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Welcome to the GAINSBOROUGH ESTATE named after Humphrey Gainsborough (1718-1776), minister, engineer and inventor

AMAN OF MANY TALENTS LOCKS ALONG THE THAMES

Born in Sudbury, Suffolk, in 1718 – and brother of the In 1770 plans were drawn up to build a canal Private collection painter Thomas – Humphrey was Minister of the between Maidenhead and Caversham to Humphrey Gainsborough, painted by his brother Thomas Gainsborough Independent Chapel in Henley from 1749 to 1776. improve navigation and replace the dangerous medieval flash locks, which are DESCRIBED AS… By 1765 his inventive and engineering skills had created shown in the 1698 painting by Jan Siberechts. designs for a drill plough, a tide mill, a water supply However, the canal was never built. “…one of the most ingenious men that ever system and a weighing machine sited outside the lived, and one of the best that ever died. Catherine Wheel. The design for “a machine to carry fish” The Thames Commissioners responded by Perhaps of all the mechanical geniuses this or is his only surviving drawing. appointing Humphrey to oversee the siting any nation has produced, Mr Gainsborough and construction of eight double-gated was the first.” Image courtesy of Gloucestershir County Council. D1245/FF38B

“Mr. Gainsborough of Henley, Oxon…has A design for a machine to carry fish. 1762 pound locks, between Maidenhead and Philip Thicknesse, The Gentleman's Magazine, 1785 made Simplicity and Cheapness the chief objects of his Attention, the most Sonning, including the building of the lock, ordinary Workmen will have skill enough to make it and the most ordinary weir and footbridge at Marsh Lock, upstream Image courtesy of the River and Rowing Museum AN HONOURED CITIZEN from Henley. Henley from the Wargrave Road by Jan Siberechts, 1698 Ploughman have skill enough to use it.” He died unexpectedly on

August 23rd 1776 at Lion Red kite photographs courtesy of Helen Olive. WHITE HILL IMPROVEMENTS ASTEAM ENGINE MYSTERY Meadow, north of Henley Bridge, whilst out 1768 saw one of his most ambitious projects, In 1775 Humphrey built a working model of: collecting tolls from to allow easier road access for “….a steam engine upon a new construction much more useful to the public Hambleden lock. He stagecoaches was buried next to his and wagons to than the common steam engine, by having much greater power and velocity” beloved wife in the Maidenhead Five years earlier, James Watt had patented a design for an engine with a separate condenser, but had cemetery of the and London by struggled to make it commercially viable. Humphrey applied for a patent, certain that his design was very Independent Chapel – and lessening the different from Watt’s, but Watt objected and granting of Humphrey’s patent was delayed. Meetings between the is the only Henley citizen to be hazardous slope honoured with a Blue Plaque. two men were proposed, but the talks likely never happened due to the death of Humphrey’s wife and his own of White Hill. He failing health. Contemporary accounts suggest that an industrial spy could have devised an From the plough to the piston, Humphrey’s passed on details of Humphrey’s design to Watt’s partner. Equally, Humphrey’s ingenious system practical achievements and contribution to the

Image courtesy of the River and Rowing Museum philosophy was always to share his knowledge for the betterment of all. Watt of ropes and town of Henley have never been fully recognised. The Arch at Park Place, near Henley extended his patent and his engine was in full production by November 1776, Perhaps now, we can be justly proud of a pulleys, which within three months of Humphrey’s death. modest and self-effacing genius-whose name CONWAY’S BRIDGE winched earth from should be recognised with those of Newcomen the top of the hill to In 1763, he successfully engineered Conway’s Bridge, A contemporary wrote: and Watt. His life was dedicated to the church, the base. The road known locally as the “Ragged Arches”, at Park Place, his wife, the people of Henley and to the benefit was realigned in “That engine alone would have furnished a fortune to all the between Henley and Wargrave. It was built using of all. 1786, when the new stones from the ruins of Reading Abbey. The bridge is Gainsboroughs and their descendants, had not that Henley Bridge was built. as durable today as it was 250 years ago, despite the unsuspicious, good hearted man (Humphrey Gainsborough) Image courtesy of the River and Rowing Museum Concieved and written by Vivienne Greenwood, Design and Henley photograph by John Loader. increase in volume and weight of traffic. let a cunning design artist see it” James Watt 1736-1819