James Brindley: The canal pioneer who changed England

[Ray T]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-36912826

[Tiggs]

I see it does not mention what we call Mr Brindley's Little jokes.

 

(sharp bends just before tunnels, for example)

[Pluto]

Why do they always suggest that canals were built narrow in the midlands to save water? They were built narrow to lower construction costs. The amount of water necessary was virtually the same on a broad or narrow canal for similar tonnages carried. Two narrow boats were needed to carry around 40 tons, so required two narrow lockfulls of water, while the same tonnage could be carried by a wide boat using one wide lockfull. The amount of water used was the same. The Rochdale Canal minutes cover water usage and implications re cargoes in detail when they were deciding whether to build a wide or narrow canal.

 

I also wish that Thomas Steers would get some mention as his introduction of ground paddles to Britain made canal construction economically viable. He also completed the Newry Canal in 1742, Britain's first summit level canal. I do find it difficult to imagine what exactly Brindley added to canal technology, having studied what had already been achieved both in Britain and abroad.

 

By the 1750s, Steers and Smeaton had also established a 'school' of canal surveyors and engineers based around Halifax, from where several important canal engineer contemporaries of Brindley came from, including Robert Whitworth, who became Brindley's second in command almost immediately after they had met.

[Sea Dog]

I learn something every day: thanks for today's little something, Pluto!

[Heartland]

James Brindley's skills included the ability to memorise structures and related facts and it has been said that this ability aided his transition from millwright to canal engineer. Too much credit has been given to him though, and no enough for his assistants such as Robert Whitworth. Whenever he embarked on a canal project it generally came to involve a degree of delegation and this facet enabled the various projects to proceed at the same time.

 

I agree with Mike about the water aspect, but there was also the construction element where a narrow canal involved less infrastructure, digging, cutting and embanking compared to a barge width waterway. There is also the element of uniting canals to form a network. It tends to be forgotten that merchandise canal carrying once provided important business for the narrow canals, where fly boats could pass both day and night.

 

With the BCN the making was a group effort involving Samuel Simcox and William Wright as well as a clerk of works. That canal was altered so much from the Brindley Canal route by the time it was opened from Birmingham to Aldersley, that it is difficult to state it was a Brindley Waterway. That the name Brindley crops up in Birmingham and Smethwick might celebrate the fact that Brindley was the engineer, the decisions that resulted in the original route being cut, were not always his to make. Since then, as far the BCN was concerned there were alterations, widenings and new canal construction all down to ability and skill of other engineers.

 

It is sad that documentary makers often gloss over these facts of history. They tend to be influenced by a few sources, or worse those academics who spin a select history.

 

Ray Shill

[Machpoint005]

James Brindley's skills included ... << Too much credit has been given to him though, >>

 

Including, according to the BBC's trailer, the invention of the pound lock.

Another reason why I didn't watch it,

[Aurelia]

Maybe some of the fine detail in the ‘Canal Pioneer’ piece has gone awry, and I don’t suppose Machpoint005 is the only reader to quibble about the lock claim. At the same time, it is worth bearing in mind that it very much easier to cavil over errors than it is avoid them. Cheers to the BBC for celebrating James Brindley’s 300th anniversary in such style.

[Machpoint005]

Yea, Fairy Nuff, but the point amply illustrates how easy it is for an "authority" to state things that are simply wrong. As I said, I didn't watch it, but I'd be surprised if there weren't at least a few more bloopers.

 

Perhaps the Beeb should have recruited an expert from this forum, instead of using a junior researcher and/or largely ignorant copy writer?

There's a difference between "fine detail" and facts that aren't factual.

[Pluto]

Maybe some of the fine detail in the ‘Canal Pioneer’ piece has gone awry, and I don’t suppose Machpoint005 is the only reader to quibble about the lock claim. At the same time, it is worth bearing in mind that it very much easier to cavil over errors than it is avoid them. Cheers to the BBC for celebrating James Brindley’s 300th anniversary in such style.

It is easy to avoid errors, it is just that television producers and researchers are either arrogant or deaf - they just do not listen to what is being explained to them. To a great extent, all they have to do is read Charles Hadfield's 'The Canal Age', which puts canal history into a reasonably accurate perspective even though it was published about sixty years ago. Having been involved with several TV canal productions, I am now very wary about helping as I would not want my name associated with the poor quality programmes that are being produced.

[Ray T]

I don't know why the Beeb didn't talk to the man himself.

 

 

 

 

http://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=85010&hl=james+brindley

 

Edited August 4, 2016 by Ray T

[matty40s]

I don't know why the Beeb didn't talk to the man himself.

