662 HISTORY AND METHODS OF THE FISHERIES. 



" The following account of the fishery at the falls, after the Revolution, was derived from two 

 aged meu in 1848, Joseph Ely, in his ninety-second year, and Justin A Ivord, iu his eighty-fifth year, 

 who had often caught fish at the falls, and from others since 1848: 



" Fishing generally began between April 15 and May 1, very seldom as early as April 15. The 

 best fishing season was in May. Shad were caught iu seines below the falls, and in scoop-nets on 

 the falls. Boats were drawn to places on the rocky falls, fastened, and filled with shad by scoop- 

 nets, then taken ashore, emptied and returned. A man in this manner could take from 2,000 to 

 3,000 shad iu a day, and sometimes more with the aid of a boatman. These movements required 

 men of some dexterity. There were some large hauls offish at the wharves below the falls. The 

 greatest haul known was 3,500, according to Ely, and 3,300, according to Alvord. (One man, of 

 South Hadley, gives 3,000 as the largest haul. Connecticut archives contain an account of 3,000 

 shad taken at a haul in the cove at East Haddam before 1766. The number in these great 

 hauls is probably exaggerated.) It was not often that 1,500 or even 1,200 shad were taken by one 

 sweep of the net. (Morse's Geography, fifth edition, says there were as many as fourteen fishing 

 wharves at the foot of the falls in 1801, and that they sometimes caught 1,200 fish at one haul ; 

 it was reported that one company cleared $4,800 in one season.) 



" Salmon were taken on the falls in dip-nets, and below, in seines, with shad. Before their 

 day salmon had been taken at the foot of the falls, in places called pens. Ely had never known 

 a salmon taken at the falls that weighed over 30 pounds ; some weighed 130, and many from 6 to 

 10 pounds. They were always few in number compared with shad. The river seemed to be full 

 of shad at times in some places, and in crossing it the oars often struck shad. Ely and Alvord, 

 like other old men, related that fishermen formerly took salmon from the net and let the shad go 

 into the river again, but not in their time, and that people in former days were ashamed to have 

 jt known that they ate shad, owing, in part, to the disgrace of being without pork. Alvord sold 

 thousands of shad after the Revolution for 3 coppers each, and salmon were sold from 2 to 3 pence 

 per pound. It was much more difficult to sell salmon than shad. Some bass were caught \\ith 

 hooks after shad time. Sturgeon were taken at the falls with spears. Lampreys, (tailed lauiprey- 

 eels, had long been plenty on the falls, and many were taken at night by hand by the- aid of 

 torch-lights. Some were eaten in a few towns in Old Hampshire, but most were carried to Granby, 

 Simsbury, and other towns in Connecticut. (Lampreys came above the falls in great numbers, 

 and entered the streams that run into the Connecticut, until the Holyoke dam was built in 1849. 

 They were very numerous in Fort River, in Hadley, below Smith's Mills, and were caught l>y the 

 light of torches, sometimes several hundred in a night. Meu waded into the streams and grasped 

 them with a mittened hand and placed them in a bag. Sometimes the lampreys in the night 

 crawled into and about the flutter-wheel of the mill and into the throat of the gate in such great 

 numbers that the wheel could not be turned in the morning until they were cleared away. In 

 Northampton Mill River, below the lower mills, lampreys were caught in the same manner as 

 in Hadley, and in other ways. In a dark night men might be seen in the river, clasping now 

 and then with one hand a squirming lamprey, and holding in the other a, birch bark torch, which 

 threw light on the river and on all objects on its borders. Very few were cooked in Northampton 

 and Hadley; many were given to hogs. Some were conveyed to other towns in Massachusetts, 

 but most to Connecticut. None are now caught above Holyoke dam.) 



"Shad seasons brought to the falls, on both sides of the river, multitudes of people from various 

 quarters. Some came from Berkshire County. All came on horses with bags to carry shad, except 

 a very few who had carts. Some, intending to purchase two loads of shad, led a horse. For 



