I left the walk along the Greenwich Riverside at the corner of Horse Ferry Road. This article is going to be about Greenwich and fish – but we need to get to Billingsgate first
If we walk either along the riverside or along Thames Street we are among the flats of Greenwich Council’s Meridian Estate. This was begun in 1933, added to in 1939 and again after the Second World War It was built by the London County Council and demonstrates their commitment to quality design and construction in housing - when these flats were built they were in a rough and dirty area. The estate still looks good with what is now one of the most desirable locations in the Borough.
It is here – on the lane called Wood Wharf that ran between the river and the wharves that the industries remained until relatively recently. There were a number of barge repair works, and indeed barge builders and breakers, as well as a site used by the Anglo-Swedish welding company and many others. Ron Richards’s book, which I mentioned last time ‘Victorian Wood Wharf’ lists many of them. He describes how he began work in 1954 at one of the largest of these sites – Orient Lighterage. (I explained in an earlier article how ‘lighterage ‘meant the management of moving goods around the port in ‘dumb’ barges, called ‘lighters’). Orient was in the tea trade taking the tea from ships in Tilbury or the Royal Docks to bonded warehouses at Wapping and elsewhere. They were a big company with many staff at several sites but containerisation led to their closure and move to Basildon in 1971. They seem to have gone out of business a couple of years ago.
On the riverside here is a cannon - I am a bit confused why that is there – there was I think a Cannon Wharf here which I can find nothing about. Can anyone else help? I remember ‘the famous Reg’ telling me that the riverside here was privately owned and they could use it to change the Council plans for a boring walkway. Hmmmm – he was trying to buy the Charing Cross floating pier and move it there with a view to becoming a rival to Greenwich Pier. In the future I will try and describe how that had been done before in Georgian times.
We need to get to Billingsgate. Thames Street soon reaches children’s play area and garden – designed to keep tourists away from people's homes. It then becomes Welland Street and then we are in Greenwich Church Street . Up to the 1950s it met a different road called Billingsgate Street. This ran down to the river and Billingsgate Dock, which is the square inlet to the river more or less behind the Foot Tunnel. . In fact Billingsgate Street is still there but we just can’ see it - it goes from the junction of Welland Street and Church Street down to the river running along beside the edge of Cutty Sark Gardens.
‘But’ you are going to say ‘Billingsgate fish market was in the City’. And so it was – there were two, and this was the other one. The only connection which I know of between them there was a Saxon Princess who owned Greenwich and gave it to St.Peter's Abbey in Ghent and she also owned the bit of the City where Billingsgate fish market used to be.
Greenwich’s Billingsgate was not just about fish – in the Middle Ages it was the main dock for the town. However Greenwich was to become a big fishing port with a fish market further to the east at Ship Stairs which were roughly at the far end of Greenwich Pier. Fisher Lane ran along the riverside between Billingsgate and the fish market. Much of this area was changed in the 19th century by Greenwich Hospital Estates. An Act of Parliament in 1850 gave them power over Billingsgate Dock and enable its public use. Recent excavation has shown this was a draw dock – where boats could be pulled up a ramp out of the water. There are a number of detailed articles on the Greenwich Industrial History blog about this. http://greenwichindustrialhistory.blogspot.com/
Fishing has clearly been carried out along the Thames since time immemorial – obviously as source of food in a subsistence economy. There are scattered references to Greenwich fishermen in the Middle Ages by which time it had become more regulated and commercial. In 1349 some Greenwich fishermen were accused of using a net which were too large and had to answer to the Lord Mayor. The City was by then the regulatory body and Fishmongers Hall enforced inspection. The trade grew through the succeeding centuries and was often concentrated in successive generations of families. In 1862 thirty seven fishing craft were registered at Greenwich and this may have represented the peak of the trade.
In the early 19th century various noxious trades were dumping their effluent in the River and the resulting level of pollution caused real problems to fishermen. . Greenwich fishermen were already looking well beyond the Thames for fish . George Beasley recorded that he was ten years old when he first went to Iceland with his father and there were ten tons of preservative salt on board. The following year thirty or forty fishing boats went. He said that his father was away for six month on these trips catching cod in snow and ice. The fish were left in the Shetlands until they picked them up on their return trip. The North Sea fishery was the major destination of Greenwich fishermen while Barking men continued fishing the River, and Gravesend men concentrated on shellfish.
By the 1860s Greenwich fishermen were beginning to move to Grimsby and base themselves there. In 1845 the Grimsby Dock Company had been set up with rail links to London – and in 1854 were sending hundreds of tons of fish a year into London. Greenwich fishermen also went to Aldeburgh and to Hull. There have been a number of short studies of Greenwich fishing and all mention the move to Grimsby – but I must say that Grimsby heritage outlets make no mention of Greenwich and queries are met with incredulity.
Other Industries here included Dodd’s Wharf, which had a sign that could be seen from the river and they had a general wharf where coal, and other goods, was transferred using boats and barges. Here also was Huntley’s coal yard with an overhead rail system to and from the riverside. Another firm was Noakes who supplied hay and straw for all the horses, they had in those days. A family member invented the Noakesoscope which was a picture projection system – a group from GLIAS witnessed a demonstration of it from a machine which had survived into the 1970s. The largest and latest firm these sites was Coneybeare ‘marine engineers and boiler makers’ and worked all sorts of metal components.
A side road here was Brewhouse Lane named
after a brewery owned by a Captain Barrett in 1695. There was also a pub in the lane called ‘Fubb’s
Yacht’ - named after a Royal Yacht
which was itself named after one of Charles II’s chubbier mistresses - Louise
de Kerouaille.
All of this area was cleared by the 1950s, partly by World War II bombing and partly when the Cutty Sark was installed . before that views from the river show some impressive weather boarded buildings –traditional Kentish style, like the ones which were in Gravesend and cleared around he same time. Today tourists wander round the empty spaces of Cutty Sark Gardens when, I am sure, they would rather see the old Greenwich they thought they had read about. A few years ago I recall one Council officer arguing that perhaps we should rebuild the old riverside village – it would be an attraction and provide much needed shelter for Cutty Sark. But, no, we just got some garish chain fast food restaurants instead.
FURTHER READING
Ron Richards ‘Wood Wharf’ – self published and only available from Ron I’m afraid
Julian Watson. In the meantime. Published by the Council in 1988 with some good pictures of the area
Greenwich fishing is covered in:
Mrs Norledge. Greenwich as an ancient fishing port. She gave this as a paper to Greenwich Antiquarians an 1915 and they later published it. (it’s based on her girl hood memories which may, or may not be accurate)
Barbara Ludlow – Greenwich Fish and Billingsgate Dock http://greenwichindustrialhistory.blogspot.com/search?q=fishing
Harvey Benham. The Codbangers. 1979
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