Gunnersbury Park & Brentford: Another family outing on Friday 24th August 2018 took us to Gunnersbury House Museum, a free museum jointly owned by the London Borough of Hounslow and the London Borough of Ealing. It turned out to be considerably more interesting than I expected.
Lionel Road – now the site of Brentford Community Stadium
The 200 acre Gunnersbury estate was bought in 1925 from the Rothschild family by Ealing Borough Council and Acton Borough Council for £130,000, although it was all actually just outside their areas and in Brentford Urban District. They wanted to build over it, but the Rothschilds stipulated that all except a small part of it it was only to be used for leisure and recreation and it was opened to the public as a park by Neville Chamberlainn, then Minister of Health, in 1926.
The elevated section of the M4 above the Great West Rd
Development of the site as a ‘country estate’ on the outskirts of London had begun in the late 17th century when the first large mansion, Gunnersbury House was built around 1663. The estate passed through various hands including wealthy merchant and MP Henry Furnese who had noted landscape designer William Kent give the park a makeover. Next Princess Amelia, favourite daughter of George II, had further changes made to the grounds for her famous parties there, including building a bathhouse.
The temple is the only 18th century building remaining on site
The first mansion was demolished in 1801 and the estate was split into two adjoining estates each with a new mansion.
A long series of rooms faces the garden in the ‘Large mansion’
The Grade II* listing for the ‘Large Mansion’ states it was built in “1801-28 by and for Alexander Copland; remodelled 1836 by Sydney Smirke for Nathan Mayer Rothschild, the City financier and Frankfurt-born founder of the British branch of this famous international Jewish banking dynasty.”
The ‘Small Mansion’ still in rather poor condition
Next door the “Small Mansion”, on the site of the former mansion was built in 1801-1802 for Stephen Cosser according its Grade II listing, though other sources place it a few years later. It was extended with a service wing in 1837-44 by eccentric “Rogue Gothic” architect Joseph Peacock (1821–1893).
The Rothschilds had two French chefs who shared this office
The Rothschilds bought the Large Mansion (now the museum) and its gardens and park in 1835, adding the Small Mansion and its grounds in 1889 to recreate the now Grade II* listed Gunnersbury Park.
Large prints from Leopold de Rothschild’s Autochromes show the place as it was over a hundred years ago – with flamingos
I walked with Linda to the park from Kew Bridge Station along Lionel Road “with some difficulty as it is now a building site and crossed the Great West Road under the overhead M4, a Ballardian trek past the old and closed castellated gate to the park to enter into a sylvan wilderness, walking past the Potomac lake and its gothic folly.”
The garden slopes down from the house to a lake
Older members of our party took a shorter walk from the underground at Acton Central. Lionel Road is now overlooked by Brentford Community Stadium opened in 2020.
Princess Amelia’s Bath House
The park is certainly worth a visit and on My London Diary you can read more about what were for me the two highlights.These were the huge Rothschild’s kitchens where meals, not generally kosher, were prepared under the supervision of two French chefs, and a display of large prints from the Autochromes taken by Leopold de Rothschild using the first practical colour photography process patented by the Lumiere brothers in 1903 and sold to the public from 1907.
We ate, not from those kitchens but from the modern park café, “tasty but rather insubstantial, and if you visit and are hungry, I’d advise a side order of chips” – or a short walk to a cheaper place near Acton Town station.
The Thames and Brentford Ait from under Kew Bridge
After the meal we said goodbye to the others and took a longer walk around the park before walking back to Kew Bridge station. With almost half and hour to wait for the next train we took a short walk by the River Thames to Brentford High Street and back.
Mooring on The Hollows
You can read more about our trip to the park and the museum and see many more pictures from the day on My London Diary at Gunnersbury Park & Brentford.
Jubilee River & Taplow: For many years I went out roughly monthly for walks with members of my elder brother and sister’s families followed by a pub lunch. As we aged the walks got shorter, the number of us still living became fewer, and the walks have become simply lunches for the remaining four at pubs closer to home. But in 2014 we were still walking perhaps five or seven miles before lunch.
