In 1805, the digging of a canal was completed. It ran for three and half miles from The River Hull right into the heart of the East Yorkshire village where Simon and I were born and raised. The chief sponsor, Mrs Charlotta Bethell, imagined the canal would be a shrewd investment - bringing in coal and taking out grain and other agricultural products.
Of course, the canal has not been used for commercial purposes in many decades. But it is still there as a leisure asset. It attracts many anglers and near Sandholme Bridge - show below - there is a caravan settlement. A public footpath runs all the way to The River Hull where the canal meets the river at Leven Lock.
At the village end of the canal there were two substantial warehouses. One was built to receive coal and the other housed grain and other crops ready for transportation by sailing barges. One of those warehouses has now been converted into a private residence and it has been lowered. Annoyingly, this project caused the public footpath to be diverted for a couple of hundred yards so you no longer get to see the old canal basin. Here's an iron boss I spotted on the side of the former warehouse - as you can see, it is dated 1825:-
When we were boys, the canal was like a playground.for village children. We swam there, pinched rowing boats, observed swans and other water birds, fished, noticed water boatmen and caddis flies and we chucked green algae around or built primitive dens. Legendary pike fish swam below the lily pads. The very name "pike" was enough to send a shudder up your spine.
Later, when we were teenagers, there was canoodling to do and I had my first puffs of marijuana "reefers" down there too.
For the first time in many a long year, I walked alongside the canal on Friday evening. Memories flooded back of happy childhood days. There was not enough time to walk all the way to Leven Lock and turn back. Near the point where I did turn back, I saw a gap in the hedgerow and this view of a lone tree on Harrison Hill though Ordnance Survey mapping has labelled it Bracken Hill for some reason. It was never Bracken Hill to us.
The canals are a terrific recreational asset and be grateful to those who pushed back against the 'fill 'em in' brigade. 1805 sounds to me like it was a fairly late canal. Canals always seem to look so peaceful and this one is not an exception.
ReplyDeleteYou are right Andrew. This little canal was indeed a latecomer and I doubt that Mrs Bethell recouped her investment.
DeleteHow lovely that you were able to enjoy some peaceful moments along the canal, bringing back good memories. We don't have pike in our area, but they look somewhat like our alligator gars (though not related). What type of fish did you and your brothers hope to catch? I enjoy fishing for largemouth bass.
ReplyDeleteMostly we caught perches and roaches. To tell you the truth I never really fell in love with fishing. I just did it because others did it.
DeleteCanal engineers, like their railroad counterparts, were geniuses.
ReplyDeleteThink of the Eyrie in upstate New York about which a song was written, usually sung by a lusty American baritone.
I am surprised you swam in your canal in East Yorkshire because we were told to keep well clear of ours (the Forth and Clyde) for fear of being dragged down by debris.
Now I know where the Ted Hughes poem Pike (YouTube) comes from.
I would not eat a pike any more than I would eat the toxic basa (a species of catfish from the Mekong Delta) which they sell in my local Sainsbury's.
Your second and third photos are like a Tennysonian idyll.
As for your third, I can feel the sun on the brick wall of that warehouse.
My interest in canals and wildlife began with Richard Mabey's book *The Unofficial Countryside* (1973) now reissued in durable paperback by Little Toller.
*Journey to the Heart of England* by Caroline Hillier (1976) confirmed me as a canal watcher. For her book she went in search of the Black Country and her people.
In the 1970s there were developers who wanted canals removed from our landscape, filled in with rubble and the wildlife killed off.
Roads were built over sections of our Scottish canals, some nitwits called them eyesores.
I realise that you are a dreamy intellectual with your head either in the clouds or a book but I must point out that The Clyde and The Forth are actually natural rivers and not canals. The clue is in the name - RIVER Clyde and RIVER Forth! Happy to have been of service. By the way, village parents always warned us about swimming in the canal but on hot summer afternoons who could resist?
DeleteClouds and Books.
