Oxford Canal
Oxford Canal | |
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Hawkesbury Village |
The Oxford Canal is a 78-mile (126 km)
The canal is usually divided into the North Oxford Canal (north of Napton, via Rugby to Hawkesbury Junction near Coventry) and the South Oxford Canal, south of Napton to Banbury and Oxford.
The canal was for about 15 years the main canal artery of trade between the
The Oxford Canal traverses Oxfordshire, Northamptonshire and east Warwickshire through broad, shallow valleys and lightly rolling hills; the canal's route northeast and then northwest forms part of the Warwickshire ring.
The route
The canal begins in
The route between Coventry and Rugby is level, with no
The canal winds through the northern part of Rugby. It passes through the 270-yard (250 m) Newbold Tunnel. In the churchyard in Newbold-on-Avon remains can be seen of an earlier canal tunnel built in the 1770s. It scales a flight of three locks at Hillmorton about three miles (5 km) east-southeast of the town.
East of Rugby, the canal passes southwest then south. It crosses under the
West of Braunston village centre, by a pub, the canal converges with the Grand Union Canal where both change direction to west-southwest. The latter canal has a major wharf, Braunston Marina, 770 yards (700 m) east and a campsite. The combined canal splits north of Napton-on-the-Hill:
- The Oxford Canal runs southwest and then turns south towards Oxford via Banbury.
- The Grand Union Canal runs north passing opposing marinas within a mile then northwest to Birmingham via Warwick.
After winding round Napton Hill, the canal ascends the Napton flight of nine locks to a local summit reach, well below the hilltop. After passing an old wharf and a pub at Fenny Compton, the canal enters a long cutting which until some time in the 19th century was a tunnel. This section is normally referred to as a "tunnel straight" or the Fenny Compton Tunnel.
The route between the farms of Priors Hardwick and Fenny Compton was never straightened, and is the most circuitous in the region: taking 5+1⁄2 miles (9 km) to cover 2.2 miles (3.5 km) (geodesically, as the crow flies). This coincides with the canal's highest "summit" reach in navigational terms. This reach is the "eleven-mile pound" mentioned in Tom Rolt's Narrow Boat.
The canal then descends the Claydon flight of locks and into the vale of the nascent Cherwell at Cropredy. The canal descends the valley to Oxford.
Within Oxford's conurbation, the end of the canal has two links to the Thames:
- three miles (5 km) north of the city where Dukes Cut leads to King's Lock;
- a few hundred yards (metres) from the heart of the city centre by Oxford railway station.[1] below Isis Lock (known to boatmen as 'Louse Lock') through Sheepwash Channel.[2] This leads to an elongated navigable circuit at the Thames called "Four Rivers" above Osney Lock.
After 330 yards (300 m) below Isis Lock the Oxford Canal ends abruptly at Hythe Bridge Street near to the current Hythe Bridge over the Castle Mill Stream, a backwater of the River Thames that runs parallel to the Oxford Canal for its southernmost part. The canal used to continue through a bridge under Hythe Bridge Street to a turning basin and goods wharf south of Hythe Bridge Street. It then continued via a bridge under Worcester Street to end in a coal wharf beside New Road. In 1951 the basin and wharves were filled in and Nuffield College has taken part of the site.
The locks on the canal are as follows.[3]
Lock Number | Name | Rise of lock |
---|---|---|
1 | Hawkesbury Lock (to/from Coventry Canal) | 1 ft 0 in (0.30 m) |
2–7 | Hilmorton Locks | 18 ft 7 in (5.66 m) |
8–16 | Napton Bottom Lock to Napton Top Lock | 49 ft 1 in (14.96 m) |
17–21 | Claydon Top Lock to Claydon Bottom Lock | 30 ft 6 in (9.30 m) |
22 | Elkington's Lock | 6 ft 5 in (1.96 m) |
23 | Varney's Lock | 5 ft 10 in (1.78 m) |
24 | Broadmoor Lock | 7 ft 3 in (2.21 m) |
25 | Cropredy Lock | 5 ft 6 in (1.68 m) |
26 | Slat Mill Lock | 8 ft 0 in (2.44 m) |
27 | Bourton Lock | 6 ft 5 in (1.96 m) |
28 | Hardwick Lock | 7 ft 6 in (2.29 m) |
29 | Banbury Lock | 5 ft 10 in (1.78 m) |
30 | Grant's Lock | 9 ft 6 in (2.90 m) |
31 | King's Sutton Lock | 10 ft 8 in (3.25 m) |
32 | Nell Bridge Lock | 8 ft 8 in (2.64 m) |
33 | Aynho Weir Lock | 1 ft 0 in (0.30 m) |
34 | Somerton Deep Lock | 12 ft 0 in (3.66 m) |
35 | Heyford Common Lock | 7 ft 2 in (2.18 m) |
36 | Allen's Lock | 5 ft 0 in (1.52 m) |
37 | Dashwood Lock | 9 ft 3 in (2.82 m) |
38 | Northbrook Lock | 5 ft 0 in (1.52 m) |
39 | Pigeon Lock | 8 ft 4 in (2.54 m) |
40 | Baker's Lock | 8 ft 6 in (2.59 m) |
41 | Shipton Weir Lock | 2 ft 5 in (0.74 m) |
42 | Roundham Lock | 7 ft 5 in (2.26 m) |
43 | Kidlington Green Lock | 4 ft 9 in (1.45 m) |
44A | Duke's Lock | 5 ft 4 in (1.63 m) |
44B | Duke's Lock (to/from the Thames via Duke's Cut) | |
45 | Wolvercote Lock | 3 ft 8 in (1.12 m) |
46 | Isis Lock (to/from the Thames via Sheepwash Channel) | 3 ft 6 in (1.07 m) |
The canal rises from Hawkesbury Junction to Hilmorton Top Lock, there is then a 6+1⁄2-mile (10.5 km) pound to Braunston Junction, where it joins the Grand Union canal. From Napton Junction the Oxford canal rises again though the Napton Locks. After Napton Top Lock there is a 10+1⁄2-mile (16.9 km) pound to Claydon Top Lock, from where the canal falls towards Oxford.
