Well, I had better get back to the Kent Water Company - you must all think this is a never ending saga, and you are probably right. This week I thought I would look at a piece of local infrastructure Greenwich which the company built
Probably the best known remains of the Kent Water Works' infrastructure is the long disused reservoir in Greenwich Park. I will say what I can about it but its history is very well written up by the Friends of Greenwich Park History Group. https://friendsofgreenwichparkhistory.greenhousecms.co.uk/Reservoir/
It dates from 1845 and I have always understood that it was the twin of the big circular reservoir on Woolwich Common which was built in 1844 and which I covered in my article on Woolwich reservoirs some weeks back. Like Woolwich is built for and funded by Government sources. It is also said to have been designed by Royal Engineer, William Denison. He was involved in the construction of the circular reservoir on Woolwich Common – but as a monitor for the Admiralty. Whoever designed the Greenwich reservoir did an amazing job in terms of internal spaces and brickwork.
At the time the reservoir was constructed William Denison was Engineer in charge at Woolwich Dockyard but had very recently been involved in projects concerning the Royal Observatory in Greenwich Park. He was soon to depart for New South Wales and very little of his long and busy career was spent in Greenwich. However a look at what he did contribute locally might be a useful and interesting study. What an amazing man!
However the Greenwich Park History Group’s account says that the Admiralty had been looking for a site for a reservoir since 1830 – and could insist that it was built in the park since the Royal Hospital for Seamen had a legal right for a supply of water.
Of course there was already a complicated water supply system in the Park which belonged to the Royal Hospital – this was via all the conduits the remains of which you can see as various brick structures. When the Kent Company was set up and granted a licence in 1809 one of the conditions was about a supply of water to the Royal Hospital. However does that mean that the Admiralty could have a big reservoir built in the Park?
The Park historians say that in the 1830s the Admiralty had looked at various locations on Blackheath and had had complaints from many including local residents Princess Sophia Matilda who as Park Ranger lived in the Rangers House. Objections were to an open stretch of water close to their houses’. Hmmm – such things are usually seen as an asset! Perhaps the Admiralty should have said they were building an ornamental pond and had a nice statue and a fountain to put in it!
Other accounts say that the Admiralty decided to pursue the construction of the reservoir following the fire in the Tower of London in 1841. The purpose being to have a ready supply of water in case of fire in Government bulldogs and in 1844 the Admiralty contracted with the Kent Water Company for the construction of reservoirs in Greenwich and Woolwich Common for fire fighting purposes. The Admiralty would finance the construction and also pay for the mains, and any changes to the engines needed to pump the water. The cost was actually more than £10,000 above that received from the Admiralty...
As I wrote in an earlier article the big circular reservoir in Woolwich was built in 1844 and used for fire fighting water. In Greenwich the very suspicion of a reservoir In Greenwich Park caused immediate alarm - as it had ten years earlier. The Park was surrounded by homes of the well connected. It was reported that initially a ‘gentleman, who had mansion adjacent the spot on which the tank was to be formed, so violently opposed the plan in Parliament that the measure was obliged to be abandoned'. Could that anonymous gentleman be Princess Sophia Matilda?
Some locals asked the authorities if the stories about the reservoir were true. It was reported that they” were confidently assured that nothing of the sort was contemplated”. But “one week had not elapsed..... when an entire lawn on the southeast side of the beautiful park was railed off for the construction of this very tank’. Oh dear
There were two issues, one was that they didn’t like it and the other was the Anglo Saxon cemetery – which today is a scheduled ancient monument – and one of the features of the Park. However in the 1840s this ‘collection of valuable and ancient relics’ were in danger and “the Archaeological Society ...admitted then to be upwards of 1000 years old. It turned out that about 10 of these "national memorials of the valour of the ancient Britons the time of Alfred the Great” had already been damaged..
A crowded meeting was held in the vestry-room of St. Alphege’s Church, with an overflow in the National Schools, to ‘consider the propriety of opposing the reservoir ‘. The Greenwich Rector, Rev Soames –one of the local soap manufacturing family - said that he “considered the present meeting of the utmost importance to the vast population of the metropolis, who sought relief from the crowded city in the quiet seclusion of their ancient park”. The reservoir was to be constructed on “one of the finest lawns in the park and occupies about half an acre of ground. It has an unsightly appearance.
