In this issue:
- From the chair
- Lottery awards in London
- The Harbour Master's house in Greenwich
- Maydew House
- West Ham Beam Engines
- London clock in Wetherby
- The New River Pipe Track
- King's Cross/St Pancras walk
- Harmsworth Quays
- Albion Dry Dock
- Preserved 'London' locomotives
- Infrared photography in recording
- Database spotlight 4
- Blackfriars Station
- Movril
- Noakesoscope
- Photographs taken by Glenn Drewett
- Books
- 333news.pdf
The summer walks have made a good start and we're looking forward to the coming activities including SERIAC in October. Please book for SERIAC using the details on the form included with this Newsletter.
This time I could have used 'Through the Letter Box' for the title as I've received a number of items through the post including the AIA News and Industrial Archaeology Review. The CBA has also issued 'British Archaeology' No.197. I've also received 'An Update on the Status of Investigations of Mills in British River Catchments — May 2024' with reference to the River Lea.
I would like to encourage members to consider writing for GLIAS and, if appropriate, the national publications.
Between the recent weather and the publication date of this it would seem a bit odd to wish members a 'good summer' but we can live in hope. Dan Hayton
The National Heritage Lottery Fund has this year awarded significant grants to some London projects.
Cody Dock on the Lea
₤1.6 million for 'Lighting Up the Lea'. This award will spotlight the industrial past around the lighthouse at Trinity Buoy Wharf where a historic vessel made by Thames Ironworks is being restored. A new heritage centre for Newham will be created.
Quentin Blake Centre, Islington
₤3.75 million to the Quentin Blake Centre that doubles the initial funding given to the Centre by the well known illustrator Quentin Blake. These awards will be used to restore John Smeaton's engine house, built in 1768, and the tower windmill base at New River Head, Islington. The building which has stood empty for decades and is completely empty will house galleries, local history displays and a café and shop. Work is planned for this autumn although another ₤1 million is still needed. They will hold free open days on 12 and 22 August; book via www.qbcentre.org.uk/visit
Brunel Museum, Rotherhithe
Work on reinventing the pumphouse — well known to GLIAS — and the tunnel shaft should start in October using an award of ₤1.85 million plus a smaller award from the AIA. Prior to the work starting there will be guided tours on:
- Saturday 17 and Sunday 18 August
- Saturday 31 August and Sunday 1 September
- Saturday 14 and Sunday 15 September
The Harbour Master's house in Greenwich
The Harbour Master's house in Greenwich sits at the end of Ballast Quay on the corner with Pelton Road. It can be seen by people having a drink in the Cutty Sark pub or attempting to walk along the riverside path. It's a big house and prominent but very few people will have any idea what it was for and who the Harbour Master was. It was all about coal.
Until the 1970s the river was busy with ships from all over the world. We think of the river in the past as full of great sailing ships with ear-ringed sailors carrying 'the spices of the east' into London but the truth is that the majority of ships coming up London River brought coal from Durham and Northumberland to power London's industry. 'Sea coal' had been coming into London for at least a thousand years — for instance, in the 17th century 200 collier ships supplied London and by the end of the 18th century about a million tons of 'sea coal' a year was coming in. It was a tough, unromantic, trade and grossly undervalued.
Coal coming into London was taxed. Here industrial archaeology is found on country lanes — right round London on roads and waterways is a circle of little white posts. Look up 'coal posts' on the web or the GLIAS Database (GLIAS Newsletter April 2024) and you will find lists of them. Any coal which came into London which was taken past these posts had to pay tax on it to the City of London. Some of the money raised went to build churches in the 18th century — one of these was the Greenwich parish church, St Alfege. The old church had collapsed in 1710 and £6,000 was given to rebuild it. It paid for all the great Hawksmoor churches — St George Wapping, St Ann Limehouse, and Christ Church Spitalfields.
As time went on the coal trade grew and more and more ships arrived in the river and created an unregulated jam and chaos. In the early 18th century there might be 90 colliers in the Pool of London at any one time, most of them unloading into a dozen or so barges. By the end of the century colliers made up three-fifths of the ships and by 1850 3-6 million tons were being brought in by sailing vessels. In 1852 the purpose-built steamer John Bowes arrived in London from the Tyne, to great acclaim. She could take 650 tons of coal and do the round trip in seven days. She was the first of many.