Thursday August 21st 2014 we parked at the ‘Oak and Saw’ in Taplow before setting off for a walk. As I wrote back then, the walk “took me to one of the places where the rich live, Taplow, just across the Thames from Maidenhead, and by the Jubilee River (the Maidenhead, Windsor and Eton Flood Alleviation Scheme) built to protect the riverside homes of billionaires from flooding, taking surges of the Thames after prolonged rain downstream to flood Old Windsor, Datchet, Wraysbury, Staines and Chertsey where most of us are considerably poorer.”
Oak and Saw, Taplow
We roughly followed the well-described walk from a link on the pub website of around 4.5 miles, though a few short deviations probably added a mile.
A detail of the gates painted by Sheila Horton at her home with fellow artist Brian Horton
Six months earlier there had been considerable flooding downriver as the Jubilee River protected the homes of the rich upstream, though the Environment Agency denied any connection, common sense says otherwise.
Walter de la Mare who lived in Hill House from 1925-39
The 7.2 mile long Jubilee River cost £110 million, with repairs found to be needed shortly after due to poor construction adding another £3.5 million – and considerable ongoing costs.
Skindles Hotel in Maidenhead, once notorious as a place for adulterous assignations.
The River Thames Scheme which would alleviate flooding in the downstream areas would cost more and although over £100 million has been spent on ‘development work’ but nothing has actually been done. It was due to be delivered by 2030 at a cost of £500 million but there seems to be no chance of either target being met.
Maidenhead BridgeRiver Thames & Maidenhead BridgeJubilee River (Datchet, Old Windsor & Staines etc Flooding Scheme).
It was a pleasant walk and “Taplow seems a nice village, and though I’m sure not everyone is filthy rich, certainly quite a few people there seemed to be from what we could see through their windows as we walked around. Its only a short distance to Maidenhead for the commute into London – or a drive along the M4, and there are many large businesses with their headquarters or large offices in the corridor west from Heathrow an easy drive away.”
And it ended with a pleasant meal and, for me as I no longer drive, a couple of decent pints of real ale.
Deptford, Greenwich and The Point: More pictures from my walk on 18th March 1990. The previous post on this walk was Lewisham and Deptford – 1990.
I walked from Deptford into the area between Deptford and Lewisham, mainly in the London Borough of Greenwich, then up the hills towards Blackheath. As often on my walks there was a good deal of wandering around as I tried to at least look down every street on my way.
This terrace of buildings from 17-21 Deptford Broadway dates from the late 17th century and is Grade II listed. The Eagle is perched on top of the Transport Cafe which was at some long past time a tavern. The listing says the building is probably from the late 17th century and still has two original staircases.
Two houses which caught my attention for their verandas. Both were built in the 1840s and are larger than you might think as you can just see they have basements. I wondered if the left hand house of the pair was built for a client with a larger family.
Ditch Alley, Blackheath Rd, Greenwich, 1990
Ditch Alley runs from Blackheath Road to John Penn St which gets its name from the engineering works of John Penn & Sons which were begun in 1799 and from 1825 produced marine engines here as well as boilers at its riverside site at Palmers Payne Wharf, Deptford.
The alley went through the centre of the site and I think all the buildings in my two pictures date from 1863 or later. Among other claims to engineering fame the company produced the world’s first wind tunnel in 1868. The company declined as shipbuilding declined in London and was wound up in 1914.
Ditch Alley, John Penn St, Greenwich, 1990, 90-3m-62
John Penn Street was originally known as Cold Bath Lane but was renamed John Penn Street in the 1870s. Parts of the works site were later occupied by the Broomfield Bakery which closed in 1992 (and is still missed by some locals – Gregg’s sausage rolls are not the same), and while Lewisham Council dithered over adding some of the remaining buildings to the Statutory List they were demolished. The site is now occupied by Wickes, Pets at Home and a large car park for these stores along with housing. More details on the Greenwich Industrial History site.
By 2009 Parry’s Dispensing Chemist’s premises at 6-8 Lewisham Road were occupied by Juliet Q Unisex Hair Beauty Salon but this closed shortly after and I think the ground floor has since remained unoccupied. But although Mr Yip may well have left us, the shop next door at No 4 is still a Chinese Take Away.
Dutton Street, Maidenstone Hill, Greenwich, 1990, 90-3m-66
Although Google Maps calls this Maidenstone Hill, the name on the houses clearly reads Dutton Street, while a newer sign on the other side of the road favours Google’s choice. This is certainly a hilly part of London and I made my way to the top of the hill.
