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An Analysis of the Physical and Economic Factors that Influenced the Building of the Chesterfield and its Subsequent History

By

John Alan Taylor, BA, Dip Ed

Contents

List of Illustrations, p2 Preface, p3

Chapter 1 - THE GEOLOGY OF THE , p11 Chapter 2 - THE LANDFORMS AND DRAINAGE OF THE AREA, p21 Chapter 3 - HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL FACTORS, p25 Chapter 4 - THE CHESTERFIELD CANAL, p29

Conclusion – p44

Appendix 1 - Chesterfield Canal; list of locks and mileages, p46 Appendix 2 - Part of the summit pound on the eastern section of the canal, p47 Appendix 3 - Generalised vertical sections, p48

Acknowledgements, p 52

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Illustrations

A starvationer boat, p3 A cuckoo boat in 1906, p6 Dawn Rose, p6 Figure 1, Course of the canal, p8 First paragraphs of the Act of Parliament authorising the canal, p 8 Figure 2, Section along the Chesterfield Canal, p9 Figure 3, Geological Timescale, Cambrian to present day, p10 Figure 4, Cross-section showing Paleozoic and later rocks at Ingleborough, p12 Figure 5, Relief of the Pennines and the position of the relevant blocks, p14 Figure 6, Rocks of the Pennines and adjacent areas, p15 Figure 7, Cross- section of the Upper and Middle Coal Measures, p17 Figure 8, Anticlines and synclines in the Chesterfield area, p18 Figure 9, Geology along the route of the canal between the Rother Valley and Thorpe Locks, p20 Figure 10, Land forms (principal escarpments) of the area around the route of the canal, p21 Figure 11, The Matlock area, geology and former lead mines, p22 Figure 12, Horizon - Contour Map of the Don Monocline p,23 Figure 13, Geology of the route of the canal through the area, p24 , p24 Figure 14, Sites of the principal coal mines, p30 Figure 15, The principal waterways and towns before 1794, p32 Figure 16, Waterways in the North Midlands area, p33 Figure 17, Canal, and feeder reservoirs, p35 Figure 18, Geology of fig. 16 + key, pp35, 36 Figure 19, Chesterfield Canal, Staveley Region (tramways & ancillary ), p38 Figure 20, The Trade of the Chesterfield Canal, pp39, 40 Figure 21, Profitability of the canal from 1789 onwards, p41 The western and eastern portals of the , p 41 Figure 22, The reservoirs that fed the summit pound, p42 Figure 23, The route of the Chesterfield Canal, p43 Colliery Company's Wharf at Dock Road Worksop 1910, p45

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Preface

As a preliminary to the actual study of the analysis of the physical and economic factors that influenced the building of the Chesterfield canal, it will be useful firstly to outline the relevant parts of the biographies of the engineers that built the canal; secondly to examine the type of narrow boats that used it.

The most famous and senior of the engineers was . He is rightly regarded as the ‘Father of the English Canal system.’ Born in 1716 of a yeoman farmer, he was at a young age apprenticed to become a millwright. He set up business in Leek, and later expanded his work by renting premises in Burslem from the Wedgwood family, with whom he became lifelong friends. Brindley’s first venture into canal building was when the Duke of Bridgewater decided to build a canal from to .

The Duke owned coal mines at Worsley, north of Manchester. These seams which dipped at 30 degrees were accessed by adits at the base of a flooded disused quarry. The coal was brought out along the flooded adits by small narrow boats nicknamed “starvationers”.

A starvationer boat at Worsley Delph

The coal was then offloaded on to carts or packhorses at a wharf in the pool at the base of the quarry. Such a primitive means of transport limited the sale of the coal to the immediate area. Immediately to the south was the growing town of Manchester and so the Duke decided to build a canal to that place in order to widen his market. To this end he appointed his land agent and engineer – - to build this enterprise. Such was Brindley’s fame as an engineer that Gilbert consulted him and Brindley became the consulting engineer. Probably the most impressive 4 feature on this canal was the Barton , which carried the canal over the at an elevation of 39ft (13m).The canal was completed in 1761.

So successful was this canal that the Duke of Bridgewater commissioned Brindley to extend the from Manchester to on the Mersey estuary. This was surveyed by Brindley and commenced in 1762.

The third canal which Brindley surveyed and engineered was the Trent and Mersey. This was commissioned by the master potters of the Stoke area led by Josiah Wedgewood. They needed a canal to carry their fragile wares smoothly and so proposed a canal from the Bridgewater canal to Shardlow on the . Brindley commenced the preliminary survey in 1758, Parliamentary approval was given in 1762 and work started immediately.

Brindley had grand plans for a Grand Cross of canals linking the four great rivers of the realm, the Mersey, the Trent the Thames and the Severn. He surveyed several more canals but he did not live to see his scheme completed. He died in 1772 and his vision was completed by later engineers.

These early canals designed by Brindley determined the pattern of much of the Midlands network in future years. They were designed to be worked by narrow boats with a length of 70ft and a beam of 7ft. This was probably an extension in length of the mine boats at Worsley. These measurements determined the size and design of the locks, with a single upper gate and double mitre lower gates – some 7ft wide and just over 70ft long- and also the which were always made for ‘legging’ to be walked through the tunnel by the boaters laying on their backs or sides, while the horses were led over the top. Thus the tunnels were no more than 8ft wide and about 12ft deep. Bearing in mind the lack of means of excavation in the mid 18th century - pick and shovel and occasionally gunpowder – it is not surprising that Brindley’s canals were designed to follow the contours and so maintain a level course even though this meant a very circuitous route. By this means he avoided embankments and kept cuttings and tunnels to a minimum. This is not to say that he did not shirk when it was necessary to build these features. Whenever it was necessary to change levels he would build a , and indeed when it was essential to ascend or descend a steep slope, as in the Thorpe flight and even more on the Norwood flight on the Chesterfield canal, he used staircase locks. Indeed the Norwood flight westwards down the Magnesian limestone escarpment used a pioneering flight of (4; 3; 3; 3 locks) to take the canal from the Norwood tunnel almost to the floodplain of the river Rother. Where it was essential to create a summit pound, as on the Chesterfield canal, he had a deep cutting made from the Thorpe locks to the Norwood tunnel. Brindley must be credited with building the first tunnels on the canal system. On his third canal, the Trent and Mersey, he needed to dig three tunnels on the northern end to join the canal to the Bridgewater at , and the longest tunnel on that canal at the southern end – the Harecastle. This latter tunnel, started in 1766, took 11 years to complete and was built at the same time as the Norwood, but the latter took only 5 years to construct. It is clear, then, that Brindley was a master surveyor and builder of the early canals. The second engineer connected with the Chesterfield canal was (b.1734 – d.1816). Brindley had married Henshall’s sister Anne in 1765 and Hugh became Brindley’s assistant in surveying the . He had much experience in surveying, having helped to 5 survey the in 1758 and in 1768, with Brindley, surveyed the route of the Staffordshire and Worcester canal. Brindley made him Clerk of Works on the Trent and Mersey. James Brindley died in 1762 and Hugh Henshall became Brindley’s heir, completing the Trent and Mersey, including the three tunnels in May 1777.

Here we come to the third, and perhaps the most important engineer in the Chesterfield canal’s construction, John Varley (1740 to 1806). Born at , Derbyshire, he was trained as a surveyor and surveyed a proposed extension of the Don navigation. Brindley appointed Varley as an assistant surveyor for the Chesterfield canal and together they planned the route of that canal. The Act of Parliament giving permission to build was passed in 1771 and construction began immediately. The following year Brindley died and Varley moved from Clerk of Works to Resident Engineer with Hugh Henshall appointed Chief Engineer in 1774. The Norwood tunnel was started in 1771 under Varley’s supervision, but completed under Henshall’s. It was opened in 1777. The details of its construction are summarised in the pamphlet by Christine Richardson (1).

Other projects undertaken by Varley included being the engineer for the and surveys for the and the Leicester Line.

