Hull - not just about fish

Fishing may be what many people associate with Hull but it was a relatively insignificant part of the history and economy of the city before the 20th century. For most of its history, Kingston upon Hull has been a city built on European trade.

Wilberforce House, birthplace of the abolitionist, built in
1656 for the Listers, a wealthy merchant family
(Copyright Bernard Sharp, used under creative commons
licence)

The history of Hull is all about its geography. On the north bank of the wide Humber estuary on the east coast of England it faced the Low Countries and Germany with ports like Antwerp, Rotterdam and Hamburg. It also had ready access to the Nordic countries, the Baltic and Russia. Hull stands at the mouth of the smaller River Hull where it drains into the Humber. It was the town's proximity to the river Hull which gave Hull its initial prosperity, as wool travelled down the river from the lands of Meaux Abbey across the East Riding and was exported out of the port of Wyke (Hull). This came to the attention of the King who acquired Wyke for himself and granted it a Royal Charter in 1299, making it 'Kingston upon Hull'. Hull became part of the great Hanseatic league which had a virtual monopoly on trade in the Baltic, and imported timber, tar, resin, flax and hemp required for ship building, metal ores from Sweden and Scandinavian furs in exchange for cloth and grain. Another major import was wine. By the seventeenth century the influence of the Hanseatic league was waning but the fortunes of the Hull merchants continued to rise.

During the Industrial Revolution  Hull's position on the river Humber had become the more important geographical factor. The cloth produced in the mills of West Yorkshire, coal from the South Yorkshire mines, lead from the Dales and steel from Sheffield all flowed down the Ouse and Trent rivers via Hull to Germany, the Low Countries, Sweden, the Baltic ports and Russia.  These long-standing European trade links, although affected by wars in Europe from time to time, were much more consistent than the notoriously unstable American cotton trade, where slumps brought hardship and starvation to large parts of the Lancashire population. This was perhaps partly due to the diversity of ports which Hull traded with meaning merchants could tranfer trade in time of war - although the vessels used were often designed for a particular route such as the Hull to Hamburg route.

Unsurprisingly Hull became a major centre of ship-building. The materials required for this like tar, hemp and timber were imported by the Hull merchants. Hull shipbuilders built some very well known vessels, including the 'Bounty' of mutiny fame. Each merchant family had his staithe on the west bank of the river with its warehouse. Behind the merchants built fine houses which faced onto the High Street. This layout is still visible today. You can view the cobbled Bishop's Staithe and Blaydes' Staithe leading down to the riverside and the grand houses belonging to the Maister, Blaydes and Wilberforce families. You can also view the old dry docks by Myton Bridge and on Dock Office row where it was entirely natural to see the prow of a ship poking out between two houses.

Prince Street Hull (Copyright Paul Harrop
used under creative commons licence)

The late 18th and early 19th centuries were the peak of prosperity for the city and this is reflected by the number of fine Regency houses around the Old Town. The town walls had to be removed to give the population more room to expand. The merchants and ship owners moved out to desirable addresses in the suburbs like Anlaby Road, Coltman Street and Cottingham. The town had a flourishing social life with several theatres, botanic gardens, etc. The ancient Hull Grammar School educated the likes of William Wilberforce while new colleges like Kingston College, Hull College and Hymers College were founded to meet the needs and aspirations of this burgeoning merchant class. The city was home to many grand civic buildings. Fittingly, one of the finest buildings in the town was the new Dock Offices proudly positioned by the lock between Prince's and Queen's Docks. Hull merchants invested their money in all the enterprises of the Victorian era like trams and the Hull and Barnsley Railway. Altogether the Hull merchants were a highly influential and prosperous group in the 19th century on both a local and a national level.

Hull also developed a number of manufacturing industries of its own and it is interesting to see how these apparently disparate industries sprang up. For example, Hull's rapeseed oil industry developed into the paint industries which used oils in their production and alongside this was a trade in brush manufacture. 'Humbrol' of Airfix model fame was originally the Humber Oil Company. Crown Paint is also based in Hull. Cod liver oil which improved the nutrition of generations of British children for was first manufactured by Mr Smith and his Nephew - a FTSE 100 company still based in the city. It was also a centre of corn milling and this evolved into a starch industry. This is where Reckitt and Coleman began. They became one of the cities biggest employers and manufacturers of dozens of iconic British brands like Brasso and Dettol. Close to Reckitt's Dansom Lane factory stands a building which was a large nineteenth century corn mill and further along Holderness Road is the wind-powered mill that belonged to J. Arthur Rank's father Joseph.



Secretaire bookcase by
Mordecai Kitching of Hull

Hull was a centre of very fine cabinet making and of the manufacture of church organs which may be linked not only to its trade in timber but also to close cultural links and flow of skills between Hull and the great musical centres of Germany, the Netherlands and the Baltic. Hull was also home to fine watch and clockmakers, jewellers and silversmiths. Many of the highly workers in these small industries were refugees fleeing antiSemitic persecution in Eastern Europe.

Thus a visitor to nineteenth century Hull would have been struck by a culturally vibrant, properous and cosmopolitan city whose merchants proudly displayed their new-found wealth in fine civic and commercial buildings and in infrastructure like new railways, trams and docks. If Hull is to recover her civic pride I feel her citizens need to rediscover and connect with this great mercantile past and the associated trade in ideas, arts, culture and skills which came with it from Northern Europe.