View, The Point, Greenwich, 1990, 90-3m-51
The Point has been noted for centuries as a viewpoint over London with wide views to the north and the west, and remains as a small area of public open space. Although now in Greenwich it was formerly in the Hundred of Blackheath, Kent, and was named The Blackheath Point.
On a clear day there is a protected view of St Paul’s Cathedral, but although I had good weather, the city was covered in the usual murk of pollution, atmospheric but hiding it. I think to get a clear view you would need to be up here after a thunderstorm had scrubbed the London air.
Point Hill, Westgrove Lane, from, The Point, Greenwich, 1990, 90-3m-53
The land drops away steeply here to a road full of houses for the fashionable and wealthy in the Victorian era – and still now for the rich. These houses are quite a contrast to the working class homes in my Dutton Street picture above.
View, The Point, Greenwich, 1990, 90-3m-55
Looking roughly north there are more plebeian residencies close to The Point and in the middle distance a number of large council blocks from the 1930s or 1950s. Beyond them is housing on the Isle of Dogs and the growing development of Docklands, as yet without its towers, though the cranes are busy.
I was coming close to the end of my walk but I took a few more pictures before leaving for home which I’ll post shortly in the final selection from this walk.
David Barber (standing) the Queens Swan Master, with uppers and swans, Staines, July 18, 2005
Swan Upping: On Monday July 18 2005 I met the Swan Uppers at Shepperton Lock and spent the day following them, riding my bike along the Thames tow path as they rowed (or were towed) upriver.
I wasn’t the only cyclist, and followed Eric, a retired teacher who was going with the uppers for the whole week, riding ahead of them with a large bag of crushed digestive biscuits which he used to entice swans and their cygnets he spotted to a suitable place on the bank for the Uppers to do their work. And he also assisted them on the bank when there were large numbers of cygnets to record.
Eric with biscuit packets and too many cygnets to count
Of course sometimes the swans were by the opposite bank of the river and could not be persuaded to cross, so we were both kept waiting while they worked, too far distant for sensible photography, before riding on to find the next family group of swans.
A small flotilla follows the Uppers
When the boats moored up at The Swan close to Staines Bridge I went off for lunch too, joining them again as they came out and set off again. The rest of the press had taken the train back to London and the atmosphere was more relaxed.
The Uppers surround a family of swans
By the time we got to Old Windsor I had taken rather a lot of pictures and was getting tired and decided to leave, though this meant missing the ceremonies at Romney Lock at the end of the day – which I photographed in some later years.
They close in and then grab the adult swans
I didn’t go to see the Swan Uppers as they passed through Staines last Monday. I hadn’t seen any cygnets on my local walks by the river. It was too hot for me to go and stand in the sun on Monday morning, and I felt I had already covered the event comprehensively in previous years.
Once properly held the swans stop struggling
Here’s what I wrote back in 2005:
Monday I was on my bike at ten in the morning, looking out for cygnets as I cycled to meet up with the swan uppers at Shepperton Lock. they had already found there first broods by then, as I could tell from the white feathers in some caps.
The cygnets are then lifted out and the health check and recording begins
I’ve written before at some length about Swan Upping so I won’t repeat all that here. There were even more press photographers than last year, and the added impediment of a small TV crew. I’m told I was on the BBC that evening, my back and Nikon D70 clearly visible, and they certainly got in my way for several shots.
Fortunately the press were on the boat, and that kept them out of the way for long enough for me to work unfettered on several occasions before they were able to disembark. Once or twice there were times when those on the boat were in a better position to take pictures, but it doesn’t often happen.
Of course, I don’t mind working with other photographers – we all have a job to do – but at times they can be a nuisance. They, and particularly the video team – did often break what I regard as one of the first rules of the documentary photographer: Thou shalt not get in the way’ of the people who are actually doing the job you are taking pictures of.
The way they worked pointed out a real difference to me between press and documentary. They were interested in getting pictures. I need to start by finding out what the event is about [and show the story].
I also provided a little amusement for the Uppers later in the day when I trod on a rotten plank on one of the landing stages [in Old Windsor]. It left me staggering around for several seconds, a hair’s breadth from falling in to the river. Earlier one of them had somehow fallen in while releasing one of the swans.