On a different theme, it is convenient here to describe the narrow boats that plied along the Chesterfield canal and beyond. They were unique in their build, being able to be steered from bow or stern and were equipped with a mast, so they could travel under sail, and sweeps (oars). Although towed by horses throughout their working life – the last commercial barge sailed on the end of the canal in 1956 – the ability to use wind or oars enabled the canal barges to sail on the river Trent from West Stockwith upstream to Gainsborough and to Nottingham, along the canal to Lincoln and along the . The Chesterfield Canal Trust has built a full scale replica – called “Dawn Rose” – which is berthed at Shireoaks Marina. Full details of these barges and the replica can be researched in the Trust’s magazine, ‘The Cuckoo’ (2). These canal boats from a very early date were nicknamed Cuckoo boats and for a full analysis of that curious name refer to the aforesaid magazines (3).

(1) Richardson, Christine; Richlow Books, 2009 (2) The Cuckoo; Summer and Autumn editions, 2015 (3) The Cuckoo; Autumn edition, 2015

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A cuckoo boat in 1906 (Bassetlaw Museum)

Dawn Rose in 2015

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An Analysis of the Physical and Economic Factors that Influenced the Building of the Chesterfield Canal and its Subsequent History

The Chesterfield Canal was built between the years 1771 and 1777, although some sections were in use from 1775. The earliest canals were the Sankey, opened 1757 and the Bridgewater, opened 1761, extended to Runcorn on the Mersey by 1766 and the Trent and Mersey, built from 1766 to 1777. The engineer for the last three canals was James Brindley whom the merchants of Chesterfield engaged to survey the route of the Chesterfield Canal. Therefore the Chesterfield Canal was one of the pioneer canals in the country.

This was a time before the principles of geology had been discovered and therefore their influence on landforms was only partially understood. This is not to say that the people of that time had no concept of the basic topographical features of the landscape. It must be understood that the population of and Wales was very low compared to the present day – only 8.9m in 1801 (1) and most were rural. Indeed the population of Chesterfield in 1801 was only about 4,500. All would have extracted their drinking water from wells and therefore knew about ground water and had a rudimentary knowledge of the water table since the nearer a river or stream one dug the more shallow the well would be. They would also know that water flowed in valleys. The engineers concerned with the canal – James Brindley, John Varley and Hugh Henshall would know the properties of the rocks; that shale was impermeable (the early canals used puddled clay as a lining to prevent leakage), but was easily dug; that sandstone was more porous but usually very hard. They also knew that limestone was also hard but porous and permeable; as a result where it forms uplands there is no or very little surface water, therefore it would be difficult to build a canal over this rock and impossible to use it as a site for a storage reservoir. They would have had little or no knowledge of faults or anticlines and synclines but they did know of the value of the hard rocks of sandstone and limestone as building materials, of the clays in the shales for brick and tile manufacture, of the economic properties of the coal measures – coal for household fuel, ganister for fireclay and the iron deposits for iron ore.

The following sections outline in more detail the geology, landforms and economic factors which influenced the building of the canal.

(1) The census of Gt. Britain 1801

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Figure 1: The course of the Chesterfield Canal

First paragraphs of the 1771 Act of Parliament authorising the construction of the canal

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Figure 2: Sections along the Chesterfield Canal - heights in feet above mean sea level

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Figure 3: The Geological Timescale Key : ma = million years

Note: Read from bottom of page upwards to follow geological events timeline

Major time zones Sub divisions Orogenies Era Cenozoic (65 ma-today) Quaternary(1.8ma-today) Holocene(10,000yrs-today)

Pleistocene (1.8 ma - 10,000 yrs)

Tertiary(65-1.8ma) Pliocene(5.3-1.8ma) Miocene (23.8 - 5.3 ma) II Alpine Oligocene(33.7-23.8ma) Eocene(54.8-33.7ma) Paleocene (65 - 54.8 ma)

Mesozoic (248-65 ma) Cretaceous (144 - 65 ma)

Jurassic (206 - 144 ma)

Triassic (248 - 206 ma)

Paleozoic (543-248 ma) Permian (290 - 248 ma) II Hercynian (Armorican)

Carboniferous(354-290ma) Upper(323-290ma)

Lower(354-323ma)

Devonian/Old Red Sandstone(ORS)(417-354ma) ||Caledonian

Silurian (443 - 417 ma)

Ordovician (490 - 443 ma)

Cambrian(543-490ma)

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CHAPTER ONE

THE GEOLOGY OF THE CHESTERFIELD CANAL

The 46 miles of the canal were built on the eastern flank of the Pennines. Chesterfield is sited on the river Rother which flows northwards over the Middle Coal Measures to its confluence with the river Don at . The western 13 miles of the canal was built on these rocks. 2880 yards of its course were driven through the shales of these coal measures at a depth of 45-50 feet forming the Norwood tunnel. The eastern portal of the Norwood tunnel was built where the overlying Permian rocks outcrop. These overlie the coal measures unconformably and, because the basal beds of the Permian are predominantly limestone and therefore carry no surface water, this limestone protected the underlying coal measures from erosion and therefore the outcrop of these coal measure rocks forms a steep scarp slope facing west, and the Permian measures form a dip slope to the east. The canal traverses this ridge by multiple locks (shown on Figure 2) and then goes through Worksop and Retford on its course to its junction with the river Trent at West Stockwith. The rocks from Worksop to West Stockwith are of Triassic age. Figure 1 shows the course of the canal from Chesterfield to the river Trent. The cross section in Figure 2 shows the relative heights of the course of the canal.

To understand the exact structure of the rocks, the geological history (stratigraphy) needs to be explained. Figure 3 shows the geological succession of the rocks that have determined that history [the solid geology with relevant orogenies (mountain building periods) from the Cambrian to the present day].

The Cambrian, Ordovician and Silurian rocks form the basement platform on which the later rocks were laid. These Lower Palaeozoic rocks were deposited in a primeval sea somewhere in the Southern Hemisphere. At the close of the Silurian, the Caledonian earth movements folded and faulted then into a pronounced mountain range. In the succeeding Devonian – Old Red Sandstone (ORS) - period they were peneplaned (worn down to sea level) and now form the hard intensely folded and faulted rocks that form the base of the Pennines. No evidence of the Devonian/ORS rocks has survived in the Pennine area – obviously worn away before the deposition of later rocks but they form extensive deposits in Scotland.

These Lower Palaeozoic masses form the uplands of North Wales (1), The Lake District (2), the Howgill Fells (3), the Southern Uplands of Scotland (4) and are present as inliers (5) on the south of the Askrigg Massif, immediately north of the Craven Faults in the Pennines where they underlie the Lower Carboniferous Limestones. They can also be seen at the Shap Wells unconformity (6). They have also been proven to lie at depth under the later rocks at Buxton in Derbyshire and at Eakring in (7).

At the close of the Devonian /ORS system the peneplaned massifs of the Caledonian Mountains were submerged under an extensive sea – in this the overlying Carboniferous rocks were laid down. For a detailed, up to date analysis of the Carboniferous and overlying Lower Permian rocks, see Appendix 3, p48. 12

Figure 4: The relationship of the later rocks to the intensely folded Palaeozoic rocks in a cross- section across the Ingleborough district.

NB This is across the Askrigg Block in the north Pennines (Image courtesy BGS)

(1)Regional Geography, North Wales (third edition) HMSO, 1971, London (2)Nothern England, ibid, 1971 (3)Northern England, ibid, 1971 (4)South of Scotland, ibid, 1971 (5)Northern England, op.cit (6)Observed by the author (7)Northern England, op.cit

The Carboniferous System

As we have noted the Chesterfield Canal is sited on the eastern flank of the southern Pennines. Chesterfield itself is built on the junction of the Upper and Middle Coal Measures and the western 13 miles of the canal are built on the Middle Coal Measures – including the Norwood Tunnel.

To understand the geological structure of the rocks over which the canal is constructed, including the layer of rocks underlying the remaining 33 miles of the course of the canal, it is necessary to examine the nature and stratigraphy of these rocks. The table below outlines the nomenclature of the Carboniferous rocks and approximate thicknesses. This classification is based on rock type (lithology)

Division of the Carboniferous System Approximate thicknesses in feet UPPER CARBONIFEROUS Coal measures 5000 Millstone grit 3000 LOWER CARBONIFEROUS Limestones and Yoredale Series 2400

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The Carboniferous deposits are mostly massive limestones – seen at their best in the waterless karst scenery of the White Peak of Derbyshire. The Mllstone Grits are a mudstone (shale) sandstone succession, with often very coarse gritstones and occasional coals. These form the scenery of the Central Pennines. The overlying Coal Measures were deposited conformably, (without a break in deposition) in a widespread sea, which was subsiding irregularly and in which sedimentation kept pace with subsidence.

