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Warwick
and Birmingham Canal history
This canal was built with the benevolent help of the
Birmingham Canal Navigations, who provided the surveyor, Samuel Bull, and
the Engineer, William Felkin. With the Earl of Warwick as a strong supporter
the Act of Parliament had little difficulties and was passed in March 1793.
It authorised a canal from the Digbeth Branch of the Birmingham Canal, where
there was to be a stop lock, for 22 miles to Warwick. From Digbeth the line
rose by six Camp Hill Locks, to Bordesley to its summit, which it maintained
for some ten miles to Knowle, where there are six falling locks. From there
the canal ran through Shrewley Tunnel (433 yards) to the top of Hatton
flight of 21 locks, not far from the bottom of which was the end at
Saltisford Wharf, Warwick.
The company began by renting a house in Birmingham
and instructed the clerk to "put a skirting board round the room,
appropriated to the use of a Committee, and to put a Hearth Stone, and a
chimney piece to the same. To build a brewhouse. Privy and Wall, to make a
yard and Garden private and entire. To sink a well and to put down a pump -
to glaze the windows in the room occupied by an office" and later to buy
"twelve Chairs, a table, window blind and curtains". The main source of
water was Olton reservoir, but in 1796 a Boulton and Watt steam engine
started work in Bowyer Street, Bordesley to pump water from the bottom to
the top of Camp Hill Locks. The Warwick and Birmingham Canal and the Warwick
and Napton Canals were ceremonially opened on the 19th December, 1799, but
more work had to be done, for trading began on 19th March, 1800. To relieve
congestion into Birmingham, the Warwick and Birmingham and the Warwick and
Napton Canal Companies built a new canal, 2i miles long, from Camp Hill to
Salford Bridge. This canal was called the Birmingham and Warwick Junction
Canal and was opened on the 1st February, 1844.
BIRMINGHAM AND WARWICK JUNCTION CANAL "Notice is
hereby given that the Birmingham and Warwick Junction Canal, leading from
the Warwick and Birmingham Canal, to the Tame Valley Canal, at Salford
Bridge, will be opened for the use of the Public, on Wednesday morning the
14th February instant." Navigation Office Birmingham. Charles Lloyd 1st
February, 1844 Clerk of the Company
Receipts dropped by two thirds in 1844 due to
railway competition. In 1845 the Warwick-Birmingham and Warwick-Napton Canal
Companies agreed to sell both canals for conversion into railway lines, to
the London and Birmingham Railway Co. Ltd., but when the railway company
said they were unlikely to get the necessary Act of Parliament for
conversion of the canal to a railway and offered £545,000 for both canals,
the canal concerns refused, and no more was heard of the scheme. In 1895
both canal companies made a conditional agreement to amalgamate with the
Grand Junction Canal Co. In 1903 Fellows, Morton and Clayton offered to
lease both canals "with a view of providing Electric traction along the
same" but instead for a time acted as the Grand Junction’s carrying agents
on the London and Birmingham run, guaranteeing 100,000 tons of traffic a
year, reduced in 1904 to 70,000 tons. In 1917 the three Warwick Canals, the
Warwick and Birmingham, Warwick Napton, and Birmingham and Warwick Junction
Canal, put themselves under the management of one joint Committee, Finally,
they were sold to the Regents Canal Co. on 1st January, 1929 and became part
of the new Grand Union Canal Company.
THE GRAND UNION CANAL HISTORY
The first step towards the creation of the Grand
Union was taken in 1925, when the Grand Junction sought a report from the
engineer of the Warwick canals on the cost of putting them in order. In
1926, the Regents Canal Co. agreed to buy the Grand Junction Canal subject
to them purchasing the Warwick Canals. A year later, the Grand Junction had
agreed to do so, though for convenience the actual purchase was carried out
by the Regents Company. In November, 1927 the name "Grand Union" was
suggested for the new company. Regents agreed to pay £62,258 15s. 0d. for
the Warwick-Birmingham Canal and £8,641 for the Warwick-Napton. In August
1928 the Acts were obtained and the new company came into existence from the
1st January, 1929. Vast sums of money were spent on converting the canal
from the top lock Camp Hill to Regents Canal Dock in London into a Broad
Canal, so that it could take boats to 12' 6in wide. Unfortunately only one
proto-type Barge was ever made - the "Progress". This took the Duke of Kent
down the new Hatton Locks when he opened these new wide locks in 1934. New
warehouses were built at Sampson Road and at Tyseley Birmingham as well as
the enlarging of the warehouse at Brentford. Unfortunately, the Grand Union
was not used as a Broad Canal and narrow-boats were the only ones to use it.
In fact there were over 200 pairs of narrow-boats working the canal in 1936.
This was reduced for economy to 100 pairs in 1937, although by September,
1937 there were still 119 pairs operating. In July 1939 there were 102 pairs
working. During the war years both men and women were trained as crews. In
1946 there were 79 pairs of boats working.