Remind me some time to write about Atlas, which was moored in Charlton and was an attempt to dodge the regulations and the fees.
The job of regulating collier ships in the Thames is long and complex story but what was eventually done was to appoint Harbour Masters for stretches of river between Gravesend and the Tower and their job was to allow vessels to proceed up stream in rotation. These Harbour Masters were appointed under the Port Act of 1799 following which a series of by-laws determined specified moorings where not more than 15 ships at a time must wait. There was a complicated system of paperwork and flags which were raised to allow boats to proceed to a wharf for unloading or tell them to stay where they were.
The original Greenwich Harbour Masters Office was in High Bridge Place — probably adjacent to the Drawdock which is still at the end of Eastney Street. Later, when the present Harbour Masters House (below left) was built this old Harbour Office became the Three Crowns pub (below right) which was demolished in the 1930s.
In the 1850s the current Harbour Master's House on Ballast Quay was built. It was designed by architect George Smith — who had locally had already designed and commissioned the surrounding housing, in his role as Surveyor to the Blackheath charity and landowner, Morden College. It closed, along with the system of regulation, in the 1890s and has been a private house ever since — and I hope I don't need to say that the privacy of the residents needs to respected.
Across on the other side of Ballast Quay on the riverfront at the start of the Riverside walk is a line of railings (below right) which match the design of the railings round the Harbour Master's House. They lead to the site of a long vanished steam boat pier.
There still are Harbour Masters on the river — if you look at the Port of London Authority website you will see that Greenwich is now included in the Upper Thames area which lies between Teddington and Crossness. James Stride is Chief Harbour Master and he has 'overall responsibility for navigational safety on the tidal Thames'. But he no longer controls the coal ships coming up the river — they finished in the 1970s when the power stations and gas works closed. The river may look empty now but the Harbour Masters still have work to do — but they no longer use the house on Ballast Quay. Mary Mills
Maydew House was designed by the London County Council Housing Department with Hubert Bennett. Built 1965-8 in a clean international modern style it is 26 stories high, 255 feet, and has a separate access shaft similar to those at Balfron Tower and Trellick Tower. It provides 144 two-bedroom flats.
Since 2015 the building has been essentially empty and in recent years the local authority has spent quite large sums of money with a view to refurbishing the tower and putting it back in use.
There was criticism of the building in the Pevsner Volume, London 2: South published in 1983 * because it can cast a long shadow over Southwark Park. This was written 40 years ago and we are now getting used to buildings twice the height and will be experiencing far deeper shadows.
However, it has now been decided that Maydew House should be demolished. In years to come it can never become the Balfron Tower of south-east London, a desirable residence for young architectural enthusiasts. Nearly 60 years is a good age for a building of this period and it also appears to have been built in the wrong place. Bob Carr
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* ISBN 978-0300096514, see p612
Since the 1980s West Ham beam engines [TQ 389 833] have been locked away from the general public almost completely. The engine house is now in a bad state of repair but there are now signs of a revival of interest and it may even be possible to have visits here in a few years' time.
The Newcomen Society paid a visit to the engine house on 4 August 1982 and a report was published in the Newcomen Bulletin. See also Dalisy Bulletin volume 4, number 1, pp4-9, and Dr Denis Smith, The Industrial Archaeology of the Lower Lea Valley 1.
At the time of the Newcomen visit records were in existence which included a series of monthly progress reports on the original installation of the beam engines in the later 1890s. This was an exchange between the Borough engineer of West Ham, Mr Lewis Angell and the Lilleshall Company who built the two engines c.1895.
At West Ham there were also three reciprocating engines driving centrifugal pumps for use in storm conditions — discharging sewage directly into the river. At least two of these were built in Scotland by John Cochrane & Co about 1900; a third engine was acquired second-hand, builder unknown. One of these engines was removed in 1973 for preservation by the London Graving Dock Company at Tilbury. The others were taken out in 1974. It was noted in 1982 that a small Bellis & Morcom engine which drove a coal conveyor had been taken into store by the Passmore Edwards Museum.