As the previous section has outlined, the underlying rocks were intensely folded and faulted and form a basal platform – some areas higher than others. The Pennines therefore are underlain by three such blocks. To the north is the Askrigg Block; this extends from the Dent Fault in the north (forms the Tyne Gap) to the Craven Faults in the south (these lie immediately north of the Aire gap). In the central Pennines was a down faulted block where the basal limestones are obscured by Millstone Grits. To the south is the Pennine Block overlain by a cover of Carboniferous limestone – the White Peak. Figure 5 shows the relief of the Pennines and the approximate position of the blocks which form the structure of the Pennines. Figure 6 shows the overall rock outcrops in the north of England.

The early Carboniferous rocks deposited in the clear and shallow seas which covered both the Askrigg and Pennine Blocks were massive limestones. These limestone deposits were bounded by coral reefs at their junction with the deeper waters of the Central Pennine area. In this deeper sea, muds interspersed with thin limestones were deposited.

Later, firstly in the Lower Carboniferous, the land to the north was subjected to uplift, or increased rainfall or both, which led to deltaic sediments being deposited on the limestones of the Askrigg Block - the Yoredale Series - where intermittent subsidence led to successive deposition of limestones, shales, sandstones and occasionally thin coals. Each repetitive deposition is known as a cyclothem. This continued deposition of cyclothems continued throughout the later Upper Carboniferous times causing the deposition of Millstone Grits and subsequent Coal Measures. Both these deposits form the Upper Carboniferous Series. The Yoredale Series was not deposited south of the Askrigg Block.

The Pennine limestones were also intruded by basic igneous rocks, mainly near Buxton and Matlock. This probably represents the dying phases of the Caledonian Orogeny. The hydrothermal phase of these intrusions of this igneous activity deposited lead and zinc ores, fluorspar (Blue John) and barites. Blue John has been intensively worked for jewellery in the Castleton area. The important mineral is, however, galena (PBS, lead ore). This was worked by the Romans and infrequently ever since. Surface deposits have long since been worked out but, by the 18th Century, deeper mines were still producing lead in the Matlock area – only 10 miles from Chesterfield. These lead deposits were very important in the development of Chesterfield’s trade, as will be outlined in Chapter 4. Figure 11 shows a map of the mines.

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Figure 5: The Relief of the Pennines and the position of the relevant blocks

Image courtesy BGS. Crown copyright Ordnance Survey. All rights reserved.

Probable boundaries of basal paleozoic blocks. A = Askrigg Block B = Middle Pennine Block C = Pennine Block 15

Figure 6: The rocks of the Pennines and adjacent areas

Image courtesy BGS. Crown copyright Ordnance Survey. All rights reserved. 16

The Millstone Grits represent more rapid cyclothem deposition with massive coarse sandstones. They must have covered the Yoredales of the north but as a result of erosion only vestiges remain, the summits of the high peaks of the Dales – Pen-y-ghent, Ingleborough and Great Whernside. The Millstone Grit deltas, however, filled the deep sea of the Central Pennines – successive grits from north to south were the Pendle Grit, the Middle Grit, the Todmorden Grit and finally the Kinderscout Grit – this last forms the highest upland of the Dark Peak at 2088ft and lies just to the west of .

The Kinderscout Grit and later grits such as the Chatsworth Grit and the later Rough Rock successively infilled the shallow seas of the Pennine Block to the south of the Central Pennine block.

Thus the Kinderscout and later grits, e.g. the Chatsworth and Rough Rock, covered the limestones of the White Peak but due to uplift in the succeeding Hercynian Orogeny they, like the succeeding Coal Measures have been eroded from the summit of the High Peak so revealing the underlying limestone, but they outcrop to the east and west of the White Peak area. The significance of the Chatsworth Grit lies in its use as a source of millstones and also grindstones for the edge tool industry of Sheffield and surrounding area. The rise of these industries in Sheffield in part determines the route of the Chesterfield Canal.

The overlying Coal Measures succeeded the Millstone Grit conformably and carry on the pattern of cyclic deltaic deposition. The Lower Coal Measures, however, differ from the underlying Millstone Grits although in having many sandstones, these are finer and have more coals, of which the most important is the Gate seam.

These are succeeded by the Middle Coal Measures where deltaic sedimentation caused the deltas to break the surface of the sea and massive coal measure forests flourished, formed of tree ferns. The underlying soils form Seaterths, often valuable sources of ganister and - favoured by non- oxidising conditions - the plant debris from the forests accumulated to a great depth, until renewed subsidence caused a new cyclothem to begin. The submerged forests were compressed to form coal. The continued subsidence and build up of cyclothem meant that 3000 - 4000 feet of coal measures formed with many workable coals. For a detailed, up to date analysis of the Carboniferous and overlying Lower Permian rocks, see Appendix 3, p48.

A map of the geology of the Pennines and adjacent area is shown in Figure 6. Figure 7 shows a cross- section of the Upper and Middle Coal Measures in the Chesterfield Area.

The coals vary between 2ft and 6ft in thickness and are classified as bituminous with volatiles – varying from 30% to 40%; occasional cannel coals have volatiles of over 50%, very useful in gas production. Some of the seat earths are valuable sources of ganister for fire clay, and there are bands of ironstone (siderite), the most important of which was the Tankersley seam (1) which outcropped north of Chesterfield from Rotherham to Wakefield. The iron industry was not confined to Sheffield alone. Rotherham, Deepcar, Stocksbridge and to the south, Staveley and Renishaw on the line of the canal, also had forges.

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Figure 7: Cross- section of the Upper and Middle Coal Measures in the Chesterfield Area

(Image courtesy of the BGS)

Key to coal seams, from lowest upwards: 1. P = Park Gate 2. SW = Swallow Wood 3. B = Barnsley 4. HH = High Hazels 5. TF = Two-Foot 6. C = Clowne

The Upper Coal Measures are not considered here because, in the neighbourhood of the canal, they are overlain by later rocks and play no part in the construction of the canal.

At the close of Coal Measure deposition circa 280m years ago there occurred another major orogony – the Hercynian or Armorican – where pressure from the south intensely folded all the rocks in southern England and central Europe. However, the stable platform of rocks in the Southern Pennines was only uplifted, tilted and faulted. The tilt of the Pennine Massif was very marked in the west where the Limestones, Millstone Grits and Coal Measures dip below the geosynclines of the plain and Lowlands at a dip of 30°. The dip to the east was much less and averages about 5° (see fig.7 above). All these and later rocks dip at this angle below the North Sea. This was not the only contortion of the Carboniferous rocks however; the southward pressure compressed these sedimentary rocks into a series of NW – SE anticlines and synclines – only slightly on the Carboniferous limestone, but very severely on the Coal Measures. Hence, around the Chesterfield area, these became a series of anticlines and synclines with associated faults. The main flexures are shown in Figure 8 below.

(1) It was worked by bell pits in the 17th and 18th Centuries, visible remains of which as heaps of sediment from the former bell pits were present until the 1960s when the NCB destroyed them by open cast mining for coal.

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Figure 8: Anticlines and synclines in the Chesterfield area

Image courtesy BGS. Crown copyright Ordnance Survey. All rights reserved. Horizon–contour map of Coal Measures Contours in metres; those above sea-level with positive sign. Yellow line indicates the line of the Spa Fault – outlined because of its importance in determining the course of the canal. See below.

The effect of this folding was to cause the outcrop of the coal seams to be frequently repeated. The topographical effect of the folding gave rise to extremely marked cuesta-vale topography. The way in which the canal engineers adapted to this is described later in Chapter 4.

As we have explained the effect of the Hercynian uplift was to uplift the Pennines. These were eventually peneplaned so revealing the limestones of the Pennine dome, the millstone grits on the flanks and the coal measures on the flanks of the millstone grits until they dip beneath the succeeding Permian rocks.

