The River Great Ouse

The River Great Ouse

Talk given to St Ives Civic Society by J R Mayhead, Secretary of the Great Ouse Restoration Society, on Monday, 26th January 1970.

View of the River Great Ouse at St Ives.
By James Hunter c1830s (image from the Norris Museum).

From Hundreds Rolls and Assize Rolls 1275-1286, there is evidence of well-established trade between King's Lynn and Huntingdon. Complaints were made that "ships which were wont to come with their merchandise to the borough of Huntingdon from Lynn and other parts" were being impeded by a staunch at Hemingford put up by Reginald de Grey and the Abbot of Ramsey's sluices at Houghton.

It seems unlikely though that the Ouse was navigable above Huntingdon until the 17th century, during which the Ouse was made navigable from St. Ives to Great Barford and later up to Bedford. The roads were very bad and often impassable in winter; it was much easier and much cheaper to move heavy goods by water, even for short distances. Coal from Newcastle was shipped up the river from King's Lynn and there were valuable return-cargoes of barley and malt, much of which was exported from King's Lynn to Holland.

By the summer of 1689 the Ouse was navigable up to Bedford. By the middle of the 18th century trade was flourishing. Up river came coal, salt, iron, deal boards, hemp and lathes as well as millstones, coke, pitch, tar, bricks, stone, grindstone, oats, turf, hempseed and pigeons' dung (most highly prized of all manures). Down river from Bedford went fuller's earth,, malt, peas, beans, barley, oats, wheat, timber, wool, apples, clay and cloth.

The big boats of 40 to 130 tons burthen could not get higher up the river than St. Ives; there the cargoes had to be shifted to much smaller boats. The boats were fastened together in "gangs" of nine or ten in charge of a"bridgman" whose business it was to pilot them up the river. They were drawn by horses led by boys. Boys were apprenticed from the age of eight years and fed and watered the horses and in summer slept near the horses in the fields. The work was dangerous as there were places where the haling way was so eroded that the horses had to step into the river.

By the beginning of the 19th century the trade on the river was declining. A document making "observations" is extant and it concludes "The trade of the River Ouze...has declined considerably within the last 15 years owing to a Canal made...by the Grand Junction Company by which the towns and neighbourhoods of Bedford and Biggleswade...are supplied with coals cheaper than they can be had by means of this Navigation." 

The railway came to Bedford in 1846, navigation above St. Ives virtually ceased and locks and sluices fell into disrepair. (navigation above Tempsford ceased in 1876 and above Eaton Socon in 1878). The decay raised in more urgent form the problem of control of floods.

In 1893 Mr L.T.Simpson, a wealthy stockbroker, bought the navigation rights, formed the "Ouse Transport Company" and in four years spent between £10,000 and £20,000 in restoration. The existing tolls, unchanged for 200 years, were quite inadequate (the tolls at St. Ives did not pay the staunchkeeper's wages) and Simpson applied to the Board of Trade for permission to raise them adequately, but it was refused. This was only the beginning of Simpson's difficulties; after long legal battles, two of which went to the House of Lords, in 1904 he gave up the struggle.

Attempts between 1906 and 1913 to revive navigation failed but in 1908 Mr Johnson of the St. Ives Traders Association suggested in evidence to a Royal Commission a single conservancy authority for the entire drainage area - he considered the question of navigation "quite secondary" to that of floods; but it was not until 1930 that the Great Ouse Catchment Board was set up.

The Great Ouse Restoration Society was formed in 1951 to press for the re-opening — by reconstruction of locks — of the ten miles of derelict river that has separated Bedford from the sea and the rest of the Fenland Waterways since last century. The rehabilitation of the locks will ease the control of the water levels, will re-open the navigation to Bedford (mainly for amenity craft), will act as a conservation source for the large quantities of water now being extracted for the Grafham Water Scheme and will improve the appearance and amenities of the river.

In 1955 Bedford Town Lock was rebuilt as a discharge structure and the Society gave £1,250 for the insertion of a pair of lock gates. In 1962 Cardington Lock was reconstructed and the Society gave £1,000 towards the cost of the downstream gates.

Now Roxton Lock is being rebuilt at a cost of £80,000 and the Society is trying to raise £5000 towards a side lock. After that, three more locks remain to be rebuilt and then the Ouse will be navigable from Bedford to King's Lynn.