Spice, Rain, Turkey & Cyprus: Sunday 15 July 2007 was another varied day for me in London, both for events and weather. I went to Hackney for Hackney Spice, but got bored and went to the South Bank where there was a tremendous thunderstorm. When the rain eased off I photographed some of the performers in a Turkish festival in Bernie Spain Gardens before crossing the river to the Embankment to photograph a protest by Greek Cypriots over the Turkish occupation of North Cyprus.
Hackney Spice
Hackney Town Hall
I think these dancers came from South London, but some other performers were local.
Hackney Spice was an event outside the town hall in Hackney, next to the Hackney Empire. Perhaps I was there too early, but it appeared to be getting off to a rather slow start, and I soon lost interest and caught a bus.
As I arrived at Coin Street, there were a few drops of rain, and apart from eating and drinking (high-priced cheap beer) not a lot was happening. I walked around and then took a walk along the embankment, sheltering under a tree as the rain came on a little harder.
Then came the thunderstorm, with perhaps the most tremendous downpour I’ve ever seen, pouring down through the leaves as if I was in the open. Even my umbrella didn’t really keep me dry, although it offered some protection. As the rain came, the view disappeared, first the distant view along the river, then the bridge, then I could no longer see the river itself, and trees only perhaps 25 metres away merged into whiteness.
There wasn’t a great deal to photograph, and I was more concerned about keeping my cameras dry – fortunately the raincoat built into my Lowe-pro camera bag was reasonably effective. As the storm eased slightly and visibility returned, still holding up my umbrella, I took a few pictures, but it was still raining too hard to move much.
Then the storm was over, and there were belly dancers on the stage. I don’t think I appreciate the finer points of this art (and appreciate quantity rather more than quality – after all you can only shake what you have), but I took a few pictures but rather more of the folk dancers that followed, their dances clearly linked to village life and agriculture.
National Federation of Cypriots – Turks out of Cyprus
March & Rally, Westminster
But I’d really come to photograph something connected with a rather different Turkish activity, the continued occupation of part of Cyprus by the Turkish army. I grew up hearing about the war in Cyprus, older brothers of friends were there fighting as a part of their compulsory national military service, and Don McCullin took some of his first and most striking images of war.
The front of the march – the red area is the Northern Cyprus, occupied by Turks
War and partition left both Greek and Turkish Cypriots with justifiable grievances – there were atrocities on both sides, and time seems to have done little to heal. While I sympathise with the Greeks who still mourn their lost sons, often disappeared without trace, I also find it hard to understand why the EU went ahead with recognition of Cyprus after the Greek Cypriots voted down the UN attempts to reunite the country. Greek and Turkish Cypriots live together with few problems in London – and it is surely time they did so in Cyprus too.
The National Federation of Cypriots march and rally called for Turkish troops and settlers who have come since the Turkish occupation in 1974 to leave Cyprus.
I’d expected the march to start late, and was surprised to see it had already begun as I came across Hungerford Bridge. It was a larger event than the similar rally I’d photographed a couple of years previously and attracted more photographers.
The organisers for some reason didn’t want photographers to cover the rally, moving us out of the area in front of the platform. It seems odd to say the least to organise a public event and then not provide proper facilities for press coverage.
Cyprus Property, a Windmill and a Regatta: On Sunday July 9th 2006, after photographing a protest over property disputes in Cyprus I went to the Brixton Windmill Festival and then on to Kingston Regatta and walked to Hampton Court. I wrote at some length on My London Diary and you can read it below with more normal capitalisation and the odd other correction.
Cyprus Property March
Park Lane
Turkish and Greek Cypriots lived together on Cyprus for many years.Three years after the island became independent in 1960, fighting started and the Turkish Cypriots were thrown out of their official positions. There were many killed in the fighting in the following years, and in 1974 both Greek and Turkish troops became involved.
Since then the island has been effectively divided into two, with the Turkish Cypriots in Northern Cyprus. Many Turkish and Greek Cypriots had to leave their homes and move to the other side of the de facto border, taking over properties vacated by those moving in the opposite direction.
Recently the situation has become more complex, with Cyprus being admitted to the EU in 2004, despite its split status. The UN had set up a re-unification plan that was approved by the Turkish population, but rejected by the Greeks. Entry to the EU has however meant that Greek property claims are now being taken up in Southern Cyprus and can then be enforced in other EU countries, including the UK.