Late in 1935 a firm of John Miller (Shipping) Ltd
introduced a new trade in iron and steel imported from the Continent to
Regents Canal Dock and put on the canal for Birmingham. In 1936 the Grand
Union formed its own subsidiaries, the Grand Union (Shipping) Ltd., to
operate the Regents Line of ships from the dock, the Grand Union
(Stevedoring and Wharfage) Co. Ltd., to service the ships. By 1945 the
company owned five ships plying backwards and forwards to the continent. In
1936 Mr. John Miller became a Director of the Grand Union, and in 1937 he
became Chairman and Managing Director.
The Grand Union Company was nationalised in 1948
when it became the British Transport Commission. The profitable Grand Union
(Shipping) Ltd. was soon afterwards sold for £180,000. In 1963 British
Waterways Board, which had taken over the canals from the former British
Transport Commission, ceased most carrying operations on the Grand Union
Canal. Since then however there has been a large growth of pleasure
cruising.
© Charles Hadfield 1966 (David and Charles) . All
the above information has been taken from "Canals of the East Midlands" by
Charles Hadfield.
THE BIRMINGHAM TO WARWICK CANAL 1793 -1972
The Junction with the Digbeth Branch is just north
of Fazeley Street, and the Warwick Basin, completely deserted and disused,
is in the angle formed by the junction. There are early 19th century
warehouses on Fazeley Street, the later ones around the basin make no use of
the canal.
Crossing the River Rea on an aqueduct, the canal
climbs southward out of the valley by means of six locks, numbers 52-57,
which are narrow; the route taken is at first the valley of the Bordesley
Brook which gives Watery Lane its name. Crossing beneath Coventry Road and
Sandy (formerly Snails) Lane, the canal reaches Camp Hill Top Lock number
52. The great steel viaduct of the Banbury and North Warwickshire Lines
(1852, 1907) goes over lane and cut. The summit level, 380 feet, continues
for ten miles to Knowle, where locks begin the descent to the Avon
valley.
The wharves at Sampson Road North are disused for
water traffic. There is a narrow motor-boat in cast-iron and two lighters.
In the yard are containers - a possible means of reviving canal use on some
waterways if not this one. The newest warehouse has no loading doors into
the water. Beyond the wharves, right, is South Road, its terraces dating
from 1870; a part of the St. Andrew's Redevelopment, they are being
demolished.
Off left, the British Rail sidings occupy a wide
strip of Small Heath beside the canal. Small Heath Bridge, 1901-4, spans
canal and ten lines. The towers visible off left are those of Dixon and
Bolton Road Schools, and the large windowed building beyond is the Heathmere
Centre, formerly the Young Christians' Institute. The factories beyond the
bridge, right, date from the 90's onward -list on map; their loading doors
and apertures are mostly bricked up. Left, the sidings are used as timber
and fuel stores. The Public Works Dept. yard just before Anderton Road, has
its own canal branch. There are stop-plank slots beneath the Golden Hillock
Road Bridge.
The canal has crossed level ground from the
lock-head. Now the Spark and Cole Valleys lie ahead, and the canal turns to
parallel the former before crossing the Cole on an embankment. A feeder from
the Spark used to enter the cut near Anderton Road. The B.S.A. Works opened
in 1863, was built between canal and railway. The buildings on Golden
Hillock Road, left, date from 1915. Right, the B.S.A. Power Station, sports
field and motor cycle testing track, and a line of poplars marking the Spark
Brook, boundary of Bordesley/Yardley manors, and two counties.
Beyond a steel footbridge, a humped bridge formerly
led to the B.S.A. branch, now blocked. The Banbury /North Warwickshire rail
lines cross overhead, a branch line, probably World War 1 date, formerly led
off beyond the B.S.A. to the Singer Works on Coventry Road. Left, the
blocked entrance to a concrete basin of similar date. Just to the east of
this, the canal crossed into Yardley, at the now diverted Cole.
Herefrom the valley has been drastically altered by
the dumping of clinker and ash from the Tyseley Destructor Works. The whole
area, except for 'gorges' in which flow the Cole-Spark stream and the
head-race to the long-demolished Hay Mill, has been raised about 50ft at
greatest, level with the canal. The watercourses can be seen far below on
both sides.
Left, the tower of St. Cyprian's Church 1873, built
by the James Horsfall (of Webster and Horsfall) who rebuilt Hay Mill as a
steam powered wireworks. The millpool may still be seen, below left.
The canal now bends north-east to maintain the level
on the east side of the Cole Valley, passing under the bridge leading to the
Destructor. Off right is Hay Hall, 15th century mansion, now Reynolds Tubes
premises. The estate has been developed completely for industry since the
1914-18 War.
Passing one of the large Wilmot Breedon factories,
the canal turns to cut directly through the central ridge of Yardley. This
is composed of sand and gravel, which was worked and taken away by boat in
earlier times. Just past the Bakelite tanks, right, was a right-angled
branch. Left, through gateways of Wilmot Breeden premises, can be seen the
great Waterloo Pit on Red Hill (Coventry Road).
Yardley clay made excellent tiles and bricks and
until Welsh slate came to the Midlands a century ago every farmer had a
small kiln for winter work. Their products travelled by cart to the
Stockfield wharves and thence by canal. Wharf Road, right, small modern
factories off Whardale Road. Off right, Stock Field, former open field, laid
out in strips, now Council estate.