 

 

 

 

http://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=85010&hl=james+brindley

 

Perhaps thats where they got their facts from.....

the 'orses mouth so to speak.

[Derek R.]

It's a dead horse.

 

Ray & Ian have a point, in that the BBC produce programs that are not factually correct. A classic example is the "Full Steam Ahead" series through which Ruth Goodman and stooges exclaim with wonder (and frequent failed continuity) how the railways took the nations goods off the pack-horse - even entertaining themselves at a "Navvies camp" on the way.

 

Elsewhere I have read that Brindley, whilst being competent at many things, was also a speculator picking up whatever attracted his attention and leaving subordinates to carry out various surveys and construction which has since been accredited to him.

Edited August 4, 2016 by Derek R.

[Sea Dog]

 

Elsewhere I have read that Brindley, whilst being competent at many things, was also a speculator picking up whatever attracted his attention and leaving subordinates to carry out various surveys and construction which has since been accredited to him.

 

That's as might be, but one has to wonder whether those things where his part is perhaps exagerated would still have happened without his involvement in the project?

[Captain Pegg]

That's as might be, but one has to wonder whether those things where his part is perhaps exagerated would still have happened without his involvement in the project?

That is probably so. The role of Engineer to the company - be it canal or railway - was an executive one that involved being accountable to the board for construction. A number of agents were usually employed to carry out the individual management of specific parts of the build to the Engineer's overall direction and it may very well have been that these agents were technically superior individuals to the Engineer at least in some of the specific details. History tends to simplify things by naming one individual as though they personally built the whole entity. One of the key skills of folk such as Brindley, Telford, Stephenson and Brunel was their ability to sell a vision to shareholders. The well known figures in engineering are often those that saw beyond the engineering itself. Their world wasn't so different to that found today as is often assumed.

 

JP

[Sea Dog]

That is probably so. The role of Engineer to the company - be it canal or railway - was an executive one that involved being accountable to the board for construction. A number of agents were usually employed to carry out the individual management of specific parts of the build to the Engineer's overall direction and it may very well have been that these agents were technically superior individuals to the Engineer at least in some of the specific details. History tends to simplify things by naming one individual as though they personally built the whole entity. One of the key skills of folk such as Brindley, Telford, Stephenson and Brunel was their ability to sell a vision to shareholders. The well known figures in engineering are often those that saw beyond the engineering itself. Their world wasn't so different to that found today as is often assumed.

 

JP

 

Nicely put.

[Derek R.]

Yes indeed. The same can be said of Grinling Gibbons http://www.britainexpress.com/History/gibbons.htm

Many High Churches, Cathedrals and stately homes claim his work, and he was undoubtedly a fine crafstman. But if he had done all the carvings in all the buildings - he would have been a very old man indeed! There's a lady historian/wood-carver at Blists Hill who has stated that quite a lot of work credited to him, was actually done by scholars of his 'school', and many were women. Similar might be said of canal art such as we know it, not every can or panel was done by Nurser or Hodgson as we well know. Some shine brighter than others, and some are illuminated by others.

[Pluto]

That is probably so. The role of Engineer to the company - be it canal or railway - was an executive one that involved being accountable to the board for construction. A number of agents were usually employed to carry out the individual management of specific parts of the build to the Engineer's overall direction and it may very well have been that these agents were technically superior individuals to the Engineer at least in some of the specific details. History tends to simplify things by naming one individual as though they personally built the whole entity. One of the key skills of folk such as Brindley, Telford, Stephenson and Brunel was their ability to sell a vision to shareholders. The well known figures in engineering are often those that saw beyond the engineering itself. Their world wasn't so different to that found today as is often assumed.

 

JP

Regarding inland waterways, it was people like Andrew Yarranton and Thomas Steers who first provided this vision, and showed the benefit of inland navigation to the economy. The problem with suggesting Brindley was the source of canal promotion and technology, is his association with the Duke of Bridgewater, a member of one of the wealthiest and most influential families in the country. Praising Brindley's work was, in effect, praising the governing elite, and this is why Brindley's praise has been taken to excess, as such praise usually is.

 

A study of inland waterway promotion in the seventeenth and early eighteenth century shows that the idea was already well established, as was the technology. Interestingly, I have just translated part of an early nineteenth century Austrian book written by an engineer who had visited many European waterways. He suggests that puddle was a British 'invention', though it is perhaps more likely that the geology of Britain provided more suitable clays than elsewhere in Europe. Clay puddle would certainly have been needed for the water features being built near stately homes in eighteenth century Britain, as well as for the water supply systems associated with water mills.

