisheries and prevent
smuggling. But their movements were so
well known to smugglers that they rarely
had q chance to Interfere with them. The
French also had cruisers along the coast, and
worked in concert with the British cutters TO
protect their respective fisheries.
The fishermen ON both sides of the English
Channel were generally large luggers, some
of them decked over, and carried crews of
eighteen or twenty men. The larger vessels
were suspected of smuggling and were
watched more closely than the open boats
but nearly all did little free trade" when
there was chance. Though the British
had well organized coast guard-had the
Ramalies, seyenty-four anchored in the
Downs, and swift cruisers, the free traders
drove prosperous business. In the fall OF
1880 noted fisherman and smuggler, named
the Whale, commanded by an man-O-war's
man, nicknamed Skyblue, the color Of his
SOU wester, laden with brandy, had Just dart
ed from creek near Cherboqrg, when she
found herself alongside of French armed
cruiser disguised as a lugger. Escape was
impossible but old Skyblue was equal to the
occasion. AS the Frenchman threw his Crap
nels on board and was busily engaged in
making the vessels fast to each other, the
smuggiers, beavers in hand, led by Skyblue
rushed on board the Frenchman, drove her
crew below and captured her After secur-
ing her matches they carried her to England
and anchored her in the Downs, near the
Ramalies. The weather was squally and
dark, all in favor of the smuggler, which
landed her brandy without interference,
and before daylight was on the fish
ing grounds attending to her legitimate busi-
ness.
The crew of the Frenchman were liberated
by boat from the Ramalies. The story Of
her capture, which of course was piracy on
the high seas, created intense excitement for
some time: investigation was instituted, but
nothing could be found out; and the incident
in a few years was almost forgotten. Forum
ately no lives were lost. After old Skyblue
had been gathered to his fathers and the crew
of the Whale had been scattered, one Of them,
a Frenchman, told the story in French news
paper, from which it was translated and cop Z
led into some of the English papers. Even al
this day all the fishermen along the west coast
of Britain fromc the Shetland Islands, and
along the south coast of England from Dover
10 the Lands End, are suspected Of free
trade proclivities. Some interesting incl
dents Of smuggling and fishing on the west
coast of Scotland in the last century, are de-
seribed in Sir Walter ScOtt's novels of "Guy
Mannering" and "Redgauntlett."