My Adventures 3: Brunel's London 10th September 2018

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On Monday the 10th September 2018 I headed up to The Embankment Tube Station to go on London Walks 'Brunel's London' walk. I arrived just over an hour early, so I decided to walk along the Victoria Embankment over Waterloo Bridge to the South Bank and back across Westminster Bridge and back to the start (about 1.5 miles).

I pass Cleopatra's Needle on the Victoria Embankment.

Cleopatra's Needle is the popular name for each of three Ancient Egyptian obelisks re-erected in London, Paris, and New York City during the nineteenth century. The obelisks in London and New York are a pair; the one in Paris is also part of a pair originally from a different site in Luxor, where its twin remains. Although all three needles are genuine Ancient Egyptian obelisks, their shared nickname is a misnomer, as they have no connection with the Ptolemaic Queen Cleopatra VII of Egypt and were already over a thousand years old in her lifetime. The London and New York needles were originally made during the reign of the 18th Dynasty Pharaoh Thutmose III. The Paris needle dates to the reign of the 19th Dynasty Pharaoh Ramesses II, and was the first to be moved and re-erected.

The London needle is on the Victoria Embankment near the Golden Jubilee Bridges.

It was originally erected in the Egyptian city of Heliopolis on the orders of Thutmose III, around 1450 BC. It remained in Alexandria until October 1877 when its transport to London was funded by William James Erasmus Wilson.

The obelisks are made of red granite, 21 meters (68 ft) high and weigh 224 tons. The Needle arrived in England after a horrendous journey by sea in 1878.

The British public subscribed £15,000 to bring it over from Alexandria in Egypt, and waited eagerly for the ‘needle’ to arrive.

A specially designed cigar-shaped container ship, called the Cleopatra, was used to convey this priceless treasure. It was built by the Dixon brothers and when finished was an iron cylinder, 93 feet long, 15 feet wide, and was divided into ten watertight compartments. A cabin, bilge keels, bridge and rudder were riveted on and to everyone’s delight …she floated!

But on October 14th 1877 in treacherous waters off the west coast of France in the Bay of Biscay disaster stuck… the Cleopatra was in danger of sinking.

The steam-ship towing her, the Olga, sent six volunteers in a boat to take off the Cleopatra’s crew, but the boat was swamped and the volunteers drowned. The names of the men who died are commemorated on one of the plaques to be seen today at the base of the Needle – William Askin, Michael Burns, James Gardiner, William Donald, Joseph Benton and William Patan.

Eventually the Olga drew alongside and rescued Cleopatra’s five crewmen and their skipper, and cut the towrope, leaving the vessel adrift in the Bay of Biscay.

In Britain the nation held its breath… would the Cleopatra remain buoyant – if not they had wasted a lot of money.

Five days later a ship spotted the Cleopatra floating peacefully and undamaged off the northern coast of Spain, and towed her to the nearest port, Ferrol.

Following her narrow escape, another steam-ship, the Anglia, was sent to tow the Cleopatra home.

Finally in January 1878 both vessels came up the Thames and the waiting crowds cheered as artillery salvoes roared a welcome.

The ‘needle’ was winched into position on the Embankment in September 1878, to the delight of the people.

If you walk along the Victoria Embankment, take a look at the wall beside the river. You can peer over the wall perilously close to the edge but that is not a very practical idea. If you stand at Cleopatra’s Needle or the Air Force Memorial there are safe balconies with stone balustrades where it is quite easy to see the wall beside the Thames. You will see a row of large lions’ heads, cast in bronze, that line the side of the Embankment. They were sculpted by Timothy Butler for of Sir Joseph Bazalgette’s Victorian sewage works programme in 1868-70.

The mouth of each lion holds a mooring ring, for use by anyone in an emergency needing to tie up a small vessel. There is very little evidence that the rings have ever been used. It is said that if the lions drink the water from the Thames, London will flood.

A rhyme helps to remember how to keep watch on the lions – “When the lions drink, London will sink. When it’s up to their manes, we’ll go down the drains.”

The lions who keep watch along the Thames in Central London, holding mooring rings in their mouths, play an interesting role as a flood warning system for superstitious Londoners, keen to keep an eye on water levels in the Thames.

Until recent times it was exceptionally rare to see the level of the Thames high enough to touch the lions’ heads. Since the 1980s, however, very high tides have become more common. While such an event is by no means a regular as every few weeks, there are times, particularly at spring and autumn tides when the tide does rise to touch the bronze heads.

I cross over Waterloo Bridge and head up The South Bank.

Sad to see Big Ben Tower covered in scaffolding but I assume it is necessary.