One very important effect of the Hercynian Orogeny was the forming of some very deep faults. Most had very little effect on the overlying Permian rocks but one major fault between Chesterfield and Worksop - the Spa fault - formed in the Caledonian Orogeny, reactivated in the Hercynian Orogeny and reactivated again in the Alpine Orogeny, has had a profound effect on the course of the canal. The movement in the Alpine Orogeny affected not only the Coal Measures but also the overlying Permian Series - the only fault in the area to do this. As a result of the downthrow side of this fault being to the north, the peneplanation of the rocks – in the Alpine Orogeny - caused the southern limb of the Magnesian Limestone to be eroded further eastwards than the northern limb, so offsetting the outcrop of this rock. This can be clearly seen on the geological map of the canal route on Figure 9. Therefore the outcrop of the impermeable Middle Permian Marls is only about one mile from the outcrop of the Middle Coal Measure shales. This was the obvious line to build the canal, but how John Varley cleverly utilised this fortunate geological accident is explained in Section 4.

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The Permian Rocks

The lowest Permian rocks are the Magnesian Limestone Series deposited 260m – 220m years ago. These represent the western margin of a tropical sea – the Zechstein Sea – which extended to the middle of present day Europe. It can be clearly seen as a pronounced ridge east of the Rother Valley and the limestone rocks cap that ridge. The Magnesian Limestone was deposited on the edge of the Zechstein Sea and thins toward the west where the shoreline deposits would have been about 5 - 6 miles west of the present-day outcrop. The deposits show the characteristics of such a shoreline. The basal deposits are intermittent outcrops of Permian Sands and Permian Marls. The sands would have represented beach deposits and the nature of the sand grains show that the land would have been a desert. The marls represent shallow estuarine deposits and consist of calcareous sands with abundant fossils. The overlying limestones were deposited in shallow shelf seas and are sometimes massive as at (1) where they were worked for the rebuilding of the Houses of Parliament from 1834, elsewhere they are formed from stromatolite reefs (2). Evidence of these can be seen at Maltby Crags, South Elmsall Quarry, Hooton Pagnell – all north of the Don. This sea was an inland sea evidenced by the amount of chemical precipitation; most of the limestone is dolomite – a double carbonate of magnesium and calcite CaMg(CO3)2. Elsewhere there are deposits of salt and gypsum. This thinning of the limestones to the west favoured the engineers of the canal in their construction of the summit pound; this will be explained in the section on the construction of the canal in Chapter 4. The Magnesian Limestones are succeeded by the Middle Permian Marls to the north but these merge into the Upper Permian Marls almost on the line of the canal. This is because the Upper Magnesian Limestone dies out just north of Worksop, at Wallingwells (3). These marls are easily eroded and formed lowlands which are impermeable and were no impediment to the route of the canal. For a detailed, up to date analysis of the Carboniferous and overlying Lower Permian rocks, see Appendix 3, p48.

(1) Used for building the Houses of Parliament. For further information on this see, ‘Yorkshire Stone to London’ by Christine Richardson (published by Richlow Histories, 1st ed 2007) (2) Stromatolites are single-celled organisms dating back to the origin of life on earth, 3.5 billion years ago. (3) These outcrops are shown on the maps on Figure 9 and Figure 12. There are two beds of Magnesian Limestone – Lower and Upper representing a partial retreat of the Zechstein Sea and its subsequent readvance. Its second shoreline only reached as far as Wallingwells.

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The Permian are succeeded by the Triassic at Shireoaks, the basal beds are the Lower Mottled Sandstones followed by the Bunter Pebble Beds. These were deposited in deserts and show evidence of dune bedding. The Pebble Beds are very thick and form a marked escarpment at Worksop but presented no obstacle to the canal builders because the flows through the Pebble Beds in a marked water gap. The Bunter Pebble Beds form undulating country, but the canal follows the course of the river until it reaches Ranby. From Ranby eastwards the rocks of the Keuper Series overlie the Bunter Beds conformably. These like the underlying Triassic rocks were deposited under desert conditions and consist of sandstones and marls. Only the Keuper Marl forms a marked escarpment, but, as the river Trent is approached, the country is low-lying and the solid rocks are much overlain by recent deposits; alluvium, river terrace deposits and fluvioglacial sands and gravels. Oddly enough it is an isolated outcrop of Bunter Pebble Beds that necessitated the building of the short Drakeholes Tunnel to enable the canal to go eastwards to West Stockwith on the Trent.

Figure 9: The Geology along the route of the canal between the Rother Valley and Thorpe Locks

Based on the Geological Survey Sheet 100, Sheffield. 21

CHAPTER 2

THE LANDFORMS AND DRAINAGE OF THE AREA

The solid geology has a strong influence on both landforms and drainage of the area which can be seen from Figure 10 below.

Figure 10: The Land forms (principal escarpments) of the area around the route of the canal

A = Derwent Valley drainage area B = Don Valley drainage area C = Trent Valley drainage area

Fig 10 shows that the area under consideration is drained by three major rivers; the Derwent, Area A, the Don and its tributaries - Area B, and the Trent – Area C. The Derwent (Area A) to the west rises on the Millstone Grit of the Middle Pennines to the north and flows southwards in a deep valley between the Carboniferous Limestone of the White Peak and Millstone Grit. The 22

Carboniferous Limestone and associated igneous intrusions forms the western side of the valley (in the Matlock area) and the Millstone Grit sandstone cuestas form the eastern side. The drainage of the Derwent does not impinge upon the area through which the canal was built but its erosive powers have revealed the igneous intrusions which has made possible the mining of galena (PBS) – lead ore. Figure 11 shows the site of the former mines. Most of these mines were worked during the working life of the canal.

Figure 11: The Matlock area, geology and former lead mines (white circles)

Blue = Carboniferous Limestone; red = Igneous intrusions; green = Millstone Grit; O = Lead Mine 23

As shown by Figure 10, the north and centre of the area (B) is drained by the river Don and its tributaries. The Don rises on the Millstone Grit country to the north then flows south east and is joined by the tributaries of the Loxley, Rivelin, Porter and Sheaf. The Sheaf joins the Don in Sheffield and the Don changes course to flow north east along the line of weakness caused by the Don monocline (a major downfold and faulted area of the Coal Measures, see Figure 12 below). The Don ultimately flows over newer rocks into the .

Figure 12: Horizon - Contour Map of the Don Monocline (Courtesy BGS)

The Rother, along with its tributary the Doe Lea, are the most important tributaries from the Coal Measures from the south flowing north to join the Don at Rotherham. The drainage of the Rother and its tributaries are separated from the easternmost rivers by the escarpment (cuesta) formed by the Coal Measures capped by the Permian limestones. This line of hills, usually called the magnesian limestone escarpment, is in fact due to this rock forming a thin capping on the Coal Measures. Magnesian limestone is the basal rock of the Permian Series and is soluble in ground water therefore carries no surface water. It forms Karst landscape; water escapes through caves dissolved from the rock e.g. the Cresswell caves. Such a surface protects the softer insoluble Coal Measures beneath and thus forms the escarpment to the east.

Two small streams flow through the Magnesian Limestone (the Maltby Dyke and the Anston Brook) but they rise in the Coal Measures to the east and flow in deep gorges through the limestone for much of their courses, flowing over the impermeable rocks which lie beneath the limestone. The easternmost rivers - the Maltby Dyke which joins the , the Anston Brook which joins the river Ryton to the south, and the rivers Maun and Poulter which both flow eastwards - all these rivers join the river Trent, as shown on Figure 5 (Area C in the map). Other than the river Trent, which was one of the main navigable arteries in England, only the lower Idle had been made navigable (see Chapter 3).

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Figure 13: The geology of the route of the canal through the Worksop area

LMS D

Worksop

Key: Orange Line = Canal D = Drift LMS Yellow = Bunter Sandstone LMS = Lower mottled Sandstone Blue = Upper Magnesian Lime Red = Permian Marl Blue = Lower Magnesian Lime

West Stockwith, where the canal meets the river Trent 25

CHAPTER THREE

HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL FACTORS

At least as important in the growth and development of the towns and economy of the area is the influence of historical, economic and political factors; and therefore human decisions are as important as physical factors in the development of the geography of the region. Therefore the decision to build the canal was as much influenced by economic and political factors as the physical factors so far described. In the late 16th to 17th centuries, England was still a dominantly agricultural country – over 90% of the population was engaged in this occupation – but, during the reign of Elizabeth I and later Stuart times, increased prosperity saw the development of trade and industry. This is particularly marked in the rise of the iron and steel industry in our area.