At the time that Denis Smith wrote 'The Industrial Archaeology of the Lower Lea Valley' the West Ham engines were in full daily operation. The stormwater pumping station with centrifugal pumps was in a low-rise building next door to the beam engine house. There were also a fully equipped workshop and a blacksmiths' forge. On closure of the West Ham pumping station in 1972 a set of blacksmiths' tools was taken into storage by the Passmore Edwards museum which also acquired a box of material relating to the engine house.
The last beam engine to run was number two which ceased work at noon on 10 January 1972. A film had been made of the engines at work 2. Some of the above was taken from notes written at the time of the Newcomen visit and facts will require verification. Bob Carr
See also GLIAS Newsletter October 2022
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1. In East London Papers, winter 1969 -1970, Vol 12 No 2, pp83-97
2. the film was made by West Ham College and digitised by GLIAS a few years ago. It has been shown at GLIAS film evenings
Jill Vickers has reported a clock which once hung outside 154 Southampton Row, WC1. This carried a familiar name and occupation in two panels above and below each of the three clock faces — Pitmans Shorthand. The firm started in 1837. The 1977 Post Office Business telephone directory reflects their gradual change of focus away from shorthand, describing the address as Pitmans Central College. This was part of an organisation which by then had several premises in London, running training schools for typing, secretarial skills and book-keeping, plus one teaching English for Overseas Students. A related business printed its textbooks for correspondence courses.
In 1990 Pitmans, by then offering computer training packages, moved to Wetherby and took the clock with them, hanging it outside their newly acquired HQ, on the site of the town's railway goods yard. But when in 2004 they moved again, to other premises in the town, the clock stayed. It received a new name — Flockton House, after Samuel Flockton Ltd, building contractors, who occupy the ground floor of the three-floor building. The accompanying photograph was taken in 2021. David Thomas
The New River was built in the early 1600s to bring clean water from springs in Hertfordshire to London. It was opened throughout to New River Head in Islington in 1613.
The New River Pipe Track, which has been discussed in recent newsletters (GLIAS Newsletter April 2024), runs north-westwards from Stoke Newington pumping station to the north end of the Blackstock Road. When the cast-iron water mains of the pipe track were laid there was almost no housing in the area, the New River still ran through open country.
In the 1850s the New River Company on health grounds had been obliged by government legislation to terminate its open channel at Stoke Newington and filter its water. From there its customers were to be supplied in pipes.
To convey water to an area north-west of Stoke Newington, cast-iron water mains were laid along the recently disused part of the bed of the New River running to the northwest. The New River Company had the right-of-way. When houses were built in the 1870s, building on top of the Pipe Track was prohibited.
If a garden wall was built across part of the Pipe Track small cast-iron plates were affixed (below) to make it clear that the New River Company (NRC) had the right to demolish this part of the wall whenever they needed access to a water main. Thames Water have inherited this right.
To recap we have the situation where the pipe track cuts a swathe diagonally across the pattern of Victorian streets. In winter when the trees are bare you can sight along it looking north-westwards and see as far as the chatrai on the top of Alexandra Buildings * (below).
Where the Pipe Track with its buried water mains crosses the streets, shafts have recently been sunk from time to time to access these mains. Lining three 36 inch water mains and connecting the newly lined pipes to various facilities where the mains cross the streets is quite a lengthy process and work in this area is continuing.
The last two photographs show activity below and above ground, in Finsbury Park Road (above, left) and in Queen's Drive (above, right). Both these photographs were taken in June 2024. Bob Carr
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* Alexandra Buildings are at the junction of Blackstock Road and The Seven Sisters Road
GLIAS member Kevin Abbey (GLIAS Newsletter August 2021) has published his 16th free self-guided walk on his website (https://mylondonwalks.com/), visiting much of the newly restored area behind St Pancras and King's Cross stations.
