138 HISTORY AND METHODS OF THE FISHERIES. 
known as the “ Hampton’ boat, but about Newburyport still known as the “Labrador” boat. These 
boats were made at Seabrook, N. H., and were often called whale-boats. The average length was 
about 19 feet on the keel and 23 feet over all, lap-streaked, very sharp forward and aft, and with 
a straight stern-post. They were generally provided with two masts and rigged with sprit or 
leg-o’-mutton sails. These boats were stowed upon deck, two on each side, with one swung upon 
the davits at the stern. : 
About 1815 a fishing company was established at Gloucester, Mass., for the purpose of carrying 
on the Bank and Labrador cod fisheries. This company had a fleet of vessels built numbering 10 
or12sail. Most of these were topsail schooners, the others being fore-and-aft rig. The former were 
most generally employed in the Labrador fisheries, though they occasionally visited the Banks. 
Their size varied from 50 to 80 tons, old measurement. The rig was peculiar on account of the 
single square topsail on the foretopmast. They had full, bluff—almost square—bows, straight sides, 
very round bilge (usually called “kettle bottom”), short, full run, square stern, and high quarter- 
deck. The latter was usually elevated 4 to 5 feet above the main deck, and reached by step-ladders. 
Being so high, and quite short (as a rule but little more than one-fourth the length of the hull), the 
quarter-deck had much the appearance of the heel on an inverted shoe, and for this reason these 
schooners were spoken of in later years as the old-fasitioned “heel-tappers.” Top-sail schooners 
were also employed in the Labrador fisheries from Newburyport and Provincetown, according to 
Mr. Daniel Sayward, of Gloucester, who says that vessels of this class belonging at the above- 
named ports often came to Gloucester to cure their fish. 
These vessels were similar in all respects to those of the same class engaged in the coasting 
trade of that period (1820 to 1850), varied in size from 130 to 150 tons, old measurement, and, as a 
rule, were old schooners. The quarter-decks were not so high as those of the vessels formerly 
sailing from Gloucester. 
There can be no doubt, however, that the Labrador fleet was mostly made up of fore-and-aft 
schooners, of the ordinary types employed in the fisheries at that period. : 
5. APPARATUS AND METHODS OF FISHING. 
TRAWLS.—Trawls are now exclusively used in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, and have been 
during the last twenty-five years or more.* The equipment of dories is similar to that of a Grand 
Banker. In former years the fishing in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence was carried on by hand-lining 
from the deck of the vessel, in a manner now practiced in the George’s fishery, excepting that the 
leads were much lighter, weighing 4 to 5 pounds, and that the vessels often fished while drifting 
with the wind and tide. 
The trawls used in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence are similar to those used on the Grand Bank. 
Captain Atwood states that before the introduction of trawling in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence 
the majority of the fish were comparatively small, about seventy being required to make a quintal. 
On Bank Bradley, for instance, the cod would usually be about as large as a common haddock. 
Occasionally one would be taken as large as a porpoise, weighing 70 or 80 pounds, perhaps one or 
two to every hundred. When trawling was introduced great quantities of these large fish were 
taken, and for several years a considerable fleet of Provincetown vessels frequented these grounds. 
Thg large fish were nearly all caught up in time, however. 
* We learn that quite a number of our fishing-vessels are fitting out for a trip to the Bay for the purpose of trawl- 
ing fish, which are said to be quite plenty in the vicinity of Cape North. This is somewhat of a new field for our 
fishermen. * * Several of the Marblehead and Beverly fishermen have fished there in past years and found fish abun- 
dant. The vessels start about the middle of April, and will probably stay two or three months.—(Cape Ann Adver- 
tiser, March 30, 1860.) 