Early Industrial Development

The industrial area of which Sheffield is the centre extended from Penistone and Barnsley to the north, Doncaster to the east and included the limestone area of the High Peak to the west, and the area around Chesterfield to the south. Its early industry was developed on local mineral resources, iron from the coal measures, ganister from Seatearth for fireclay, lead from veins in the Carboniferous limestone to the west, limestone from the Permian beds to the east, clay from the coal measure shales and other Permian clays for bricks and tiles, sandstones for millstones and grind stones, sandstones and limestone for local building materials and of course coal itself.

Since, however, in late medieval and early industrial times there were few means of using coal in industry and no means of carrying it cheaply any distance, its use was restricted to the immediate local area of mining – smiths, lime-burners and especially domestic use. The output of these enterprises was very small and their markets would have been local. Even in an area where wood was plentiful, coal was cheaper; certainly in the early 16th century Leland records that “betwixt Cawood and Rotherham be good plenti of wood, yet the people there burn much yerth coal by cawse hit is plentifully found there, and sold good chepe”. Nef, in his book ‘Rise of the British Coal Industry’, records that by 1657 there were at least 24 pits working in north Derbyshire, of which there were four at Walton, three at Barlow, two each at Dromfield and Eckington and one at Tapton, yet the coal would have been used locally because of the lack of water transport to a navigable river.

The Don Valley area centred on Sheffield was ideally suited for iron and steel manufacture because here the coal measures contained seams of iron ore (the Tankersley ore) and ganister (for fireclay) and using the abundant wood for charcoal, iron could be smelted by the cementation process. The high hills 800 - 1000ft to the west of Sheffield provided winds to facilitate a draught for the furnaces. After 1700, the use of bellows enabled the furnaces to be located in the valley bottoms. The availability of the steep valleys of the tributaries to the west with frequent rapids enabled the provision of hammer-ponds to provide powerful water wheels to work trip hammers and grindstones. The millstone grit measures to the west of Sheffield provided a ready source of 26 grindstones (especially the Chatsworth grits) which enabled the Sheffield area to become a centre of the edge tool industry, including cutlery.

The products of this industry were sold nationally and internationally by transporting them overland (20 miles) to the river port of thence via the Trent and Humber to Hull. This trade through Bawtry was a 17th Century development. Cornelius Vermuyden, the famous Dutch engineer was engaged in 1626 to drain the marshy lowlands between Doncaster and the Humber. During this enterprise he canalised the river Don to Doncaster and he diverted the river Idle into the Trent at West Stockwith. (For full account see A.W Godfellow in ‘Sheffield and its Region’ B.A, 1956, p104.)

Leland, in the early 16th century, spoke of Bawtry only as “a bare and poor market town” but Thoresby (Diary, April 7 1683) wrote of the place as “famous for millstones and pigs of lead, hence transported beyond seas.” By then, Sheffield imported iron ore from Sweden through Bawtry in order that it could make high quality steel. Further evidence of the importance of Bawtry in the early eighteenth century is given by Daniel Defoe in his ‘Account of a Tour Through England’ published in 1726;

“This town of Bawtry becomes the Center of all the Exportation of this Part of the Country, especially for heavy Goods which they bring down hither from all the adjacent Countries, such as lead ,from the Lead Mines and Smelting-Houses in Derbyshire, wrought Iron and Edge-Tools of all Sorts, from the Forges at Sheffield, and from the Country call’d Hallamshire, being adjacent to the Towns of Sheffield and Rotherham, where an innumerable Number of People are employed .... Also Millstones and Grindstones, in very great Quantities, are brought down and shipped off here, and so carry’d by Sea to Hull, and to London, and even to Holland also. This makes Bawtry Wharf be famous all over the South Part of the (author’s note - and he could have added North Derbyshire), for it is the Place whether all their heavy Goods are carried, to be embarked and shipped off.”

The iron industry was also important in North Derbyshire by the mid-16th century. In 1657 there were 19 iron works of different kinds in the “Hundred of Scarsdale” - furnaces, forges, smelting houses and slitting mills (1).

Lead had been mined in the limestones of the High Peak since Roman times and was mined intermittently throughout the middle ages. Initially it was traded through to the Trent, but by the late 17th Century, Chesterfield had become the dominant trading centre, sending it by pack horse through Worksop, Blythe or Retford to Bawtry for export via the Trent. Evidence of this dominance is in a petition of the mayor and burgesses of Hull to Queen Elizabeth I in 1695 (2).

(1) Holmsfield, Dore and Totley had three smelting houses each, there was one at Norton; there were three furnaces and forges at Stavely and Wingerworth and a slitting mill at Eckington. From ‘The History of Trade and Transport on the River Trent’ by A.C. Wood. (2) The petitioners asserted that certain London merchants had bought up all the lead in Derbyshire and set up a weighing apparatus at Bawtry. There, the lead was weighed instead of at 27

Hull, and then was shipped directly down the Idle, Trent and Humber to London thus defrauding the merchants of Hull of their duties. This lead must have been sent from Chesterfield to Bawtry.

Thus, the late 17th and 18th centuries saw the beginning of the with improvements in iron and steel manufacture and also in the smelting of lead by the adoption of the Cupola System (3). Therefore trade increased with which the inadequate road system could not cope. As a result of this appalling state of the roads (4), the turnpike movement began to improve roads and levied tolls to maintain the carriageways. Fast travel on these roads was not possible until McAdam’s invention of road surfacing in the 19th century. The increasing importance of the necessity for trade led to two major developments in the late 17th and early 18th centuries both concerned with the traditional transport of goods by water; first was the improvement of the rivers and, after 1750, the building of canals. In our area the Trent had always been navigable to Nottingham and during the 18th Century was made navigable to Burton (see Wood op cit). The Don had been made navigable from Doncaster to the Aire at Goole in 1626 by Cornelius Vermuyden who also made the lower Idle navigable.

In 1696 the Company of Cutlers in Hallamshire (founded in 1624) petitioned parliament for a bill to make the Don navigable from Tinsley (E. Sheffield) to Doncaster. Although there was considerable opposition, not least from those with interests in the Bawtry trade, this act was passed in 1726. A canal made the Don navigable from Tinsley to the navigable Don at Doncaster by 1732. From thenceforward all the Don Valley/Bawtry trade was sent by this waterway (5).

The other river to be canalised at this period was the Derwent, there were numerous petitions to make that waterway navigable from 1664 onwards (6). All these attempts produced numerous petitions both for and against, but for our purposes the most significant was that presented by Nottingham, Mansfield, Southwell, East Retford, Blythe, Stockwith, the inhabitants of the hundred of Bassetlaw, from Bawtry and from Chesterfield.

(3) About 1750 the Cupola was introduced – an improved method of smelting - where the fuel did not come into contact with the lead ore. (4) The very poor condition of the roads is summarized by Arthur Young who, writing of the road from Sheffield to Rotherham thence to Doncaster, said that it was, “Extrebly bad, very stony and full of holes”. It suffered as did all roads at that time from inefficient methods of maintenance – ruts were just filled with earth which bad weather, heavy traffic washed away and reduced the road to a state in which it became impassable or, where passable, meant that traffic was slow difficult and dangerous. (5) The cutlers company’s obligations were ‘for making the River Dun navigable from Holmstile in Doncaster up to the upmost extent of Tinsley westwards, for levying rates and duties and for keeping in repair the highway from Sheffield to Tinsley. (6) The petitions were introduced in 1664, 1675, 1676, 1695, 1698, 1702 and an act was finally passed in 1719. See Wood Op.Cit. p14.

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Most of the lead from Chesterfield went, at this period, by land transport through Worksop, East Retford or Blythe to Bawtry from where it was shipped down the Idle to West Stockwith and from there along the Trent and Humber to Hull. They feared the destruction of the lead trade because they not only used the lead themselves, they also sent agricultural produce back to Chesterfield. This is one of the first indications of the reciprocal trade between Chesterfield and Worksop and Retford.

It was probably with a view to countering the results of the Derwent scheme and safe-guarding the interest of those places engaged in the overland transport of lead from Chesterfield that an Act of Parliament was secured in the same year as the Derwent Act (1719) to extend the navigation of the river Idle from Bawtry to East Retford. The corporation of Retford had power to construct all necessary dams, locks, weirs and bridges but no works were commenced.