History
Construction
The Oxford Canal was constructed in several stages over a period of more than twenty years.
Coventry to Oxford Canal Act 1769 | |
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Act of Parliament | |
Dates | |
Royal assent | 21 April 1769 |
In 1769 the Coventry to Oxford Canal Act 1769 (
Surveying of the route and initial construction were originally supervised by the celebrated engineer James Brindley, assisted by Samuel Simcock who was also Brindley's brother-in-law. Brindley died in 1772, when the canal had only reached Brinklow, and Simcock took over. By 1774 the canal had reached Napton, but the company was already running out of money.[4][5]
Coventry-Oxford Canal Act 1775 | |
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Act of Parliament | |
Dates | |
Royal assent | 30 March 1775 |
Coventry-Oxford Canal Act 1786 | |
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Act of Parliament | |
Dates | |
Royal assent | 11 April 1786 |
Other legislation | |
Repealed by | Oxford Canal Navigation Act 1829 |
Status: Repealed |
In 1775, a second act (
The Oxford Canal reached the outskirts of Oxford in 1789, when a coal wharf was opened at Heyfield Hutt, now the site of Hayfield Road. The final section into central Oxford was ceremonially opened on 1 January 1790.[7]
The Duke's Cut, a short link from the Oxford Canal to the River Thames, just north of Oxford, was built in 1789 by the Duke of Marlborough.[4]
The River Swift (a tributary of the River Avon) connected to the original route of the Oxford Canal near Cosford and was used as a water feeder to the canal. In 1785 there was a proposal to make the river navigable from the Oxford Canal at Cosford to the town of Lutterworth in Leicestershire. This proposal however never came to fruition. The River Swift, however is still an important feeder to the northern Oxford Canal, via the now unnavigable Brownsover Arm; a part of the canal which was bypassed when the canal was straightened.[5]
Commercial use
Heyday
For the next 15 years the Oxford Canal became one of the most important and profitable transport links in Britain, with most commercial traffic between London and the Midlands using the route. Its principal traffic was coal from Warwickshire. It also carried stone, agricultural products and other goods.
A much more direct route between London and the Midlands, the
The Grand Junction and Oxford canal companies were bitter rivals. When
Traffic from Birmingham had to use five miles (8 km) of the Oxford Canal to get from Braunston to join the Grand Junction at Napton. The Oxford Canal exploited this by charging high tolls for Grand Junction traffic on this short section.
