Grand Surrey Canal

Grand Surrey Canal

The Grand Surrey Canal was a canal constructed in south London during the early 19th century.

Originally intended to extend from Rotherhithe to Mitcham in what was then Surrey, it was authorised by an 1801 Act of Parliament, though the project soon ran into financial difficulties and further Acts were passed (in 1807, 1808 and 1811) to allow new funds to be committed to the project.

At the same time, the company's priorities shifted from extending the canal to exploiting the ship dock created at its junction with the River Thames at Rotherhithe. The dock (from 1864 part of Surrey Commercial Docks) eventually opened on 13 March 1807, but it was to be another two years before the first stretch of canal opened (in 1809), extending three miles southwards towards a basin at Camberwell and a junction with the short-lived Croydon Canal (to which the Grand Surrey Canal provided a vital connection to the Thames) at New Cross. A short branch to Peckham opened in 1826.

During the second half of the 19th century, the canal was used by the South Metropolitan Gas Company to supply coal via its own fleet of tugs and barges to its gas works site on the Old Kent Road. The canal was also heavily used to move timber — Whitten Timber at Eagle Wharf in Peckham Hill Street is a family firm which can trace its associations with the canal back to 1935.

The Grand Surrey Canal was the first to have canal police (forerunners of the British Transport Police). "Bank rangers" were appointed in 1811 to keep law and order along the length of the canal. [cite web | url = http://www.btp.police.uk/History%20Society/Publications/History%20Society/Constituent%20Force/Canal%20Forces/Canal%20Police%20History.htm | title = Canal Police Forces | work = BTP History Society | accessdate = 2006-04-11]

Parts of the canal were finally abandoned in the 1940s, and by the 1960s most of the canal had been drained. The dock closed in 1970, and most of the canal was filled in. The former Camberwell Basin now forms part of the site of Burgess Park.

References


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