“We all work nets alike up and down the river – we have been brought up to fishing.”

Joseph Armitage, 1830

It’s hard to imagine it today, but in the 18th and 19th centuries, the London suburbs of Hammersmith and Chiswick were fishing villages. Working on the river had been a major feature of life in London since medieval times, and for many years, St Nicholas’ church in Chiswick, situated on the riverbank near the old Thames ferry crossing, was known as the fishermen’s church, named after the patron saint of sailors and fishermen. Local fishermen plundered the Thames for its stocks of salmon, eels, flounder and smelt, often being taught by their fathers from a young age, and eventually taking over their nets and boats.

Chiswick and Hammersmith were once seen as healthy, rural villages and by the late 18th century were attracting affluent city dwellers, who built grand houses in the area. On the surface, fishing life continued as it always had – with some fun interspersed with the hard work. In 1829, 23-year-old Moses Gibson, whose grandfather, father and brothers were all fishermen, had taken part in an annual sailing match between 24 boats, all owned by fishermen. In a test of skill, they had to sail their boats from Hammersmith Bridge to Kew and back. The local gentry and other well-to-do residents donated monetary prizes, and turned out to watch the race. Moses came second in his boat, the Countess Macartney, narrowly losing out to Thomas Humphreys in his boat, the Providence. These were both Peter boats – traditional, double-ended fishing boats designed to deal with the Thames’ tidal waters.

But there was, underneath this jollity, increasing pressure on the fishing industry and those who worked in it. Pollution caused by industrialisation was leading to a dearth of fish and therefore less income for the fishermen. One’s equipment – nets and so on – cost a substantial amount of money, and others might try and steal them to use themselves or sell on.

Moses Gibson was the victim of such a theft in 1830. At the Old Bailey, he accused two brothers, William and Joseph Armitage, of stealing his fishing nets, worth about two shillings, from his new boat, the Godspeed, while it was docked in its usual place outside Hammersmith’s Old Ship pub. The local fishing community all knew each other; as Moses stated in court, “I know the prisoners – they are fishermen, but seldom work on the river Thames.” Another fisherman, William Pearce, had seen William Armitage with two nets, and recognised them as “my brother’s nets”.

The fishermen who shared this stretch of the Thames usually saw each other as brothers, and would protect each other. Joseph, aged 21, and his brother William, 20, were both sentenced to 14 years’ transportation to Australia for the theft.

By 1839, writer Thomas Faulkner was lamenting the state of the fishing industry in Hammersmith, saying that so few smelt fish had appeared in the area during the previous five years “that the produce scarcely pays the fishermen for their labour in catching them”. Apart from the likes of the Armitage brothers, local fishermen formed a tight community, supporting each other when times were hard. When William Pearce, a Chiswick fisherman, was called to the Brentford Petty Sessions to answer a charge of infringing the fishery rules in 1839, the magistrates’ room was crowded with other fishermen there to support one of their brothers. William, however, was found guilty, fined 50 shillings and sent to the house of correction for a month. His brother John then received the same penalty, and also had his valuable net, worth £7, confiscated.

As time went on many local fishermen, under pressure from the decreasing numbers of fish and increased pollution, continued to fight against the regulations governing fishing. In September 1854, Moses and Lewis Gibson’s other brother, James, together with fellow Hammersmith fishermen James Holder and John Gibbs, were charged with obstructing two water-bailiffs after they were caught using an illegal net on the river at Richmond. They were convicted, and fined £1 each.

By the late 1860s, Chiswick and Hammersmith were no longer fishing villages but bustling London suburbs, workers shunning the river for other jobs in the city. An 1868 gazetteer described Hammersmith as a “suburban district”, and stressed its brickfields, iron-foundry and forge, wax-bleaching grounds and breweries rather than its fishing community. Likewise, in the 1870s, Chiswick was noted in another gazetteer for its gas-works and sewage system. It was clear that a way of life that had existed for centuries was virtually over.