The walk starts at the front of the St Pancras Station and Renaissance Hotel on Euston Road, and takes in St Pancras Square, Granary Square, Central St Martins University and Thomas Heatherwick's revamped Coal Drops Yard, now a fascinating shopping, drinking and eating experience.
The walk also passes the amazing 'Gas Holder Park', Camley Street Nature Park and ends in the fascinating and very historic Old St Pancras Church and burial garden.
Now being demolished, Harmsworth Quays was once Western Europe's largest printing works. Covering 12 acres it was built in 1989 on the site of Centre Pond, one of the Surrey Docks timber ponds. For more than 23 years The Evening Standard, The Daily Mail, Metro and so on were printed here.
In 2012 printing operations were moved to Thurrock, Essex, but the building remained and since then it has been a nightclub and events venue known as the Printworks. Some features of the printing plant were retained including the van loading dock and steel stairs which gave the club an industrial feel. The venue had a total capacity of 6,000 people achieved by having two performance rooms known as the Press Halls and Inkwells. The site was also available for hire and was used for filmmaking, commercials, etc.
It became one of Britain's top nightclubs but was closed for redevelopment in 2023. Historic England granted Harmsworth Quays a Certificate of Immunity from listing in February 2023. This expires in February 2028. The Press Halls part of the building is due to reopen as a music and events venue in 2026.
Photograph 1 shows the Works in 1995, it is an inset from photograph 2 in the previous Albion dry dock note (GLIAS Newsletter 332, pp3-4).
Photographs 2 and 3 taken in April 2024 show the works partially demolished. Photograph 2 is looking north and photograph 3 is looking southeast. Bob Carr
In the June newsletter (GLIAS Newsletter June 2024), Bob Carr asks about the current state of the Albion Dry Dock in the Surrey Commercial Docks. I went there last year, the dock has been infilled, paved over and partly built upon. The paving is at a slightly lower level than the (granite?) coping stones and therefore the outline of about half of the dock remains visible. Ian Bull
Preserved 'London' locomotives
Pete Oakley (GLIAS Newsletter June 2024) has sent more interesting photographs of locomotives preserved around the country with London connections.
At the Statfold Barn Railway:
a former Woolwich Arsenal diesel locomotive named Carnegie running on the 18 inch gauge track. The engine was built by The Hunslet Engine Company in Leeds. Its works number is 4524 and it was built in 1954. It has a 88hp McLaren engine that is fitted with an electric starter. It was built to be capable of hauling a 375 ton train at a top speed of 8mph (speed was not a priority at the works).
diesel hydraulic 2 foot gauge locomotive built by Hunslet, Leeds (number 9351 of 1994) for use on the construction of the Jubilee Line extension between Green Park and Stratford. It was later used by Murphy on the Lee Valley Cable Tunnel project in east London. The tunnel formed part of the preparatory works for the 2012 London Olympics.
Surrey County Council GP39, built by Hudswell Clarke (Leeds) in 1930, works number 1643. It was used on the construction of the Guildford bypass. The project finished in 1934 and the loco was sold to the Penrhyn Slate Quarries where it was renamed Bronllwyd and used until 1949.
At the Chasewater Light Railway:
Docklands Light Railway battery locomotive, DLR No993, named Kylie. It was built by the Hunslet Company in Leeds (works number 9285). There is something wrong with it and it has been brought to Chasewater for assessment and will be repaired in Burton upon Trent.
vertical boilered locomotive built by Sentinel in 1945 for the Tottenham and District Gasworks Company (works number 9366). It was officially withdrawn from service in 1968 after being retained as a spare to two diesel shunters. It was purchased for preservation in 1970 and taken to the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre. It was returned to steam in 1971. It travelled to various railways and after being out of steam for a number of years it was retubed and fitted with vacuum brakes and returned to steam in 2017.
At the Amerton Railway, in Staffordshire:
Lorna Doone, Kerr Stuart works number 4250. It was built in 1922 for use on the building of the Southend Arterial Road (the A127).
After use on this project it was sold to Devon County Council where it was named Lorna Doone.
It went to several other sites before being restored to steam at Amerton.