One such case concerns the Orams, an English couple who bought land and built a villa on it in Northern Cyprus. They bought the land from a Turkish Cypriot who had received it in exchange for property he had to leave in southern Cyprus in 1974. The land had belonged to a Greek Cypriot who took the matter to a court in southern Cyprus recently, obtaining an order against them that they should demolish the house and pay damages (which the Orams are appealing against.) Although the judgement cannot be enforced in northern Cyprus, as this is still under Turkish control, the lawyers are trying to enforce it in the UK courts against the UK assets of the Orams.
Settlement of the property issues requires Greek and Turkish Cypriots to come together produce a plan for peace in the divided country. It would then be possible for a suitable property commission – such as that already set up under the advice of the EU in northern Cyprus – to work through all the cases.
The marchers were asking for the support of the British government in refusing to accept the decision of the Cyprus court on ‘public policy’ grounds, and to make further attempts to establish a proper peace plan that would allow proper resolution of property and other disputes in the island.
[Following a series cases with appeals to the the High Court, the European Court of Justice, and back to the UK Appeal Court, the Orams lost their case and apparently abandoned their property in Cyprus in 2010. Property issues in Cyprus remain in a mess but are reported to be moving very slowly towards an amnesty in 2026.]
The Brixton Windmill Festival wasn’t music at the well-known pub, but at the real windmill 50 yards further on, built by a Mr Ashby many years ago to take advantage of its hilltop site to get the energy to grind his corn.
A local choir sang with spirit performing Amazing Grace as a tribute to those killed and injured on in the London Bombings of 7 July 2005
When I first visited around 30 years ago it had been recently restored by the GLC and I climbed up the rather rickety ladder holding the small occupant of the pushchair I had taken with me for a view of the surroundings. Since then it has been vandalised and partly restored, and though it’s still an impressive site, you are only allowed upstairs on very special occasions (and probably after signing a a form in triplicate saying you take your life entirely into your own hands.)
But it is still a useful site, a green patch in which to sit or stroll, some swings for kids, a cup of tea, and a reminder of past ages. There was some music at the festival, a group of local singers while I was there, as well as stalls from a number of local organisations, including the local history society, the credit union and also the police and others. I hope a few more people came after I left.
It was a pleasant afternoon for a walk by the Thames, and although the shopping streets of the town were hot and bothered as usual, once out on the bridge it was a different world. the river itself was rather busier than usual, with over half its width buoyed off for the regatta, with pairs and trios of boats being stroked lustily downstream chased by umpires in powered catamarans.
I walked past the regatta enclosure and stood a few minutes watching by the bank before continuing along the riverside path. The start and marshalling area were a little more interesting as the officials tried to sort out the various teams, heats and finals. There were quite a few grammar, not to mention Eton and a few other posh schools, but not a single comprehensive or secondary mod while I was in earshot.
Island home
It turned out to be a rather longer walk to Hampton Court than I’d imagined (for once I’d not bothered with a map) and I was tired [and late] when I got to the river exit from the flower show.
There were a few people carrying rather straggly looking plants and a couple of photographers already lying in wait to photograph them, but I couldn’t really work up a great deal of interest. so I walked on and caught the bus home.
[I’d been keen to go to Kingston as I was hoping to get more local pictures for the show ‘Another London’ with Mike Seaborne and Paul Baldesare which was to be in Kingston Museum at the start of 2007. You can still see all the pictures by all three of us on-line at the Another London web site, including one from the Regatta.]
The children’s fun area is a nice idea, [32 computer controlled fountains] but this works better at Parc Citroen in Paris, and hasn’t stood up to British weather or use. We just don’t have the same level of upkeep in Newham as does the City of Paris. Competitions such as was carried out for this are a good idea, but only if the judges think rather more about what the result will look like in ten years time rather than on the sketches. It is also unfortunately not possible to enter the Green Dock at the ground level at the north end and walk through it (there is still an entry at the south end.)
[The park is managed by the Greater London Authority and was built on one of the most polluted sites in the country, the former PR Chemicals factory, which took years to decontaminate.]
The sides of the dock were lined by a metal fence with lower wires, which have currently been removed. In their place the fence is lined by normal street safety barriers, tied together with plastic bags. Although it may be effective, it is visually unacceptable and hopefully the fences are to be repaired and these removed.
