John Brightley

It's shown on the CRT online asset map.

My immediate thought is - why make something like this? All the downsides of a wider beam but little benefit.

Haha Carl ! I probably did ! Thanks for enlightening me ! Faggots and peas were certainly on the menu, but not in a batch. Looks like a few places have been serving them for a while, but it's certainly not widespread. None of the chippies in Kenilworth serve them either. It's good for every town and city to have it's own special delicacies that make the place more distinctive. Have you had a Coventry Godcake ? They date back several hundred years, and are topical as they were traditionally served at Easter. Again, not many places sell them - I've only had one once or twice.

Although batch is the right word, a faggot and pea batch certainly isn't a traditional Coventry delicacy ! I grew up in Coventry and still live close by and have never heard of one of those, let alone had one. Faggots and pays are Black Country, not Warwickshire. Sounds like something someone has made up recently. And bread rolls generally aren't called cobs in Birmingham. Cobs are an East Midlands term. It's generally a roll in Brum. When I was growing up in Coventry in the 70s and 80s, the word 'cob' definitely wasn't used at all. Nor was it used in Brum. The first time I heard the word was when I went to Leicester. I genuinely had no idea what they meant when they said 'cob' to start with. And then I found that 'cob' was also used in Hinckley, whereas 2 miles away in Nuneaton it was always 'batch'.

What makes you think that ? As the advert says, the conversion is written about in a book by Jean Calder.

CRT have made a video about the Hatton open day - you may find it interesting if only for the spider cranes...

Yes, thank you for arranging it Ray. It was a special day.

Thanks Ray. I don't think I have seen the first photo before, so if you do find out where it came from, I would be interested to know. The second photo is similar to one I already have, and shows the view from the end of the arm. The first bridge photo is of Coventry Road bridge, Griff Hollows. The concrete bridge shown was built in 1969, when the canal was still technically navigable but silted up. The photo dates from 1975 when the canal was in the process of being piped/infilled. The second photo is of the railway bridge over the old line of the canal at the new Bermuda Park station. The path on the right is the old towpath, the path on the left is new and connects the two platforms of the station.

The photo isn't Wyken, Mike, it's the Griff arm.

The cruiser in the photo above seems to be the same one shown in this photo by Graham Wigley of Bradley depot: Taken from Graham's talk of Dec 2024, published on YouTube here:

Mike Askin has kindly put a recording of Graham's talk on YouTube, here: Recorded at an RCHS meeting held in December 2024 at the Birmingham & Midland Institute. Thanks to Graham and all those others who made it happen.

There were also underground canals with boats in the Arbury coal mines near Nuneaton in the 1770's.

All the books and magazines have now gone, and thankfully the magazines have all been taken by people who are going to use them for historical research.

Hi Roger. Yes, they are available. I've sent you a PM. It's only possible for you to send PM's after you've made about 4 posts on the forum.

Probably in the 1980's when the area was gentrified.

Thanks to everyone who has contacted me about the books and magazines. The books, Narrow Boat and Canal & Riverboat magazines have now gone. The Waterways World and Canal Boat magazines are still available.

To get the most accurate distances, I would recommend measuring on an Ordnance Survey map viewer such as Outdooractive, rather than Google Earth. Outdooractive tells me the distance from Briton Ferry to Bridge Street Neath is 3 miles (4.8 km). Edit: I have just measured it on Google Earth and that also gives me 4.8km....

I have been given some canal books and magazines by the family of a recently deceased canal enthusiast, to avoid them being thrown into a skip. I am keeping a few of them myself but there are a lot which I don't want. They may help with someone's historical research. I have already sorted them into chronological order and boxed them up for you. They are completely free, though you would have to collect them from me here in Kenilworth. I will help loading them into a car. You can take as many or as few as you would like, although I don't want to split boxes. First come first served. The magazines are as follows: Waterways World from 1972-1993 Canal & Riverboat/ Canals & Rivers 1991-2013 Narrow Boat 1984-5 Canal Boat 1996-2024 If you need more info please PM me.

Good point. I will have to ask my friends in the Coventry Canal Society whether they have anything in their archive about moorings or rally here in the 60s.

I think this is a good list of places if you need to leave the boat unattended (eg to go to the pub in the evening). If you're staying on the boat, many other places are possible, such as Kings Norton junction, though I wouldn't stop overnight anywhere between there and central Brum simply because of the noise from trains. We have found the moorings at the end of the Stourbridge arm (outside the basin) fine, as well as Wolverhampton top lock (though that is a little noisy).

I have answered my own question, by finding another photo which shows the house in the background. The photo shows the colliery loading basin at the end of the Griff arm at Bermuda Village, Nuneaton. The photo must date from after 1961, as the basin was being used to load coal on to commercial boats up to that date. There has been no record previously of this arm being used for pleasure craft moorings, and this can't have lasted for long, as the arm was completely silted up by the early 1970's. Photos of this arm are very rare, and if you have any I'd be interested to see them. Also if anyone has any recollections of boats (pleasure or commercial) traveling down the arm after 1961 that would be useful too. Interestingly, information that I have found suggests that the Griff arm was never in British Waterways ownership. It was built by the Arbury estate to serve their collieries, and passed with the collieries to the National Coal Board. I understand that ownership transferred to Nuneaton Council when the arm was partially filled in and piped in 1979.

I remember mugs and plates with that 'Tern' boat design being for sale in canalside shops in the late '70's / early '80's. That 'Thomas Clayton' lettering seems rather amateurish, so maybe someone's added it after purchase.

Myself and Hugh Potter have been working on a small group of photos in the RCHS Weaver collection, most of which I have identified as the Coventry Canal branches in the Bedworth area. But this one has me stumped. I don't recognise the location at all. Hugh thought it might be the Newdigate arm, but I don't think so, as to my knowledge there weren't any pleasure boats moored in that area in the 1960's. Do any of you recognise it ?

For future reference, another early use of the term "narrow boat" can be found in @Heartland 's book "An introduction to Midland Canal Carriers 1770-1845", where there is a copy of a newspaper advertisement from 1830 which refers to "To be sold by auction...eight narrow boats, in good repair..."

The term "narrow boat" appeared in print many times before Rolt used it to name his book. @Heartland has found a reference to the term in print in a newspaper of 1830. (From "An introduction to Midland Canal Carriers 1770-1845)