By Mike Smylie 

One of my very favourite boats is the 18ft Suffolk beach boat Three Sisters, IH81, built in Thorpeness for a Mr Ralph. Several times I’ve been out off the coast between Aldeburgh and Felixstowe drift-netting for herring aboard this boat, with her owner Robert Simper (p60). Ok, so she’s been rebuilt but she remains as much in spirit now as she was when she was first built for fishing off and around Thorpeness back in 1896.
She’s typical for working craft along this coast; it is said that these small but solid craft were originally double-enders and evolved from the Norse influence we’ve seen throughout our travels around the northern part of the UK. In fact, this boatbuilding influence is apparent anywhere north-about from the Thames through to Southern Ireland and the Bristol Channel.
For these boats the transom was adopted in the first half of the 19th century through the need for more space aboard to carry fish and to improve sailing performance as they were seldom just rowed when working. In Aldeburgh these were called ‘boats’ in contrast to Southwold and Walberswick where they were ‘punts’, but these clinker-built two-masters were common anywhere from almost Lowestoft to the river Deben, including tiny beach landings such as Bawdsey, Hollesley and Shingle Beach. All showed the characteristics of being good sailers, capable of working off the steep Suffolk beaches and set a dipping lug main and small standing lug mizzen on a bumpkin.
If you read some historical information on these craft, you could be forgiven that they simply fished for sprats as those from Aldeburgh have been termed sprat boats. In truth, even if sprats were vital to an Aldeburgh fisherman’s survival, like most beach-based fishing communities, these vessels were general workhorses. They were used to drift for herring in autumn, going spratting in winter, trawling in spring and summer, as well as sometimes shrimping and setting the odd pot for lobsters and crabs. Come the summer, serving the local tourists with a hour’s sail was more fruitful for many than several hours fishing, and thus taking trippers out was a normal pastime.
Three Sisters had an engine fitted in the 1920s, a time when new boats were fattened up to counterbalance the weight of these units. As the boats increased in weight and hauling up the beach became almost impossible, most of the beach-based communities disappeared, with the boats being kept in the river Deben. Aldeburgh was the exception, and the odd boat still operates directly off the beach, though the numbers have severely declined just as the general fishing industry has. The added problem today is unchanged from a century ago – the lack of access to market – and it’s no wonder that these small communities failed. Many had to travel miles to sell the catch they’d achieved from a day’s fishing, and traipsing around the neighbourhood was often the only choice. Today’s ‘elf & safety’ wouldn’t even let you, even if you’d the energy to do so! A good thing, then, that each time I’ve been drifting for herring in Three Sisters, we haven’t caught more than we can eat in a few sessions of chomping.