Infrared photography in recording
The infrared region of the electromagnetic spectrum, to which the eye is not sensitive, has wavelengths longer than the visible spectrum running from blue to red. In its early days from 1839 analogue film could not help as the materials were only blue sensitive or 'ordinary'. Later in the 19th century with the rise of organic chemistry, dye sensitisers extended sensitivity into the green region as well, termed 'orthochromatic' followed by red sensitisers to give the modern 'panchromatic' materials. In the 1930s further work produced infrared sensitive materials which were used with a filter to block visible light and transmit infrared radiation. The film stock was particularly tricky to handle in practice and was much used in aerial photography and other scientific uses. The film gives a noticeably different tone rendering with dark skies and white foliage due to the high infrared reflectance of the chlorophyll content. These features can give a dramatic rendering to the most mundane scenes and can highlight points of interest in recording.
The advance of technology means that now most infrared and surveillance work is done by electronic and digital imaging.
A happy result for digital cameras is that the sensor is inherently sensitive to infrared and they need to be fitted with an infrared blocking filter in front of the sensor. A digital camera can be modified by removing this filter at reasonable cost by a specialist. Otherwise and fortunately, there is adequate sensitivity left in the sensor to allow most cameras to be used for recording by the addition of a visually opaque 720nm filter on the lens. These are available at modest cost on the internet as is copious advice on the practicalities of such photography and the simple afterwork on the image. The low visibility of the viewfinder image takes getting used to.
The range of images shown here try to give a sample of infrared recording on a range of subjects, not all in London. Good luck with your experiments.
Sidney Ray. All photographs by the author
The GLIAS Database has over 4,000 entries, but what are the 'highlights'?
One way of finding some of the key sites is to search for entries featured in Keith Falconer's 1980 book, 'Guide to England's Industrial Heritage', published by Batsford.
The Batsford series never had a London edition (GLIAS Newsletter December 1980), but this nationwide book is represented in the Industrial History Online website (www.industrialhistoryonline.co.uk/yiho/) with 1,294 entries, of which 73 are in London.
The Database is steadily growing but we need help in adding new sites and improving the existing entries. Also we would like to see more entries augmented by photos.
To get involved, or to get logon details, please contact us at database@glias.org.uk
Blackfriars Station, in the City of London, serves both the Thameslink line from Bedford to Brighton and the District and Circle lines in the London Underground network. The original station was called St Pauls and was on the London, Chatham and Dover Railway (LC&DR). It was renamed in 1937.
It was bomb damaged in the Second World War and the original station demolished for rebuilding in 1964.
The station frontage was memorable for its list of destinations around the entrances and in the ticket office, dating from the LC&DR days. Most of these signs have been preserved as a panel in the main line station.
A recent visit and viewing the blandness of the north side with its featureless office accommodation, brought back memories of the former soot-stained glory of the façade they replace. Sidney Ray. All photographs by the author
What was Movril (GLIAS Newsletter June 2024)?
Bovril, the beefy drink, was marketed and well advertised from the late 19th century and would have been a household name at the time that (the motor oil?) Movril was introduced.
Was Bovril initially some kind of waggish joke among some members of the motoring fraternity, Jeremy Clarkson types? Motor oil resembles concentrated Bovril prior to hot water being added and somehow the joke became incorporated into a commercial product. It is an interesting speculation. Bob Carr
In the late 1970s/early 1980s GLIAS members went on a visit to see a working Noakesoscope. I wonder if any one has any memories of the visit — and more importantly of the Noakesoscope itself; This is to pass on to someone researching and who is working with a team restoring one.
Contact Mary Mills. Email: marymillsmmmmm@aol.com
Photographs taken by Glenn Drewett
Glenn, a keen GLIAS member in its first decade, died earlier this year. Although it appeared that he had disposed of all his negatives and photographs taken on GLIAS events, he had retained some albums of digital colour ones from about 2004 to 2012 which included a few of London I A interest.
Glenn's brother kindly agreed for me to have these albums to in turn arrange for the photographs to go to suitable organisations, and that I could select some to appear in the GLIAS Newsletter, shown below. David Thomas
