Shropshire Routes to Roots

5. The East Shropshire canals

Tub Boats

In east Shropshire, three private 'tub boat' canals with purely local ambitions had been constructed.

Each tub boat was about 6 metres (20 feet) long and 2 metres (6 feet 4 inches) wide, and could carry up to eight tons, depending on their depth. The boats were connected together and were pulled in trains by a horse. One contemporary report claimed that each horse could pull an astonishing 140 tons, although this seems highly optimistic. More realistically, a horse could cope with a broad barge of 70 tons.

Tub boats on a canal Larger image, in a new window [25kb] [Reproduced with kind permission of British Waterways]

Local Canals

The Donnington Wood Canal served the mines, ironworks and other businesses of Lord Gower, a wealthy industrialist.

From the end of this was built the one and three-quarter mile long Wombridge Canal, which linked William Reynold's mines with furnaces at Donnington Wood.

The shorter Ketley Canal from Ketley to Oakengates was also built by William Reynolds. This canal had an inclined plane, where the boats were carried down a 22 metre (73 feet) fall on a cradle on rails. There was also an inclined plane on a later branch of the Donnington Wood Canal.

The Shropshire Canal

Although also a tub boat canal, the Shropshire Canal was a more ambitious concern. Unlike the others, it was built by a company (the Shropshire Canal Company) following an Act of Parliament, passed in 1788. Nevertheless, most of the subscribers were local industrialists, including William Reynolds, Samuel Derby, John Wilkinson and the Marquis of Stafford. Reynolds carried out the survey and Jessop gave evidence to Parliament.

The canal rose 37 metres (120 feet) by an inclined plane from its junction with the Donnington Wood Canal, past the junction with the Ketley Canal, and then descended 38 metres (126 feet) by another inclined plane. It continued past Madeley and what is now Blists Hill Open Air Museum to its third incline, where it descended 63 metres (207 feet) to Coalport. It then ran for three-quarters of a mile close to the River Severn. The main line, seven and three-quarter miles long, opened in 1791. A two and three-quarter mile branch from the summit level was opened the following year to above Coalbrookdale, though beyond Horsehay it was probably replaced by a tramroad about 1800.

The inclined plane at Blists Hill Larger image, in a new window [43kb] [Secret Shropshire]

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