STEAM DRIFTER "STEPHENS" FROM INVERALLOCHY

This painting was commissioned by the great-grandson of the owner of the steam drifter "Stephens".  She is depicted leaving Fraserburgh harbour on a summer's evening, for another night's drift-net fishing for herring, during the boom years of this fishery in the 1930s.

At 87 feet in length, the steel-built vessel was built in 1911 by A Hall & Co., Aberdeen, as the Inverness-registered "Vale o' Moray".  A long and varied career followed, which saw her requisitioned for Admiralty service in two world wars, as well as having at least six different owners and three changes of name in "civilian" life, finally being scrapped in Norway in 1955.  The painting shows her in mid-career, when she was registered in Inverallochy.