Mr Soames went to the Admiralty to meet Mr. Sydney Herbert, with a ‘memorial upon the subject’ - and he had sent copies to everyone else he could think of. Having got to the Admiralty he tried explaining the matter to the’ scientific gentlemen’ present. Some days later received a letter saying that the ‘scientific gentlemen thought that the protection of Deptford Dockyard and Greenwich Hospital from fire was necessary.” However the site was changed to protect the remaining Saxon graves.
The reservoir was completed in 1845/6.It is circular and at first was open and unroofed. It was capable of holding about 1,125,000 gallons, and the top-water level is 158 feet above Ordnance datum. –and described by the Kent Company as a ‘summit reservoir.
Less than a year after it was finished there was a burst in the main pipe which took the water from the reservoir into the dock and victualling yards. At first the crack in the road was small, but the “force of the great body of water soon enlarged a cavity, and ‘an immense volume of water was projected against and over the opposite houses, breaking several windows”. They had to send a messenger to then resident manager of the Kent Water Works at Brookmill before anything could be done. Soon it was under control and it abated - but several square feet of roadway, was wrecked.
The reservoir and its water was shown to be vital in February 1846 when a fire broke out in a public-house at High Bridge and next door to the Royal Hospital offices. The pub and the two houses opposite were burnt down. They needed water for the fire-engines – so – here was the opportunity to test the supply of water from the reservoir in the Park. You will be glad to know that along with the new fire engines ‘ It answered the most sanguine expectations of all the gentlemen present’ , and ’is a great acquisition not only to the hospital but to the town of Greenwich’. The new equipment ‘throws water about 80 feet high, and with a force almost incredible’. Adjutant Lieut. Rivers, of Greenwich Hospital, was ready ' as always; to give his services. But the hose had a twist in the centre, and the force of water caused it to turn quickly, and caught his coat by the corner’. He was nearly seriously hurt. He had been sitting on top of a wall 30 feet high with the hose in his hand –and as it was his “coat was completely torn from his back”.
In 1858 at 6 am one morning a ’servant of the company- the turnkey', went to the reservoir for the purpose of cleaning it. He saw a young man ‘therein bathing, and cautioned him as to a recurrence of the offence’. The next day he went again to the reservoir ‘in performance of his duty’, and, much to his surprise, again found the young man bathing. What was worse he was ‘indecent’. Anyway he ‘assisted him out of the water; and took him to Mr. Morris, the company engineer’. Morris took him down to the station-house and charged him. The young man said he was not aware that the reservoir belonged to the Company.
The young man was WiIfred Airey, son of the Astronomer Royal. He was 22 and at the time of the offence was a student at Cambridge .He had been born in the Greenwich Observatory – and went on to be a civil engineer
So in 1858 4 he was charged under the Police Act with indecently bathing in a reservoir in Greenwich Park, belonging to the Kent Waterworks Company. Mr. Morris said they would have to clear out the reservoir, which would put them to an expense of nearly 40s. And so Wilfred was convicted the prisoner .under the Police Act, of indecently bathing, with = a penalty of 20s
The reservoir was open until 1871 when new
legislation meant that it had to be covered. It was then covered over by brick arches, which
are supported by iron joists. There was an electrical apparatus there,
connected with an index at the Deptford station, which showed the height of the
water in the reservoir, , under the terms of their agreement with the
Government Department a certain amount
of water had to be constantly kept there, so that it may be available at all
times in case of fire. This apparatus was put up and kept in working order by
the Post-Office authorities at the expense of the Company.
By 1891, the Admiralty had stopped using the reservoir to supply water to its buildings. The only thing I know about it over the next 130 years is a plan I once saw of the inside of it when it was considered for conversion into an air raid shelter in the Second World War. There are many interesting pictures on the net from those who have followed up on this work.
Today its old site is a wildlife area with no public access-although there has been a recent study of the wild flowers that grow there. Undisturbed it has vanished into the landscape of the Park.
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