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BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 
THE VESSEL FISHERIES. 
The vessels employed in the fisheries of Massachusetts are chiefly distinguished 
for their relatively high value and large size. Those engaged in the food fisheries are 
the best of their class in the country. The fishing fleet is much more numerous and 
important than in any other New England State; and, with the exception of Maryland, 
Massachusetts has a larger number of fishing vessels than any other State. 
Statistics of the vessel fisheries are exhibited from the following points of view: 
By counties, by customs districts, by apparatus, by fishing-grounds, and by fisheries. 
There are seven counties in Massachusetts from which vessel fishing is now carried 
on; these are Essex, Suffolk, Plymouth, Barnstable, Nantucket, Dukes, and Bristol. 
The extent of the industry in each is clearly shown in the following tables. 
The first table indicates that of the 10,760 persons employed on the fishing fleet 
of Massachusetts, 5,729 are on vessels belonging in Essex County, in which is situated 
the great fishing port of Gloucester, and 2,295 on vessels in Barnstable County, while 
only 13 vessel fishermen are credited to Plymouth County. Vessels engaged in trans- 
porting fishery products carried 91 men, of whom 42 were in Barnstable County and 
22 in Essex County. 
The first table also gives the number of Americans, British provincials, and other 
foreigners constituting the crews of the fishing vessels of Massachusetts. As already 
stated, this is one of the most important questions connected with the fishery marine 
of New England ; it is also one which has been the subject of much misstatement and 
misapprehension. The table shows that of the 10,851 persons on the fishing vessels 
of Massachusetts in 1889, 8,002, or 73.7 per cent, were American citizens, 1,157, or 10.7 
per cent, were British provincials, and 1,692, or 15.6 per cent, were subjects of other 
countries. The general tendency among fishermen of foreign birth, so far as informa- 
tion can be obtained, is to become naturalized, marry, and acquire homes at the various 
fishing ports; many of them own the whole or part of the vessels in which they sail. 
The second table of this series shows that $5,335,602 was invested in the vessel 
fisheries of Massachusetts in 1889, of which sum $2,858,250, or more than half, is 
credited to Essex County, and $1,136,250 to Bristol County. The former county had 
442 fisliing vessels, or considerably more than half of the fishing fleet of the State, 
followed by Barnstable County with 188, and Bristol County with 80. The vessels 
employed in transporting numbered 22, of which 10 were in Barnstable County. Trawl 
lines and hand lines are the most widely adopted and important apparatus employed 
in the vessel fisheries of the State; the quantity used in .1889 was valued at over 
$550,000. Seines to the number of 235, worth $120,600, were carried by mackerel ves- 
sels, chiefly in Essex, Barnstable, and Suffolk counties. Gill nets, the next important 
means of capture, are fished chiefly in Essex and Barnstable counties, in which 988 
of the total number operated, viz, 1,049, were owned. The minor apparatus carried by 
the vessels of Massachusetts consists of snap nets, harpoons, pots, rakes, and dredges. 
The devices used in the whale fishery are of such a miscellaneous nature that it has 
not been found practicable to classify them or show them separately under the head 
of apparatus. Their value has been included with that of the outfit of the vessels in 
the tables. 