Once it was in operation, the Chesterfield canal abolished the laborious and costly land carriage to the Humber, and reduced transport costs to one-fifth of what they had formerly been. By 1785 the canal was carrying over 50,000 tons of goods per annum (7). Both Worksop and East Retford grew rapidly as a result of the trade between them and Chesterfield and West Stockwith. Chesterfield benefitted from the trade in agricultural produce, the towns and villages to the east from the easy access to coal and iron products. On the other hand the river Idle from Bawtry to West Stockwith was by-passed and its trade rapidly declined. By 1813 its trade was only a fraction of what it had formerly been (8). By 1832 there were only two boat owners in the town and the Idle was only used by small craft bringing up coal or groceries from West Stockwith or Gainsborough.

(7) Ashton, T.S ‘Iron and Steel in the Industrial Revolution’, p139. (8) Peck W, ‘Bawtry and C Thorne’ (1813) p10.

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CHAPTER FOUR

THE CHESTERFIELD CANAL

The previous Chapters have outlined firstly the physical background of the area, both the overall region and the landscape over which the canal was built. The Geology showed the nature and the structure of the rocks, their influence on the landscape, and their economic value; this last factor is essential in explaining the development of the early industry. Chapter 3 briefly outlined the early history of the region in order to outline the cultural background and to explain some of the political and economic factors that influenced the development of trade and industry in the region.

From the early 18th century the metal industries for the Don Valley area grew rapidly, helped by major inventions. In 1743 Joseph Huntsman introduced the crucible process for making steel (1). For the first time the iron could be separated from the use of charcoal in the process and the crucibles could be heated by coal. Another invention at this time was the manufacture of Sheffield Plate in 1743. Thomas Bolsover, a cutler, invented a process where silver could be bonded with copper and be rolled so that the metals would form a two or three-ply sheet of which only the outer side or sides consisted of silver. This made possible the manufacture of elaborate tableware such as candlesticks, jugs tea and coffee-pots much more cheaply than solid silver. Industries developed rapidly in the Don valley, notably the Walker brothers in Rotherham and in Sheffield several firms were making Sheffield plate and in the late 18th century, Britannia Metal, a pewter- based alloy similar in appearance to silver, was also invented in the town. In 1773 Sheffield was given a silver assay office.

Towards the middle of the eighteenth century it became obvious to the merchants of Chesterfield that they needed the cheap waterway travel to facilitate their trade. The most obvious route was to make a canal along the River Rother to the Don navigation at Rotherham.

However there were several disadvantages to such a scheme. The main raw material in the Chesterfield area was coal, a bulky, heavy commodity only economically transported by barge. Nobody in the Don Valley area would want this fuel because the Don Valley area, as we have seen, is sited on the same coalfield, nor would the iron products of North Derbyshire be saleable in the Sheffield area (see quote by Leland p25). The products that the Chesterfield area produced were needed in the towns of North Nottinghamshire to the east of North Derbyshire.

(1) See G.P. Jones, chapter 9, Industrial Evolution p157 et seq, Sheffield and its Region, B.A. Sheffield 1956, for a full description of this invention.

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In return, the Chesterfield area needed agricultural produce, especially grain and malt since the Millstone Grits and Lower Coal Measures to the west of Chesterfield were high, relatively barren moorlands, suitable only for sheep and the coal measures themselves were dominantly best used for cattle grazing. But the Don valley had the same type of agriculture. Moreover, any barges navigating such a Rother valley waterway would not only have to pay tolls on that waterway but also have to pay tolls to navigate the Don Valley canal and canalised river to Goole – these tolls would no doubt be exorbitant because they would be set by the merchants of Sheffield.

As we have seen in the previous Chapter, there had been a strong reciprocal trade with the towns to the east of Chesterfield based on the export of lead through Bawtry. This was an overland trade to the River Idle, then by ship to the rest of England and abroad. In return the Nottinghamshire merchants supplied North Derbyshire with agricultural produce, especially wheat and barley. However, what the Nottinghamshire towns and settlements needed was exactly what the Derbyshire area could supply - coal for fuel and to work the new steam engines. Figure 13 shows the sites of the principal coal mines on the line of the canal sunk from 1770 to 1902. In addition Chesterfield could supply iron wares and lead for plumbing in the newly built prosperous merchants’ houses. This trading rapport had been established since the sixteenth century (see note 2, p26) and was well established by the late 17th century as noted in the protest of these towns (see p27) to the proposed act to canalise the Derwent. Therefore it was an obvious move for the three towns of Chesterfield, Worksop and Retford to agree to build a water link between themselves and the river Trent. Figure 14 shows a map of the principal waterways together with main towns and villages mentioned in the text.

Figure 14: The sites of the principal coal mines on the line of the canal sunk from 1770 to 1902

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As we have seen though, Retford had made the preliminary move, gaining permission from Parliament to canalise the River Idle from that town to Bawtry in 1719, but had never proceeded with that scheme. It was natural, therefore, that the first proposal for the route of the canal should be to take it from Retford along the Idle to Bawtry, thence along the navigable stretch of the Idle to that river’s junction with the Trent at West Stockwith. Several problems decided Brindley against such a proposal. Firstly the river Idle was not easy to make navigable, it would be much cheaper to build a canal along the floodplain and neighbouring lowlands; secondly, the navigable section of the Idle was under the control of the owners of that waterway and they would demand tolls for its use; thirdly, the existing basin at West Stockwith was deemed to be too small for the new canal; fourthly, the influence of the Rev Seth Ellis Stevenson, the Headmaster of Retford Grammar School in the 1760s and 1770s. For his part in securing the route of the canal through Retford; see the article by Christine Richardson in the Chesterfield Canal Trust’s magazine (2).

Therefore Brindley decided that the route of the canal would follow the course of the river Idle from Retford passing by the villages of Welham, , Hayton, and Wiseton before turning due east at Drakeholes. Here a narrow ridge of Bunter Pebble Beds impeded progress so a 134 yard tunnel was built. From here the canal follows the contours round the prominent hill of Gringley-on-the-Hill, past Walkeringham through Misson to West Stockwith, only yards from the mouth of the (then) navigable river Idle.

Nevertheless the Retford merchants still wanted to influence the canal and requested that it be broad beam width. Though Brindley’s canals had always been for narrow boats, it was agreed that the canal should be a broad canal, but to Retford only and the expense of the wider canal should be met by the merchants of Retford. The remainder of the canal was to be for narrow boats only.

The reason for this decision was probably partly due to Brindley’s own preference for narrow boat canals, but also due to the problem of providing water for the many locks that were needed to traverse the upland that lay between Worksop and Chesterfield (see fig.2), and the difficulty of making reservoirs on a ridge capped dominantly by Magnesian Limestone.

(2) Explained in detail by Christine Richardson in ‘The Cuckoo’, Autumn 2015, p14.

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Figure 15: The principal waterways and towns in the area before 1794

The exact route of the canal

At the junction of the canal with the river Trent, Brindley designed a large basin capable of holding sea-going vessels, these were large sloops, sailing ships that could navigate the Trent, the Humber and the North Sea and could sail to the Continent. They had their own wharf and , opposite was a wharf for the canal boats and their warehouse. Goods from the canal boats were offloaded in this basin and transhipped to the sea-going sloops. The basin and immediate environs also had ship repair facilities and boat-building yards. The basin was also a port of call for passenger carrying craft on the Trent and a ferry port to . The basin was easily constructed since it was excavated from the alluvial deposits of the Trent. The line of the canal was taken inland mostly on the river terraces and marls of the Keuper Series. The details of the course to Retford are outlined in the previous paragraph. For a full list of the locks on the canal see Appendix 1.

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Figure 16: Waterways in the North Midlands area, including the Chesterfield Canal together with principal industries

Key: ------= route of the Chesterfield Canal – Chesterfield, Worksop, Retford, and West Stockwith, from ‘The History of Trade and Transport on the River Trent’ by A.C. Wood.

