When the Boat Comes In — Season 1, Episode 3: Fish in Woolly Jumpers

Episode synopsis

Times are hard as the miners strike over a pay claim and Tom, now married with a son to keep as well as Mary, who has tuberculosis, borrows money from the seemingly flush Jack. Jack meets Matt's sister Dolly Mather, a war widow with whom he has an affair. Aware that Jack is involved in some sort of scam, Tom threatens to expose them unless Jack counts him in so Jack and Matt take Tom on their nocturnal 'fishing trip', in reality stealing sheep. They have a narrow escape after a run-in with a policeman but Jessie, against Jack's expectations, condones his activities.

About When the Boat Comes In

When the Boat Comes In is a British television period drama produced by the BBC between 8 January 1976 and 21 April 1981. Taking place between 1919 to 1937, Jack Ford is a veteran of The Great War who returns to his poverty-stricken (fictional) town of Gallowshield in the North East of England. It dramatises the interwar political struggles of the 1920s and 1930s, and explores the impact of national and international politics upon Ford and those around him.

More episodes from Season 1

• E1A Land Fit for Heroes and Idiots
• E2Say Hello... Say Tirra
• E4Swords and Pick Handles
• E5Coal Comfort
• E6Empire Day on the Slag Heap
• E7A First Time for Everything
• E8Paddy Boyle's Discharge
• E9Angel on Horseback
• E10King for a Day
• E11Happy New Year, Some Say
• E12Heads You Win, Tails I Lose
• E13Kind Hearted Rat with a Lifebelt