Beyond Stockfield Road, deepest cut. New small
industrial estate right. Off left, site of Tenchlee, Yardley hamlet. A few
houses survive, like Pinfold House, 17th and 18th century, top of bank,
left, by bridge. Yardley Road bridge rebuilt 1935, former short tunnel (280
yards). Off right, not visible, was Field Gate Farm, at gate of Acocks Green
Field. Canal cuts off corner of this beyond disused Yardley Coal Wharf.
Yardley Road was boundary lane between two great fields. Left, Yardley
Cemetery. Streets laid out in 1890s descend to canal, right. Canal bends
south, crosses valley of Westley Brook, diverted (right) as feeder. Main
source for summit level is Olton Reservoir. Rover Works, left, demolished
1980s, site of Broomfield Hall. Four stop-gates at Woodcock Lane Bridge
(only original one on canal through Birmingham, 1794). B.C.S. laundry and
warehouses, left, Council housing estate right.
Beyond Lincoln Road bridge, re-built 1930s,
Yardley/Solihull boundary, 30 yards. Sluice, left. Towpath shored, 1930s,
narrow, not meant for horses. Central channel dredged, sides very shallow,
lack of oil in water shows disuse.
The 380 foot summit level is maintained from Camp
Hill to Knowle by means of bends, embankments and cuttings, notably that
west of Dovehouse Lane. From Birmingham (Yardley) boundary to Catherine de
Barnes Heath the canal ran through farmland and large estates, a wholly
rural landscape until the 1920s apart from villas at Ulverley Green and
Solihull Gas Works. Olton developed as a rural suburb of large mansions
towards the end of last century, based on Olton Station; north of the
railway the laying out of estates began after World War 1 and has continued
sporadically to the present. The original canal bridges of the 1790s have
been replaced (or abandoned, at Dovehouse Lane) not for the advantage of
water traffic but for the benefit of car-driving commuters. Olton Reservoir,
made on Hatchford Brook to supply the canal, now supplies very little water
to it; the brook itself is (or was) the feeder, but is now a mere trickle.
At bridge 85 the canal goes back into Warwickshire
which was left at Spark Brook. The Banbury line, later G.W.R., crosses
Kineton Green Brook very close to the canal. Small factories occupy the
strip between rail and canal banks, notably Cartwrights', incorrectly called
Olton Mill. To left is a suburb of semi and detached houses mostly built in
the early 1930s. At Richmond Road bridge (1935) is the disused village
school. Off right are former hamlets of Kineton Green and Ulverley Green,
recorded in Doomsday Book - a century or more before Solihull.
Feeder from Olton Mere, right. The manor house of
Ulverley was on Castle Lane, right, beyond Sceptre Park. Off left, the lane
leads to Hobs Moat, a great earthwork which was the site of the moated
timber castle of the lords of manor, the Odingsells. The four blocks,
mid-1960s, of the Sceptre Park estate are called Amethyst, Sapphire,
Emerald, and Garnet courts. Passing between the 1930s estates of
Knightsbridge Road/Highwood Avenue to left, Bradbury Road to right, then
canal goes through a deep cutting; High Wood to left is nearly fifty feet
above the water. The original brick bridge (1796), which has been superseded
by a 1964 steel span, has had new parapets and the arch has been concreted.
Lode Lane carries heavy traffic between Solihull and
Sheldon, so its bridge was first to be rebuilt postwar; it is always busy
with cars, lorries and transporters going to and from the great Rover works.
Emerging from Olton House Cutting, the canal crosses
Billsmore or Olton Mill Brook on a short embankment. Bridge 80, formerly
taking a farm track over the waterway, has been replaced (1965) by a steel
span giving access via Rowood Drive to a new estate. At Solihull Wharf just
beyond was the nearest point to which coal supplies for the village could be
brought by water. Solihull Gas Works was established here, supplied directly
from coal boats.
From small beginnings the Lode Lane Industrial
Estate has grown postwar to a score of small factories. The Gas Works have
become a huge and still growing Gas Research Station for the West Midlands
Gas Board. Incongruously a Midlands Electricity Board site with a
telecommunications mast, is surrounded by rival organisation's buildings.
Beyond Damson Lane bridge, 1958, and the 1930s development thereabout, the
canal is in the still wholly rural landscape of Elmdon Heath. Paralleled by
Lugtrout Lane, and flanked by farm pastures, the canal goes eastward for a
nearly straight mile.
Crossing Hampton Coppice Brook, it leaves Solihull
and enters Meriden Rural District. Bridge 78, Hampton Lane, was rebuilt in
the 1930s during the reconstruction and improvement that followed the
formation of the Grand Union Canal Co. Here is the wharf at Catherine de
Barnes (Kettlebarn and other variants anciently, known to locals as Catney
Barnes), with the Boat Inn nearby; iron coal boats and a few pleasure craft
are at the wharf. There are private moorings at intervals all along the
route, and a crane with boats under repair towards Hampton Lane.
© John Morris Jones 1972.
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