The two buildings in the park have a Japanese feel. One usefully houses toilets and a café, while the other was erected by Newham in memory of the victims of war. Its undulating seating was intended to carry on the wave theme of the Green Dock, but is perhaps of more interest to skateboarders than for comfort.
Walk along the edge of the ‘Green Dock’ to the riverside.
The park gives an excellent view of the Thames Barrier. Silvertown was one of the areas to be flooded in 1953, though rather less disastrously than Canvey, although some 1130 homes here were flooded. It took until 1982 for the Thames Barrier to be completed. Estimates of how much longer it will remain effective with the sea level rise due to global warming vary widely, but certainly at the moment it is getting used rather more often than was envisaged.
Walk back along the other edge of the Green Dock to the cafe and/or the station.
It’s some years since I’ve been back to the park, and it would be interesting to see how it has changed over the years. Perhaps I’ll find time this summer.
This walk will continue in a later post with Part 10: Riverside which mainly looks at views from the DLR.
The walk starts at the top of the stairs leading up from the Station to the Bus Station. Here there is a memorial to the Thames Ironworks.
C J Mare’s shipbuilding firm did not prosper and was soon bought out by the Thames Ironworks and Shipbuilding Company, whose works soon occupied most of the Essex shore of Bow Creek as well as areas close to the Thames on the Middlesex side. Over the years it built at least 650 ships (some sources say 900) as well as bridges and other iron structures.
Frank Hills
Its greatest fame came under the ownership of Frank Hills who bought the Thames Ironworks and Shipbuilding Company in 1880, when it was struggling to retain employment for its 6,000 men in face of competition from larger yards on the Clyde, Tyne and Mersey.
Thames Ironworks occupied most of the land on the east of Bow Creek and some on the far side.
Hills, educated at Harrow was a Christian, a fine sportsman, English champion in the mile and 3 miles, an Oxford football blue, and played for England when they beat Scotland 5-4 in 1879. He was also the first President of the London Vegetarian Society (1888) and the Vegetarian Cycling and Athletic Club, and also served as President of a London Vegetarian Rambling Club. He also founded The Vegetarian, an independent magazine, and founded the Vegetarian Federal Union (1889), becoming President. He was also a member of the Temperance (total abstinence) union.
As an employer he was described as an “enlightened patriarch” who cared deeply for the welfare of his workers. For some years he lived among them in a small house in the East India Dock Road. Despite this, relations at work were not always good, especially when he engaged non-union workers, and some of the workforce went out on strike at the time of the dock strike of 1889.
Hills was one of the first employers to set up a bonus scheme – in 1892 – and he voluntarily introduced an eight-hour day in 1894 at a time when many employers demanded 10 or 12 hour days. He tried to get his workers to “sign the pledge” and take healthy exercise – and set up clubs of all kinds to keep them out of the pubs. These included a temperance league, cycling club, cricket club, an amateur operatic society and a brass band as well as a football club, the Thames Ironworks Football Team set up in 1895. In 1900, Hills put up the money to fund a merger with another local side, the Old Castle Swifts, and they became West Ham Football Club. The nickname the Hammers comes from the tools they used in building ships.
Leamouth, 1992. Thames Ironworks formerly occupied all the land to the left of Bow Creek at its mouth and some parts in the centre of the picture.
The Albion Disaster
Disaster struck at the Ironworks in 1898 at the launch of HMS Albion. The Duchess of York (later Queen Mary) tried 3 times to break the champagne bottle on the steel hull, but it just bounced off. Despite this bad omen, the launch went ahead. The 12,950 tons batleship, then the largest of the ship ever built on Bow Creek and the wave it created as it slipped into the water smashed a temporary jetty between it and a ship under construction for the Japanese navy.
A huge crowd had turned up to watch the launch, and a large number had managed to get onto this jetty (which hadn’t been intended for such use.) 26 people were awarded Royal Humane Society Broze Medals for their attempts to save those in the water, but despite their bravery, 38 were killed. Hills was devastated. He personally visited the families of the bereaved and paid the funeral expenses, as well as contributing generously to the West Ham Council fund for the survivors.
In 1911, the Ironworks built the Thunderer, at 22,500 tons the Navy’s largest dreadnought and the last great ship (and the largest) to be built on the Thames. It was an order that broke the yard. Hills, his health gravely effected by the Albion disaster in 1891, had a stroke shortly before its launch. The company closed at the end of the year, but Hills lived on until 1927, dying a few days short of his 70th birthday.