The penultimate lock before Retford town (Whitsunday Pie Lock) was the last of the broad beam locks. In Retford the canal crosses the river Idle by three aqueducts, two small and one larger. The canal then turns westwards to traverse the interfluve between Retford and Ranby where it follows a low gap in the Bunter Pebble Beds (less than 100 ft. above sea level) for about one mile until its course is traced onto the first terrace of the River Ryton. The canal follows a sinuous course after Ranby as it has been excavated along the contour. Just after Worksop is Morse lock (1). After this lock a subsidiary canal – the Lady Lee Arm – was built in 1778 some three quarters of a mile to a limestone quarry (this waterway is now in-filled). Between Morse lock and the aqueduct over the River Ryton, there are eight locks as the canal begins its rise along the outcrop of the Middle Permian Marls and passes through the of Shireoaks. From here the canal ascends the dip slope of the upland capped by the Lower Magnesian Limestone.

(1) By 1960, this was the head of navigation until restoration began in 1995.

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It is here that the basic geological skills of the early canal engineers (possibly John Varley since James Brindley died in 1772), are shown to the full. Here the canal follows the line of the Spa fault; the effect of which has been explained in the Chapter on the geology of the area (1). The effect of the Spa fault is to enable the canal to be built over the Middle Permian Marls to the summit pound. The canal rises to this pound by two pioneering flights of locks - the Turnerwood and the Thorpe flights. The Turnerwood flight consists of seven locks and has a feeder channel from the river Ryton below lock 38 (hence called Feeder Lock). The Thorpe flight has fifteen locks in just over half a mile including four staircase sets, two double and two treble; these were some of first such locks on the canal system.

The topmost lock on the Thorpe flight is the last before the summit pound. This is four miles long and includes the Norwood Tunnel which is 2,880 yards long, one of the longest canal tunnels at the time of building (2). The canal passes from the Thorpe locks in a deep cutting, following the line of the Spa fault and its route, therefore, would follow the outcrop of the Middle Permian Marls except for a very short one mile stretch before Dog Kennel Bridge. Here the geological map shows the canal to pass over the limestone but because the limestone was deposited on the margin of Zechstein Sea and thins westwards, it is probable that the deep cutting of the summit pound would reach the base of the limestone and therefore be on impermeable rock. At Dog Kennel Bridge, no. 31, the canal passes on to Coal Measure shales, and a mile beyond the bridge the land rises to form a low plateau and it was through this that the Norwood tunnel was dug. This feature saved water as, being underground, there was no evaporation and it was fed by groundwater. The eastern part of the pound, some 600 yards from the eastern portal of the tunnel, was fed by a feeder from a large reservoir at Harthill, also sited on the Coal Measure shales.

The history of the building of the Norwood tunnel has been more than adequately described by Christine Richardson in her booklet “Norwood Tunnel; four centuries of challenge” (3). Here it is sufficient to summarise the main details of the project. Work began as soon as the Act was passed in 1771. The low plateau through which the tunnel was driven was, as the geological map on Figure 18 below shows, almost entirely formed from Middle Coal Measure shales (if the map is entirely accurate, wholly shales). It interesting to speculate how Brindley and Varley might have realised that this relatively soft rock would have formed this physical feature in a time when there were no geological maps. Firstly the land was almost level – some 300 feet high. Any outcrops of harder rocks would have caused higher land. Secondly the fields would have held standing water in wet weather, so indicating an impermeable surface. Thirdly as the geological map extract, Figure 18, shows two coal seams, now known as Wales 1 and 2, outcrop near the western portal of the tunnel. These might well have been known to the local miners who worked at pit adjacent to that portal. Both the engineers and the miners would have known that these seams would be both over and underlain by shale.

(1) See Chapter 1, page 18 and Figure 10 of The Geology of the area between Chesterfield and Worksop. (2) The other tunnel of almost equal length was the Harecastle, also built by Brindley. (3) Richardson, Christine, Richlow Books, 2009.

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Comparative maps of the line of the canal and its underlying geology. Figure 17: Canal, tunnel and feeder reservoirs

Orange line shows the original line of the canal. Norwood Tunnel is dashed line

Figure 18: The geology

Both maps courtesy BGS. Crown copyright Ordnance Survey. All rights reserved. Grey on the coal measures indicates shales. 36

Key to the geological map above (Courtesy BGS)

Work on the tunnel began in November 1771 and by then preliminary agreements had been made with the local coal owner – probably the Killamarsh colliery - which would explain why the Norwood (western) end was started almost at the same time as the eastern end. The clay for the bricks was extracted from the building of the storage reservoir at Pebley. The lime for the mortar would have been made from the Magnesian Limestone. The eastern part of the tunnel would have been started possibly earlier because the summit pound from the Thorpe locks would be excavated first to provide the line of the tunnel. There was a quarry excavated just before Dog Kennel bridge with a wharf on the canal which would provide the stone for the portals and possibly to line parts of the canal. This eastern part of the canal would also have had the workshops needed to dress the stone and build the temporary wooden arches necessary in the 37 construction of the tunnel (see Appendix 2 for a nineteenth century map of this section of the canal). The tunnel was built by sinking bell-pits about 100 yards apart to the depth required and from the base of which an adit would be excavated forming the line of the tunnel which was lined with bricks. By 1772 there were 15 brick kilns above the tunnel manufacturing bricks by hand. As soon as a section was built, narrow boats would be used to transport bricks to areas under construction and stone from the aforementioned quarry. In 1773 the Canal Company authorised the building of a house at the eastern end of the canal for John Varley’s use. This also had an office for William Whitehead, a company clerk who logged the boat traffic.

At this point it will be convenient to consider the construction of the canal from Chesterfield eastwards since this part of the canal was started at the same time as the western parts and indeed much of the Derbyshire end of the canal to Killamarsh was completed by 1775 and was in use by that date. The Western terminus of the canal at Chesterfield was constructed at almost the same time as the eastern. The canal company used the river Rother to approach the town, where a large basin was constructed (now non-existent). Shortly before Tapton Lock, the Rother is diverted by a weir into its own channel and the main line of the canal begins. The canal from there follows the course of the Rother with locks being built to accommodate each change of level. Just past the fifth lock () a small secondary canal was built in the 1790s. This was an underground canal, two miles long, navigable for 20ft long barges which carried coal from several seams to the main canal. The barges had in them wooden boxes called corves which were craned up into the waiting Cuckoo boats or rail wagons.

The canal then continued to Staveley which is now the limit of navigation on the western limb of the waterway. From Staveley the canal crosses the via a high embankment (known today as the Staveley Puddlebank). Shortly after this embankment a short arm was built in 1776 during the initial construction of the canal. This – the Norbriggs Cutting – was to connect the waterway to the Worksop – Chesterfield turnpike road, to enable cargoes transported by road to be transferred to the canal. This was the temporary Head of Navigation until the puddlebank was completed. The wharf at the end of the cutting was not only a transhipment point from the road, but it also had a tramway to a local colliery and so coal was sent from this point along the canal. There was also a feeder for water supply from the headwaters of the Doe Lea. Figure 19 below shows the course of the ancillary feeders to the canal in the Staveley area. Thus this map shows the course of the underground tunnel which fed the canal from the coal mines south of Hollingwood Common, the tramway to the pits at (this tramway would also have served Staveley colliery), the tramways that served the coal mines at Norbriggs and transported their coal to the wharf on the Norbriggs arm of the canal. There was also a tramway to the canal through Renishaw from Spinkhill.

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Figure 19: Tramways and feeders in the Staveley area

Map produced by M. Berrill, 1962

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From this point, the canal follows the line of the river Doe Lea to Renishaw. From this town, the original line of the canal wound round the base of the small hill in order to keep a level course. These bends are known as the Brindley Loops. They were isolated when the Manchester, Sheffield and Railway Company, later the , built its track along the valley in 1890-91. This Company diverted the canal along the line of the railway track. From this diversion the canal follows the river Rother for a short distance then takes a right angle bend through Killamarsh, where there was another lock (Belk Lane Lock) to begin the climb up the steep escarpment formed by the Middle Coal Measure ridge (usually termed the Magnesian Limestone escarpment). From this lock the canal follows a sinuous course along a deep subsidiary stream valley until it reaches the steep slope of the actual escarpment. Here the canal is lifted almost 100 feet in less than a third of a mile by the most impressive piece of canal engineering. Brindley raised the canal up this slope by a series of thirteen locks arranged in four staircase sets, i.e. with the chambers linking one to another without any intervening sections of canal. These were arranged in three treble sets and at the top is a quadruple set. The exact route of the canal is shown on Figure 23.