DeleteNot a bad name for a clever wee lassie's blog.
Teacher needs a lesson in geography. See online:
*Forth and Clyde Canal - the Coast to Coast Route.*
*Forth and Clyde Canal Wikipedia.*
*Forth and Clyde Canal - Inland Waterways Association.*
*Forth & Clyde and Union Canal towpaths (Walkhighlands).
I'll take yourself and Tasker for a pint in the toon of Clydebank, show ye's where Upper Clyde Shipyards used to be, then we'll have a walk along the Forth & Clyde Canal all the way to Bowling, where we'll hae another pint.
And maybe a game of dominoes !
You were free range kids. You could come and go without supervision. Your territory had a long history and it's still here today.
ReplyDeleteI know that you were "free range" too Red. Were you a chicken?
DeleteWe're cattle country!
DeleteI'm guessing you went to see your brother. The photos are lovely.
ReplyDeleteYes Nurse LIly, I did see Simon. The canal walk was a bonus.
DeleteIt must have been a rather emotional walk for you, what with your brother being so ill and the area brimming with memories of happy times. Every time I repeat what was my Mum and my favourite walk together, I walk part of it with tears streaming down my face.
ReplyDeleteThe canal path looks not unlike Ripon Canal. There, too, warehouses around the town end of the canal have been converted to flats, but one can still walk close to the basin. I very much hope to do so in July.
I believe that Ripon Canal was much more significant, It was opened earlier too - 1773. Remember to take a handkerchief next time you follow your parents' favourite walking route.
DeleteLovely views of the canal. I wouldn't mind spending time there just wandering and daydreaming.
ReplyDeleteTo do that you would have to change your nickname to Canal!
DeleteLast night on " Gentleman Jack" ( BBC(pm) there was discussion about whether it was going to be worth deepening the canal for bigger boats or not, as the new fangled trains were just arriving. Jack didn't know whether to take her investments out of canals and into trains!
ReplyDeleteThat is interesting Frances. Mrs Bethell came late to the canal game. I doubt that she recouped her investments even though this part of East Yorkshire was never reached by railways.
DeleteFreshwater shark. Another name for a Pike or a Prog Rock band YP. I have similar Coarse fishing memories.
ReplyDeleteHappy memories. Canals run so straight and were at one stage functional as you say but now fill a happier time for canal boat dwellers. I would always be afraid of the barge sinking at night though.
ReplyDeleteThis little canal used to have some moored houseboats on it but they are now long gone.
Delete"Pinched rowing boats, canoodling, and puffs of marijuana reefers"? YP - I'm shocked!
ReplyDelete(Well everyone else has already beaten me to the comments I'd make.)
As always excellent photos, and that iron boss would be late Georgian, so has stood the test of time well.
I am sorry if reference to my youthful behaviours has shocked you Carol. I know that it must all seem rather odd to a former convent girl who lived a blameless childhood.
DeleteThat last photo of the lone tree is stunning.
ReplyDeleteGlad you like that shot Bob. When I stumbled on the scene my heart was lifted.
DeleteFarm ponds, the only bodies of water we had at our disposal as kids, didn't have the same appeal as canals. I supposed because you could always see the start and end of them from anywhere in the pond.
ReplyDeleteI agree. A pond isn't going anywhere but a canal, just like a river, goes beyond where you are to some place else.
DeleteAt one point, Florida was going to have a barge canal cutting right through the state from the gulf to the Atlantic. Some of it was completed. Thank goodness, though, not all of it.
ReplyDeleteThere are a lot of memories for you in this post, I imagine. You certainly got some beautiful pictures.
I am glad you had a visit with your brother and then were able to take some time for a nice walk down memory lane (canal)! How our lifetime has flown!
ReplyDeleteI wonder about the disparity in names for the hill. And I'm wondering too about "lowering" a warehouse for residential purposes. Like, they built walls downward from an elevated warehouse? Or did they actually lower the structure from a previous position on stilts or piers?
ReplyDelete