26/11/2025
- It's hard to imagine Worcester experiencing two tides daily and large cargo boats using South Quay and later Diglis. Worcester really was an important inland Port. Worcester folk only spoke of the river with positivity, afterall it made many people rich and linked them to other settlements. Today, it is usually given negative press, mainly due to flooding or sewage outflow! We mentioned Fish Street last week, as being the Street of the Fishmongers. This week we look at the Salmon Fishermen and their families who worked the Severn at Worcester. For Centuries, Salmon was caught using nets cast and dragged towards boats or direct to the river bank. After all the river banks were gentle slopes with beaches existing in many places. The Severn had not been tamed and boxed in yet. Line fishing was very rare until the end of the 16th Century. Most people just didn't have the luxury of free time, a time to sit and fish with a rod. By the 18th and 19th Century, Salmon Fishermen and their families lived mainly in Severn Street. This was once Frog Lane. Small brick cottages were constructed on the site of the silted up Castle Moat, creating a curved Terrace. Even today several houses are still known as 'Fisherman's Cottages'. A plaque is situated at the start of Severn Street explaining this unique community. One notable family was the Jenkins family who fished the Severn for years. John Jenkins had combined fishing with being the City Ale Taster. Nets and boats were stored on the riverside and when not fishing, nets were repaired and maintained by the whole family. Fish was then carried to Fish Street to sell. One description said Salmon were 'hawked about on donkeys' backs and sold at sixpence a pound'. At one point laws forbid selling fish outside the Parish of St Albans. Salmon Fishermen living downstream were often accused of overfishing, especially in Upton Upon Severn. In 1613, Fishermen in the upper reaches of the Severn, in North Worcestershire and Shropshire petitioned the Quarter Sessions to say their livelihoods were in jeopardy because of the overfishing in Upton, Ripple and Holdfast. It was highlighted that they were 'working with forestalling nets which reach from one side of the river to the other and from the top to the bottom thereof so that they take multitudes of fish'. Further problems appeared in 1714 when it was profitable to supply Salmon to big Cities. As the years progressed, most observations say smaller fish were taken at the wrong time of the year! This even went against an Act of Parliament which made it a crime to take any salmon weighing less than 6lb from the Severn. Even in the 19th Century, illegal nets were being seized by the authorities and fishermen heavily fined. When the Locks and Weir were constructed at Diglis in the 1840s, Salmon fishing was confined to the area South of Diglis. Census returns in 1861 shows 74 people in 18 families were working in the fishing industry in Severn Street. This seems to have been the height of fishermen living in Severn Street. By the 20th Century the amount of Salmon caught became a cause for concern. The Berrows reported as late as 1952 that the Severn River Board introduced further legislation 'in an effort to stop any further deterioration of the Severn as a salmon producing river.' The board decided to expand the ban on netting to the long length of the Severn between Farmilode in Gloucestershire and Tewkesbury. The prohibition had already been in operation since the 1920s on all the Severn upstream of Tewkesbury. This board also explained that between 1906-1910 the average catch of Salmon was about 25,000! In 1951 this number was just 3,000. Overfishing was the main cause in the decline. Shipping arriving at Diglis also made it hazardous to fish in small boats. Lt.Col Goodman, board Chairman, said he didn't think the river would ever be 'a great rod fishing river'. He did say netting had provided a valuable source of food during the Second World War. It is worth remembering 'The Salmons Leap' pub that stood in Severn Street too. A pub with a very appropriate name, but sadly demolished in 2009. Today the Fish Pass at Diglis has helped bring Salmon further up stream again. Some parts of the Severn can be fished today, but please make sure you find out where you can legally do this and when.