 

The early development of canals and inland waterways is far more complicated, and interesting, than Brindley suddenly appearing on the scene with all the answers.

[RLWP]

It is easy to avoid errors, it is just that television producers and researchers are either arrogant or deaf - they just do not listen to what is being explained to them.

 

Except they want a simple history that can be described in a more or less linear fashion in sixty minute slots (or fifty plus ten for export)

 

I avoid most historical programmes that I have read more than a couple of books about as I know I will end up critiquing it rather than enjoying it. Naturally, I'm dodging the current 'Full Steam Ahead' series

 

Richard

[Aurelia]

I cannot let Pluto's remark 'Praising Brindley's work was, in effect, praising the governing elite' pass unchallenged.

 

About three weeks after James Brindley's death, the Oxford Journal published a letter chronicling the recent opening of a section of the Trent and Mersey Canal.

 

'The banks on each side' writes the correspondent, 'were covered for many miles with an innumerable crowd of spectators, whose shouts with the ringing of bells, and the discharge of cannon, seemed to rend the sky. A solemn goblet was drank to the immortal memory of our lamented engineer, the late Mr Brindley, who is now supposed to preside (a guardian genius) over this canal.' (For anyone who is interested, the letter appeared on 17 October, 1772).

 

The October 1772 festivities celebrated a big boost to the economy of the Potteries. To view the carnival as a grovel to the aristocracy requires cynicism of no small order.

[Pluto]

Of course people gathered to celebrate the opening of a canal, and similar celebrations are recorded around the canal system, not just on those built by Brindley. What I am suggesting is that the subsequent contemporary published reports and commentary should be seen against the background of the Duke's influential position and the culture of the day. Would the rising merchant class, who paid for the highly-successful early northern canals, have been seen as a suitable subject for such glorification? I haven't found much contemporary material which praised them, rather the Duke of Bridgewater and Brindley were always portrayed as at the founders of the canal age, an age which was already well into its development, a development which can be traced back to the mid-seventeenth century and before.

 

British canals used little in the way of novel technology as that technology was already available on the continent. What IS important with regard to the development of British canals is the economic ideas behind their promotion, and it was that which interested visitors from other European countries, and which they discussed in publications in their home countries, especially those published after the end of the Napoleonic wars.

[Ray T]

Of course people gathered to celebrate the opening of a canal, and similar celebrations are recorded around the canal system, not just on those built by Brindley. What I am suggesting is that the subsequent contemporary published reports and commentary should be seen against the background of the Duke's influential position and the culture of the day. Would the rising merchant class, who paid for the highly-successful early northern canals, have been seen as a suitable subject for such glorification? I haven't found much contemporary material which praised them, rather the Duke of Bridgewater and Brindley were always portrayed as at the founders of the canal age, an age which was already well into its development, a development which can be traced back to the mid-seventeenth century and before.

 

British canals used little in the way of novel technology as that technology was already available on the continent. What IS important with regard to the development of British canals is the economic ideas behind their promotion, and it was that which interested visitors from other European countries, and which they discussed in publications in their home countries, especially those published after the end of the Napoleonic wars.

All hail this grand day when with gay colours flying,

The barges are seen on the current to glide,

When with fond emulation all parties are vying,

To make our canal of Old England the pride.

 

Chorus :

Long down its fair stream may the rich vessel glide,

And the Croydon Canal be of England the pride.

 

And may it long flourish, while commerce caressing,

Adorns its gay banks with her wealth-bringing stores;

To Croydon, and all round the country a blessing,

May industry's sons ever thrive on its shore!

 

And now my good fellows sure nothing is wanting

To heighten our mirth and our blessings crown,

But with the gay belles on its banks to be flaunting

When spring smiles again on this high-favoured town.

 

 

Composed by a 'gentleman' to celebrate the Croydon Canal.

It was sung at the opening in October 1809 by Mr J Walsh, one of the proprietors.

Words to be found in ‘Canal Songs’ by Jon Raven.

Information about the short-lived Croydon Canal can be found on the Canal Museum website.

 

http://www.waterwaysongs.co.uk/all_hail.htm

 

 

http://collections.canalrivertrust.org.uk/bw192.3.2.2.13.1.461

Edited August 5, 2016 by Ray T

[Aurelia]

What a great song, Ray. Thanks!

[Heartland]

It is of interest to see the Oxford Journal reference. James Brindley did much to get the Trent & Mersey built to the Potteries. There were family connection in the Potteries and the reference must also be viewed with that fact in mind