The Hill family of Strood has fished the River Medway for centuries, earning a living catching shrimps, Dover soles, smelts and dredging for oysters.

As pollution and other changes reduced catches to a level at which no family could survive, the ancient industry came to an end.

Today freemen of the River Medway still trawl the River, but these days it’s a hobby rather than a commercial activity.

Last of the Hill family to make a living at it was Harry Hill, who packed up in 1938.

In recent editions we have been telling the story through the words of his youngest daughter Phyllis Nicholson, who was 86 when she wrote her reminiscences. She has now died.

She tells of the impact of the Second World War on her early married life, with a husband also called Harry.

I was able to rent a house a few streets away from where I was living at 94 Grove Road, so that Harry and I started married life on our own. When he went back off leave (he served in the RAF) and I was left on my own - Dad thought it best I stayed at 94 again - as it was convenient to get to work.

With the air raids getting more frequent my sister would take my food and drink down to the shelter, so that I could take cover straight away when I returned home from work.

My father was a night watchman at the local waterworks on top of the hill. He had a good view and saw most of what was going on.

One night we were in the shelter and there was a very loud bang. Even the shelter shook. We were terrified not knowing what we were going to find when the “all clear” went. All we knew was that it must have been very close.

The house was badly damaged and we knew we had been lucky to survive. Houses around us had all been hit and we could hear the cries of people that were buried in the wreckage.

The ARP were soon on hand and everyone was helping. But that night we found we had lost four of our neighbours who were killed outright.

Having got permission from my landlord I took my family to live with me at Cliffe Road.

Now there was a new terror, – doodlebugs – not knowing where they would land when the engine stopped. We just prayed they would not be too close.

The Germans were also dropping land mines and one was to land near the Cliffe Road house causing more damage. Most of my family were in an air raid shelter which was more or less next to the house.

The shelter belonged to the ARP and we were allowed to use it.

My brother Tom came off worse when a mine dropped. He was the last one in the shelter and the door was blown off and fell across his legs breaking one of them. The house wasn’t damaged too much although the roof and a couple of windows were blown out. As we had nowhere else to go the Council covered the roof so we were protected from the weather, and we boarded up the windows. I threw out the headboard from one of the beds because it was peppered with glass, but we were counting our blessings.

In January 1945 my daughter Susan Joy was born. She was a very good baby and my father nicknamed her Sunshine.

By now the war was coming to an end. Rationing was still on, but everyone was glad when the fighting was over at last. Street parties were held, and servicemen and women were coming home to their loved ones. The house in Grove Road was at last repaired and my family were able to move back. Harry was demobbed and went back to work in the Dockyard. Later we moved to another house which was owned by my father. His father had bought several houses and when he died and left them to his sons.

Harry received 94 Grove Road, 21 Grange Road and 6 Victoria Street which was the house we moved in to. It backed onto the Grove Road house.

There were only oil lamps in the new house, so dad had the electric light installed for us.

In 1947 I gave birth to my son Keith and I owe his life to the little midwife who attended me. The umbilical chord was around his neck, but she worked very quickly and at last I heard his cry.

Phyllis’s grandfather, who had bought several houses, was John Thomas Jennings Hill, who – as reported in last week’s Memories – gave up fishing after he was nearly drowned after being pulled overboard when he became entangled in a rope. He was well known in Strood as Jubilee Johnny.

Jubilee was the name of his bawley boat.

Jubilee Johnny had been apprenticed to his father, John Hyland Hill, in 1858 when he was 14. He served the usual seven years during which he was contracted not gamble at dice or cards, nor haunt taverns or playhouses, nor absent himself from his master’s service. Neither was he supposed to get married without permission, but he did marry Susannah Morris five years into his apprenticeship.

Giving up fishing was a profitable move for Jubilee Johnny, because he managed the business on shore and his management paid off. He was soon supplying fishmongers throughout the Medway Towns, who placed their orders by sending postcards. Of course, that was well before telephones, but there would have been at least two and probably three postal deliveries a day.

In 1901 he became Chamberlain of the Rochester Oyster Fishery, which meant he played a key role in regulating fishing on the River Medway and on ensuring the apprenticeship scheme was properly run.

Mr Hill felt strong enough economically to commission the building of a new bawley to his own specifications. She was named Susannah, after his wife, and built at the Co-operative Boatyard at Borstal. Her construction was of elm, oak and Oregon pine, and she had an overall length of 39 feet.

After visiting an exhibition in London, Mr Hill decided that the bawley would benefit hugely if an engine was installed. She was the first fishing boat on the Medway to be motorised. This appalled other fishermen, but they never refused a tow when the winds did not serve.

The vessel, which cost £210, was launched by Mr Hill’s daughter with a bottle of Eau de Cologne rather than Champagne. The engine came into its own when a member of the Hill family discovered a hitherto unknown oyster bed close to some Royal Navy moorings. The oysters had grown to maturity during the First World War when fishing was restricted.

Using the engine, they were able to trawl at night, so as not to reveal the presence of the oysters.

Perhaps the money from this operation helped to finance the purchase of the houses.

In 1909 John Thomas Jennings Hill was appointed the Mayor’s Water Bailiff, who among other things was responsible for summoning the Jury for the annual Admiralty Court.

He lived to the grand old age of 85 and died in 1928. Susannah died in 1918.

Harry, Phyllis’s father, was the last of the long line of Hills that supported their families by fishing the River Medway. Some of his sons carried on, to keep the interest alive, but they couldn’t make a living from it.

In 1961, aged 85, he was interviewed by one of the local papers which referred to him as “keen eyed and sharp witted”. He had retired in 1938 after 53 years “messing about in boats”. That was the year his wife Ada died.

War was beckoning, when fishing on the River ceased anyway.

Describing some of the changes on the River since he began fishing, he spoke of the dangers of navigating a waterway in which there were no lights whatsoever to follow at night. Nor were navigation buoys in place. “It did mean you had to know every inch of the River and every movement of the tide,” he said.

Of course, it was a time when the Medway was busy with commercial shipping as well as war ships and small craft such as tugs, lighters, and pleasure boats.

Harry was a keen sportsman and in the 1890s played for two teams in the Rochester Football League, Strood Excelsior and Hook of Snodland.

He recalled playing under “floodlights” on one occasion, the lights being oil lamps stuck up on poles all around the ground.

He also recalled the freezing winter of 1895 when he and his chums were able to skate along the canal at Higham.

Like his father Harry served on the Admiralty Court Jury. He died in 1963 aged 87.