Flat-pack Steamers
Should you visit Lake Titicaca in Peru, (The Sacred Lake and legendary birthplace of the Incas), you can see the steamship Yavari, now the only ‘working’ single-screw iron passenger ship in the world.
Ordered from Boulton & Watt in Birmingham by the Peruvian government as one of a pair of cargo-passenger ‘gunboats’, her iron hull (and that of her sister ship) was built in Bow Creek, in numbered pieces, none weighing more than 3.5 cwt, the heaviest that a mule could carry. The two ships were completely fitted out here, then carefully stripped down, numbered and colour-coded and crated for transit.
In 1862, they travelled on a ship around the Horn accompanied by 8 British engineers to Ordered from Boulton & Watt in Birmingham by the Peruvian government as one of a pair of cargo-passenger ‘gunboats’, her iron hull (and that of her sister ship) was built in Bow Creek, in numbered pieces, none weighing more than 3.5 cwt, the heaviest that a mule could carry. The two ships were completely fitted out here, then carefully stripped down, numbered and crated for transit. In 1862, they travelled by sea around the Horn accompanied by 8 British engineers to Arica, Peru, where the railway (the oldest in South America) took them the first 37 miles of the journey. The remaining 190 miles were to be by mule, and over mountain passes higher than anything in Europe up to the lake at 12, 500 ft, across the driest desert in the world. Meanwhile the engineers went ahead to build a jetty and machine shop on the lake. It took over 7 years for all the parts to arrive, and the Peruvian Navy in the meanwhile helped itself to the guns, which never made it.
Eventually the rest was there and the first ship, the Yavari was launched on Christmas day 1870. There was still a problem. There was no coal at Titicaca for the steam engines; the only fuel available was dried llama dung, and a simple journey along the 100 mile lake and back took 1,400 sacks. Its perhaps not surprising that the steam engine was replaced by a diesel in 1914. The ship continued in regular service until the 1950s. It was rediscovered in 1982, and found to be in excellent condition, thanks to the clean fresh water and high altitude of the lake, and is now preserved by a Peruvian charity.
The Memorial
At the top of the stairs leading down to the station barriers at Canning Town is a memorial to the Thames Ironworks by Richard Kindersley, unveiled by the Archbishop of Canterbury in 1998. The large cast iron plate across its top is from the first iron Royal Navy vessel with a full iron hull, HMS Warrior, built around a quarter of a mile south of her by the Thames Ironworks and Shipbuilding Company in 1860.
The Warrior had 3 masts, two funnels and a screw propeller. When under fire, wooden ships splintered terribly and it was flying wood splinters that resulted in most injuries and deaths, and the use of iron cut this down. Other navies soon followed the example. The ship is restored and can be seen at Portsmouth.
The elegant engraving on the stonework in the middle of the stairway tells some of the story of the company. You can see a part of the company site (now empty) from the station platform.
3: Canning Town Transport Interchange
From Thames Ironworks memorial, look through the large glass windows towards the station, with its two level platforms. Walk along to see the bus station (which includes toilets) before taking the escalator down into to the bottom level of the station.
Canning Town DLR and Jubilee Line stations. Bus is in Bus Station
One of the better aspects of the LDDC, responsible for development from 1981-98 was the creation of the DLR and some other aspects of transport infrastructure. Widely derided as a ‘toy train’, the DLR has demonstrated the use of light railway technology.
The new Canning Town station replaced one to the north of the A13 on the North London Line, and opened as a DLR and Silverlink station in 1994, to close after a few months for a couple of years for the building of the Jubilee line. The station reopened – together with the adjoining bus station – in 1999.
North London Line services stopped in December 2006 in preparation for the DLR extension to Stratford International. The station has three levels; at the bottom is the booking hall and barriers, above that are the Jubilee line platforms, with the former NLL platforms at the same level to the east. The DLR lines and platforms are above those of the Jubilee Line.
This is perhaps the best example, indeed one of very few examples of an integrated transport interchange in London.
Bow Creek Walkway
As you walk past the ticket machines and office, in front you will see the exit from the station to the Bow Creek Walkway, completed in the 1990s, but still not open to the public.
Weeds on the walkway – now open but still incomplete
Newham has at least one other example of an expensively constructed foot path in a similar limbo. In this case the reason is said to be that the various parties involved, which include Tower Hamlets and Newham have been unable to reach an agreement about the ownership and liabilities involved.
