Walter Haylett

Walter Haylett was my grandfather. Sadly, we don't have a picture of him although I know there used to be one of him aboard one of his drifters on the wall in The Ship pub at Caister.

Walter was born in 1840. He went in to the family's fishing business and by 1872 was master of his own drifter, the main catch being herring. In 1868 he married Jane Real from Kessingland.

On 26th October of 1872 he he rescued the crew of the Dutch schooner Blyliam when it foundered off Great Yarmouth, for which he received a certificate and a medal from the king of the Netherlands. I have the medal but not, sadly, the certificate.

Both Walter’s brothers died at sea, James, in 1885, in a ‘yawl disaster’, and John, ‘drowned at sea as a boy’. Despite these tragedies, Walter went on to own a large fleet of drifters, operating out of Great Yarmouth, which followed the great shoals of herring round the coast of Britain. Again, I have no pictures of any of Walter's drifters but the George Albert (top) is an example of a Yarmouth drifter - photo courtesy Imperial War Museum. Walter had a large family, seven sons and three daughters, many of whom were involved in the family business.

Although there is no picture of Walter, we do have a letter of his.  It was written from Caister on April 21st 1918 and addressed to his son Ernest, my grandfather, who was in Portland following the mining of his ship, the Savan, on 12th March off Portland Bill. The letter can be downloaded from Dropbox here.

Part of the letter reads, Edwin started off by train for Oban yesterday to join his boat there. He sent his crew to Stornoway to fetch her to Oban to commence the herring fishing there. The nets and gear went by train so he will be there when the boat arrives. Some Yarmouth boats are fishing there now & doing well. Herrings are fetching £7 or £8 per cran. The boats all done well at Stornoway.

Edwin was Walter’s fifth son, born 1877. Another son, Alfred (born 1883), is described in the letter as leaving London the previous day, and planning to stop in Yarmouth Roads for the night before proceeding on to fish off Leith. It is interesting to imagine Hayletts fishing in Scottish waters a century ago!

Walter died in 1920.