Sapperton Canal Tunnel

Sapperton Canal Tunnel

The Coates Portal at the south-eastern end of the Sapperton Canal Tunnel
Overview
Location	Sapperton, Gloucestershire
Coordinates	51°42′58″N 2°04′00″W / 51.7162°N 2.0666°W / 51.7162; -2.0666Coordinates: 51°42′58″N 2°04′00″W / 51.7162°N 2.0666°W / 51.7162; -2.0666
OS grid reference	SO955019
Status	disused
Waterway	Thames and Severn Canal
Start	51°43′43″N 2°04′58″W / 51.7287°N 2.0828°W / 51.7287; -2.0828
End	51°42′15″N 2°03′01″W / 51.7041°N 2.0504°W / 51.7041; -2.0504
Operation
Opened	20 April 1789
Closed	c1910
Technical
Length	3,817 yards (3,490 m)
Towpath	No

Daneway portal - Sapperton Tunnel

The Sapperton Canal Tunnel is a tunnel on the Thames and Severn Canal near Cirencester in Gloucestershire, England. It was the longest canal tunnel, and the longest tunnel of any kind, in England from 1789 to 1811.

The tunnel was opened on 20 April 1789 after five years of construction and is 3,817 yards (3,490 m) long. It has no towpath; narrowboats were propelled through the tunnel by legging.^[1]

It was superseded as the longest canal tunnel in England in 1811 by the Huddersfield Narrow Canal's Standedge Tunnel, which is 5,456 yards (4,989 m) long and remains the highest, longest and deepest canal tunnel in Britain - though, unlike Sapperton, Standedge can only accommodate 7-foot-wide narrowboats (2.1 m). Sapperton Tunnel is not currently navigable, but restoration is proposed by the Cotswold Canals Trust as part of their project to re-open the canal route from Thames to Severn. The trust operates tourist boat trips into the tunnel in winter months.

The Sapperton railway tunnel, on the Golden Valley Line, follows a broadly similar route under the 'Cotswold Edge'.

The Tunnel in Fiction

In Hornblower and the Atropos by C.S. Forester, Hornblower helps the boatman "leg" through Sapperton Tunnel after the boatman's assistant is incapacitated. Forester spends the first two chapters of the book on the canal-boat journey, Roughly a third of the first chapter is devoted to the tunnel.

In the novel Gone by Mo Hayder the tunnel is used extensively as a location in this crime thriller.

Coordinates

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Point	Coordinates (links to map & photo sources)
Daneway portal	51°43′43″N 2°04′58″W / 51.7287°N 2.0828°W / 51.7287; -2.0828
Mid-point	51°42′58″N 2°04′00″W / 51.7162°N 2.0666°W / 51.7162; -2.0666
Coates portal	51°42′15″N 2°03′01″W / 51.7041°N 2.0504°W / 51.7041; -2.0504

References

1. ^ "Thames and Severn Canal". http://www.cotswoldcanals.com/history.htm. 

External links

Media related to Sapperton Canal Tunnel at Wikimedia Commons