Canary Wharf and the Millenium Dome from Silvertown
Stratford & Silvertown: One of the shorter posts I wrote on My London Diary was about my trip to Silvertown and Stratford in East London on 21st June 2006. Here it is in full, just as I published it then:
on wednesday 21st i took the DLR to stations in silvertown, taking pictures from the train, the platforms and around the stations. then i went to stratford to make more pictures there.
I left home in mid-afternoon and began photographing from the DLR a little after 4pm. It was a fine day and I was going to join a walk around Stratford in the evening by the Greater London Industrial Archaelogy Society and had a couple of hour before I was to meet with them at Stratford Station.
It was almost a year since London had been awarded the 2012 Olympics and I had made a number of visits to the Olympic area to record it before the huge changes that were about to take place.
The DLR extension to King George V station in North Woolwich had opened in December 2005, but had yet made little impact on the surrounding area. Construction had already begun on its extension under the River Thames to Woolwich Arsenal which opened in January 2009.
The line is largely elevated on a concrete viaduct which gives extensive views of the area. As the trains are driver-less I was able to sit at the front of the train and photograph through the front window. Then the DLR was relatively little used and at least on schooldays there was little competition for the front seats – and I think the train windows were usually cleaner.
Trains on the line were then reasonably frequent so I was able to get off at various stations to walk around a little and then return to the station to continue my journey, including a visit to Lyle Park with views across the River Thames.
The station platforms also provide elevated viewpoints to photograph the area. I went as far as Silvertown station and then made my way back to Stratford.
Here I left the train to join the GLIAS walk around the area to the south of the Olympic site, including the Carpenters Estate, a popular council estate close to the station which Newham were then trying to empty and sell off against local opposition, Stratford High Street and the Waterworks River.
By the time this evening walk ended although it was the middle of June the light was fading, though I think this picture exaggerates this a little.
There are quite a few more pictures on My London Diary, beginning here, but I took many more that day, particularly on the evening walk. Perhaps I will post more from this here some time.
Gravesend and Northfleet, Kent: Twenty years ago on Thursday 8th June 2006 I took my folding bike by train to Gravesend and spent an afternoon cycling through the area on the Kent bank of the River Thames, long home to the cement industry – the manufacture of ‘Portland Cement’ began here in 1834.
Looking across the cement works at Northfleet to Tilbury docks
I’d long had an interest in the area, both for its industrial history and for its sometimes spectacular landscapes created by this. I was first inspired when I borrowed an old book from my local library, Donald Maxwell’s ‘A Pilgrimage of the Thames‘, published in 1932. His accounts and sketches, some first published earlier in the Church Times present an interesting and romantic view of places and people along the river beginning at Gravesend and ending at Oxford.
Maxwell (1877-1936) reports a Thames pilot telling him as he sketched on a jetty, “The principal products of Gravesend are paper, cement and smoke – especially smoke.”
Later, writing about Northfleet he muses prophetically “One day, when the cement industry has left this valley, and centres of population have shifted, this district will be called the Switzerland of England, and weekend châlets, each with its aeroplane-landing on the cliff, will look down once again upon green shores and tree-embowered banks.”
Henley’s Cable Works Offices
It hasn’t happened quite like that, though the cement industry has gone and there are some luxury riverside flats and the new town of Ebbsfleet developing around a new station on the Channel Tunnel Rail Link (which Eurostar trains whizz through non-stop at around the same speed as aircraft when Maxwell wrote.)
A footbridge over a chalk ravine left by quarrying
Of course Maxwell’s book was not my only source for information about the area. Particularly useful was the 1971 geography text ‘Lower Thameside‘ by Roy Millward & Adrian Robinson with its chapter ‘The Cement Industry of Lower Thameside‘ which gave some rather more precise information and a suggested itinerary which informed my first actual visits to the area in the 1980s.
A few years after I took these pictures in 2006 the vast cement works at Northfleet had gone.
The photographs on My London Diary are not captioned (and I wrote nothing about them) but a they are in order of my ride beginning in Gravesend and moving west, with views across the Thames to Tilbury. From Rosherville I moved on to Northfleet (where Gravesend & Northfleet FC is now Ebbsfleet United) and then on to take the train home from Swanscombe.