Straightening
The Oxford Canal was originally built as a contour canal, meaning that it twisted around hills to minimise vertical deviations from a level contour. This meant however that the canal followed a very winding and circuitous route: Although the distance between Coventry and Napton was only 16 miles (26 km) as the crow flies, the distance by the original route of the canal was 43 miles (69 km). This mattered little when the Oxford Canal had no competition, however, with increased canal competition, and one eye on the developing railway network, the company decided to straighten the route.[4]
In 1827
Slow decline
The straightening of the canal coincided with the beginning of the
In 1833 a section of the new line of canal in Barby Fields near Dunchurch was used as a test site for a new wrought iron boat, Swallow, built by Graham and Houston. Drawn by two horses, the boat completed a distance of 1.5 mile in 7 minutes 35 seconds, a speed of almost 12 miles per hour.[9]
Traffic on the Oxford Canal held up reasonably well in the face of railway competition compared to many other navigations, but did see a gradual decline; in 1838, 520,000 tons were carried, which declined to 482,000 tons in 1868. However, income declined much more sharply due to the company slashing its tolls; takings which had gone from £18,478 in 1791/3, and then risen to a maximum of £90,446 in 1827/29, then fell to £26,312 in 1855. Nevertheless, the company was still profitable, and was able to pay dividends.[5]
The northern section of the Oxford Canal between Coventry, Braunston and Napton remained an important trunk route, and remained extremely busy with freight traffic until the 1960s. The staple traffic was coal from the
20th century
In 1934, the Braunston-Napton stretch of the canal was taken over by the recently formed Grand Union Canal company, and widened as part of that company's London to Birmingham main-line.[4]
In a bid to raise funds to overcome an arrears of maintenance, in 1936, the Oxford Canal Company decided to sell off their terminal basin at Oxford. In 1937 Baron Nuffield (Later Viscount Nuffield) bought the canal basin at Oxford for £133,373[10] (equivalent to £9,155,800 in 2021).[11] In 1951 he filled it in and built Nuffield College on part of the former coal wharf. Coal traffic was relocated to a canal wharf in Juxon Street, in Jericho, Oxford. The goods wharf and the remainder of the coal wharf are now under a public car park that Nuffield College lets to Oxford City Council. For this reason, the canal today ends abruptly in central Oxford.[4]
Many Oxford Canal boatmen and women favoured
The Oxford Canal remained independent until it was
Revival
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During the 1960s pleasure boating began to grow in popularity and replace the old trading boats, After a fact-finding cruise on the canal, Barbara Castle (Minister for Transport) rejected a proposal for closure.[13] The canal was designated as a cruiseway under the Transport Act 1968, which defined at as being a waterway to be maintained for leisure use.[4]
The canal is now thriving. In the summer it is one of the most crowded canals on the network.[citation needed]
Oxford Canal Walk
The towpath of the canal, with a 5+1⁄2-mile (9 km) extension from Hawkesbury Junction to Coventry on the towpath of the Coventry Canal, forms the 82-mile (132 km) Oxford Canal Walk. The 10-mile (16 km) stretch from Oxford to
See also
- Canals of Great Britain
- Eagle Ironworks, Oxford
- History of the British canal system
References
Notes
- ^ "Canal Guide (South Oxford Canal)". UK: Canal Guide.
- ^ "River Thames (Sheepwash Channel)". canalplan.org.uk. UK: CanalPlanAC. Retrieved 15 September 2012.
- ISBN 978-0-00-721109-8.
- ^ ISBN 1-870002-25-3.
- ^ a b c d e f g "The Development of Transport in Rugby by Peter H Elliott" (PDF). Warwickshire Railways. pp. 45–56. Retrieved 14 June 2022.
- ^ "LIFT BRIDGES – OXFORD CANAL HERITAGE REPORT" (PDF). Canal & River Trust. Retrieved 16 June 2022.
- ^ "Oxford Journal". Oxford Journal. England. 2 January 1790. Retrieved 24 August 2020 – via British Newspaper Archive.
- ^ "Coventry Herald. Friday 28 December 1827". Coventry Herald. England. 28 December 1827. Retrieved 4 September 2020 – via British Newspaper Archive.
- ^ "Fast Boats on Canals". Berkshire Chronicle. England. 13 July 1833. Retrieved 4 September 2020 – via British Newspaper Archive.
- ^ "Lord Nuffield's Purchase". Sunderland Daily Echo and Shipping Gazette. England. 25 March 1937. Retrieved 24 August 2020 – via British Newspaper Archive.
- ^ UK Retail Price Index inflation figures are based on data from Clark, Gregory (2017). "The Annual RPI and Average Earnings for Britain, 1209 to Present (New Series)". MeasuringWorth. Retrieved 11 June 2022.
- ^ "Historic Boat Record". Archived from the original on 11 March 2012. Retrieved 23 February 2010.
- ^ "New Charter for Waterways". Coventry Evening Telegraph. England. 7 September 1967. Retrieved 24 August 2020 – via British Newspaper Archive.
- ^ Ramblers Association: info on Oxford Canal Walk Archived 12 December 2007 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ "A Slight Diversion – Oxford Canal Walk". Geocaching.com. Retrieved 14 April 2016.
Bibliography
- British Waterways Board (1965). Inland Cruising Booklet 6: Cruising on the Oxford Canal (New ed.). London: British Waterways Board.
- Compton, Hugh J. (1976). The Oxford Canal. Newton Abbot: David & Charles. OCLC 3198544.
- Davies, Mark; Robinson, Catherine (2003) [2001]. A Towpath Walk in Oxford. Oxford: Oxford Towpath Press. ISBN 0-9535593-1-9.
- ISBN 0-413-22000-1.
- Waterways World (1989). Oxford Canal Cruising Guide. ISBN 1-870002-25-3.
External links
- Canal & River Trust webpage about the Oxford Canal
- Detail of towns, history etc. along the Oxford Canal Archived 1 July 2018 at the Wayback Machine
- images & map of mile markers seen along the Oxford canal