The Ashley B and Four Sons are up on the hard at Jennings Boatyard in Reedville, Va. Larry Chowning photo.
Sitting side-by-side up on the hard at Jennings Boatyard Inc. in Reedville, Va., in September are the Chesapeake Bay wooden deadrise commercial fishing boats Ashley B and Four Sons.
Jennings is a yard that caters to commercial fishermen. Once named Rice’s Boatyard, it was a boatbuilding and repair center for wooden boats in the Reedville area.
Such names as Raymond and Wilson Bray, Jay Barrett and Albert Headley were boatbuilders and woodworkers there and in 1981 when the yard was owned by Virgil Miller the Bray brothers built the Four Sons.
The Four Sons, above, is owned by Paul Somers of White Stone, Va., and was a feature cover story in NF in 2014. Photo by Chowning
The Four Sons is named after the four sons of Paul Somers, who uses the boat in the Chesapeake Bay pound net fishery. A decade ago, Somers and his crew were the cover story for the June 2014 NF issue.
The story was “Tow Time - Chesapeake Bay Builder delivers an easygoing pound net skiff.” It was about a seine skiff built for Somers by Larry Jennings, owner of the yard. Today, Jennings builds various styles of boats at the yard out of fiberglass, Okoume marine plywood and PVC.
Coincidentally, the same day in 2014 the cover story article was being done on Somers’ skiff, the Ashley B owned by watermen Bill Davenport was hauling pound poles out to a net in the Rappahannock River.
On the same day in 2014, when the Four Sons were reported on by NF, the Ashley B was in the Rappahannock River hauling pound net poles. Photo by Chowning
“There they are together up on the yard, and that’s quite a sight,” says Larry Jennings. “These boats are classic deadrise wooden boats and are still working and doing what they were built to do - work the water.”
Jennings always finds room in his yard for commercial workboats, which is not always the case today with boatyards. “There is only one other place close by that can haul my boat,” says Somers.
He says watermen in the Reedville area are fortunate to have a boatyard that supports and caters to working watermen. “We can always count on Larry to haul our boats on our schedule. We do not want to be up on the yard when there are fish to be caught. Not all boatyards are as accommodating and understanding,” he says.
Somers had Jennings caulk the bottom of the Four Sons, and he and one of his crew painted the bottom with antifouling paint. “We are going to wait until spring to paint the topsides,” says Somers. “Caulking is not something that I feel we can do properly so I always get Larry to do that.”
The Ashley B was built by renowned Deltaville, Va., boatbuilder Grover Lee Owens and is used by Davenport to crab, oyster, and work pound nets. When she was photographed in 2014, she was rigged for pound netting. In September 2024, she was rigged for crab potting.
Somers, 68, says, “I am strictly in the pound net business, but to be successful today, you’ve got to be diverse and have the licenses and the rigs to work in multiple fisheries.”
Somers’ is a third-generation pound net fisherman, and this year, fishing has been extremely challenging. “We have not caught many fish this year,” says Somers. “Fishing is a lot different today than when my father and grandfather worked the Chesapeake Bay. We’ve got so many regulations now. The old timers would not have put up with it, but it is still a good life for me. I’ve been doing this all my life, and if I am able, I’m going to put the nets out again next spring.”
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