In the 1790s two small reservoirs, both sited on the Coal Measure shale, at Woodall Pond and Killamarsh Pond, were dug to increase the water supply. There was a feeder channel from these reservoirs at the top of the Norwood flight. The short stretch of canal from the top of the locks leads to the western portal of the Norwood tunnel. These are shown on figures 17 and 18, the geography and the geology of the area around the tunnel. Figure 22, p42, shows all the summit reservoirs.

In June 1777 the canal was officially opened. As has been indicated in the account of the construction of the waterway, some parts of the canal had been used for trade as soon as they were completed, notably the Norbriggs arm to Chesterfield and the Worksop to Retford section. However, records of the trade on the canal only exist from after the opening date. Figure 20, part 1 below shows a brief summary of the main goods being transported ten years after the opening, but part 2, gives the monies due for goods left on the wharves for 14 days, a most interesting variety of goods carried by the canal, together with a fascinating insight into the value of money at that time.

Figure 20, part 1: The Trade of the Chesterfield Canal An indication of the influence of the canal on the trade of the goods carried has been given in Chapter 3. A brief summary of the effect on the trade of the area is written on the Chesterfield Canal Trust’s website, which records that within ten years the canal began to show a modest dividend and steady trade in all manner of goods including:

Agricultural produce Malt, Lime, Sail Cloth, Bricks and Tiles, Coal and Coke, Iron and Cast and Wrought Iron produce, Lead and Marble.

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Figure 20, part 2: A much more comprehensive list can be seen below, provided by the Chesterfield Canal Trust.

Figure 21, below, shows the profitability of the canal in 1789 – the year in which the first dividend of 1% was paid. The gross income for that year was £8320 of which £2780 was profit. The document then lists the total tonnage carried - 74,312 - and then breaks that tonnage into the tonnage of the principal goods carried. The document also records that at the Derbyshire end the canal transported tramway rails so that nearby coal mines and quarries could transport their products to the canal. Some of these tramways are shown on Figure 19, the Staveley Area. The document ends by stating that the trade increased over the subsequent years so that by 1795 the canal was able to pay a dividend of 6%.

It is evident that by the end of the eighteenth century the immediate fortunes of the waterway were assured and it remained prosperous until 1850. A brief summary of its fortunes thereafter will be given in the conclusion.

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Figure 21: The profitability of the canal from 1789 onwards

The western and eastern portals of the Norwood Tunnel in the 1950s (courtesy IWPS)

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Figure 22: The reservoirs that fed the summit pound

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Figure 23: The whole route of the canal

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CONCLUSION

During the first 50 years of the nineteenth century the canal prospered, for before the advent of the railways it was the only practicable method of carrying heavy, bulky goods and was much more efficient than horse and cart since a barge held far more than a cart and only needed the same one horse to pull it. Thus, although the turnpike system of improving roads had been widely constructed during the time of the building of the Chesterfield canal, it only supplemented the canal to transport goods to and from it. Of course the turnpikes were the primary method of stage coach travel. Nevertheless there were complaints, especially about the bottleneck at the Norwood end of the tunnel. Here the small reservoirs held too little water therefore boats had to offload some of their cargo to maintain the water levels in the complex flight of staircase locks to Killamarsh. This problem is explained in full by Christine Richardson in her book on the Norwood Tunnel.

The most prosperous time in the canal’s history was in the 15 years from 1840. In 1834 the old Houses of Parliament had burned down. Barry and Pugin were the architects who were awarded the contracts to design the replacement of the and they chose Anston stone. Thus Magnesian Limestone from the Duke of Leeds’ quarries sited only two miles from the canal was chosen to be the building stone. A major clause in the contract was that the supply of stone must be constant; this gave continuous work for the canal for the first four years and intermittently for a further ten years. The stone was transported to Dog Kennel wharf, where it was loaded on to “cuckoo” boats for transport to West Stockwith for transhipment on to Trent sloops, thence sailed to London. A full description of this episode in the canal’s life is given in Richardson’s book ‘Yorkshire Stone to London’.

However, from about 1850 two industrial developments led to the decline of the canal. The first was the building of the railways. Just as there was a “canal boom” from 1760 to 1835, so there was a “railway boom” from 1840 until the latter years of the nineteenth century. In 1844 plans were laid to build the Sheffield and Lincolnshire Junction Railway. In 1847 this company (now the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway) took ownership of the Chesterfield Canal in order to use its route, and the rail line was built over the Magnesian Limestone ridge following the line of the Spa Fault. The line passes through Kiveton village to where it is adjacent to the canal as is shown on Appendix 2. From there it follows the line of the canal to Worksop. The Act empowering the Railway Company to take the canal over stated that it must keep it navigable and maintain the Norwood tunnel. As steam engines became more powerful and could transport freight in larger quantities and a much faster speed, they took the canal’s trade, and therefore the cross-country trade through the Norwood tunnel. By the end of the century there was very little boat trade using the tunnel.

The second death blow to the canal was the sinking of deep mine collieries. The earliest of these was Shireoaks pit, sunk in 1854; the first mine to be sunk through the concealed coalfield. Being sited next to the canal, it gave trade to that waterway. It had its own and initially sent all its produce by canal. Later it was linked to the rail network but still used the canal until 1946. In that year the last barges left for the Retford. The author, as a 12 year old, saw one! From that year, Morse lock above Worksop was closed and the canal east of Worksop was abandoned. Far 45 more serious for the future of the waterway was the sinking of Kiveton Colliery just north of the Norwood tunnel in 1864. This company had no obligation to maintain the tunnel and the coal measures below that tunnel contain extremely rich coal seams. These are shown on the cross- section on Figure 7. The most important seam was the Barnsley (Top Hard in Nottinghamshire). This coal was 5ft thick, even thicker in some places. The mining of this coal caused widespread subsidence and severely damaged the tunnel from 1875 onwards. The railway engineers attempted to maintain the tunnel, but, when part of it finally collapsed on 19th October 1907, the tunnel was abandoned. From that time the canal became two sections, and the areas that were served by the immediate flights of locks were disused. Although some trade continued on the Chesterfield arm, at some time in the 1920s or 30s trade ceased and that section was abandoned. Commercial traffic continued on the eastern section until 1956.

The detail of the decline of the canal and its subsequent restoration in the late 20th century can be studied through the Chesterfield Canal Trust.

Shireoaks Colliery Company's Wharf at Dock Road Worksop, 1910

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Appendix 1: Chesterfield Canal - list of locks and mileages

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Appendix 2: Part of the summit pound on the eastern section of the canal

D

C

A B

Reproduced by kind permission of the Chesterfield Canal Trust

A - Eastern portal of Norwood Tunnel within a few yards of this point. B - (i) Point at which the feeder from the Harthill storage reservoirs enter the canal. (ii) for barges to turn since the eastern portal is currently the head of navigation on the eastern section of the canal. C - Dog Kennel Bridge. D - The wharf from which stone from Anston quarries was prepared for transportation to West Stockwith; from there transhipped to London for the rebuilding of the Houses of Parliament.

This map of the summit pound is the part where the eastern section leaves the northern outcrop of the Magnesian Limestone (the outcrop north of the Spa fault) and passes on to the Middle Coal Measures just before Dog Kennel Bridge. The whole of this section of the pound is in a deep cutting – some 30 feet deep - since within a few yards of the western edge of the map the canal enters the Norwood tunnel.

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Appendix 3: Generalised vertical sections (Courtesy BGS)

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Acknowledgements

I wish to acknowledge the invaluable clerical assistance given by David Fell and Kate Pudney. I am indebted to John and Christine Revill for their invaluable encouragement and support. I am very grateful to the British Geological Survey for sending me several specially prepared diagrams with permission to publish them and to the Ordnance Survey for permission to publish some maps. I wish to thank the Chesterfield Canal Trust and the Chesterfield Canal Partnership for many maps and diagrams. The encouragement given by Robin Stonebridge and Rod Auton and the many resources also provided by Rod Auton.

Alan Taylor, January 2016.

This document is © Alan Taylor. It is not to be used by third parties without his permission. Where stated, maps are © Ordnance Survey and/or the British Geological Survey, and are only to be used within this pamphlet.