Powick watergate.
basil | 11/14/2005 | 2:29 pm
Watergate at Powick.
This original photograph was found in a scrapbook and given to me. Sadly it is not too sharp but at least it is a record. We call them paddles here and on the Avon, on the Thames Rimmers and I think in the north Cloughd. The structure is remarkably similar to the ones on the Salwarpe, last used by Brindley during contruction of the canal, and to the one we dismantled on the Stour near Cookley to use during restoration of the Avon.
The Romans brought a huge quantity of iron to Worcester, the 150 acre Pitchcroft site, now the city racecourse, was covered in filthy black slag, which Yarranton took up river to resmelt for his shoe and hat buckles, which he tinplated. My Fathers Worcester garden had rockeries made from this spelter which we could crack open and find multi coloured marbles. When we swam in the Teme at Powick, Bransford, and Whitbourne we found iron pigs and pieces of ore at the weir sites. I would love to sponsor an Aqua Club to systematically work up the river to Ludlow as I am sure there are interesting relics to be discovered. The Severn Trent Engineers found things but were very secretive, they didnt want to talk about navigation as they were a universal fishing lobby. The boats being discovered in the Severn Estuary are only the beginning.
The square rigged trows had a large winch for raising the heavy draped yard and this could be used to put a line over the bows to a tree or bollard above the watergate and wind the boat up the water slope. This was standard practice on the Avon until steam boats arrived. Max.
1650’s Watergate at Cookley.
The Blacksmith at Eastham is recorded as working in 1685 and is believed to be much older. His iron was stored in a surviving warehouse now Wychebach House. Elsewhere caves were used, a quite common practice in the sandstone Severn Valley. Max.