Big Ben is the nickname for the Great Bell of the clock at the north end of the Palace of Westminster in London and is usually extended to refer to both the clock and the clock tower. The official name of the tower in which Big Ben is located was originally the Clock Tower, but it was renamed Elizabeth Tower in 2012 to mark the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II.

I cross over the busy Westminster Bridge and back along the Victoria Embankment.

I am now at The Battle Of Britain Memorial.

The Battle of Britain Monument in London is a superb monument to The Few - commemorating those people who took part in this vital battle of the Second World War.

The monument utilises a panelled granite structure 25 m (82 ft) long which was originally designed as a smoke outlet for underground trains when they were powered by steam engines. A walkway was cut obliquely through the middle of the structure, and is lined with panels of high relief sculpture in bronze depicting scenes from the Battle of Britain. The centrepiece is an approximately life sized sculpture of airmen scrambling for their aircraft during the battle. The outside of the monument is lined with bronze plaques listing 2,936 pilots and aircrew from 14 countries who took part in the battle on the Allied side.

The sculptor of the monument is Paul Day. The statue was cast by Morris Singer, which is the oldest established fine art foundry in the world and has cast many prominent statues and sculptures in London and around the world, including the lions and fountains in Trafalgar Square.

Just a short walk up is the Royal Air force Memorial.

The Royal Air Force Memorial is a military memorial on the Victoria Embankment in central London, dedicated to the memory of the casualties of the Royal Air Force in World War I (and, by extension, all subsequent conflicts). Unveiled in 1923, it became a Grade II listed structure in 1958, and was upgraded to Grade II in 2018. It is considered to be the official memorial of the RAF and related services.

Around the top of the pylon, each face bears alternately the words PER ARDUA and AD ASTRA, from the motto of the RAF, "Per ardua ad astra". On the west side of the pylon facing the Embankment, the words "Per Ardua" are picked out in gold, and lower down there is the RAF insignia, and a dedication: IN MEMORY OF/ ALL RANKS OF THE/ ROYAL NAVAL AIR/ SERVICE ROYAL/ FLYING CORPS/ ROYAL AIR FORCE/ AND THOSE/ AIR FORCES FROM/ EVERY PART OF THE/ BRITISH EMPIRE/ WHO GAVE THEIR/ LIVES IN WINNING/ VICTORY FOR/ THEIR KING/ AND COUNTRY/ 1914–1918", and a quotation from Exodus, chapter 19: I BARE YOU ON EAGLES/ WINGS AND BROUGHT/ YOU UNTO/ MYSELF. Further down, on the base, is another inscription THIS INSCRIPTION IS ADDED/ IN REMEMBRANCE OF THOSE/ MEN AND WOMEN OF THE/ AIR FORCES OF EVERY PART OF/ THE BRITISH COMMONWEALTH AND EMPIRE/ WHO GAVE THEIR LIVES/ 1939–1945. The side facing the river bears the RAF insignia again and the inscription: 1914/ 1918/ IN/ PERPETUAL/ MEMORY/ 1939–1945.

Next I walk through the beautiful Whitehall Gardens.

Opened in 1870 the gardens stretch parallel with the Victoria Embankment. Statues located down the centre line of the garden are of William Tynedale, Sir Henry Bartle Frere and General Sir James Outram.

In 2000 the gardens won a Millennium Award to carry out works to improve the shrubs within the gardens.

Here sits the Statue of William Tyndale.

William Tyndale c. 1494 – c. 6 October 1536, was an English scholar who became a leading figure in the Protestant Reformation in the years leading up to his execution. He is well known for his translation of the Bible into English. He was influenced by the work of Desiderius Erasmus, who made the Greek New Testament available in Europe, and by Martin Luther. A number of partial translations had been made from the seventh century onward, but the spread of Wycliffe's Bible in the late 14th century led to the death penalty for anyone found in unlicensed possession of Scripture in English, although translations were available in all other major European languages.

So after a 1.5 mile walk I'm back at the Embankment station where I meet Gill the walk leader for Brunel's London walk.

BRUNEL'S LONDON WALK

Here I met Gill at 1040 hours and paid my £10 for the walk. It is an additional £5 for the boat ride that Gill gets at a discount price. I had arranged to pay myself.

So we board the RB1 Thames Clipper Boat run by TfL and we first set off towards Westminster.

This walk is primary about Isambard Kingdom Brunel but will also cover his father Marc Isambard Brunel and Henry Marc Brunel.

We head upriver towards Westminster Bridge at first. The bridge is painted predominantly green, the same colour as the leather seats in the House of Commons which is on the side of the Palace of Westminster nearest to the bridge. This is in contrast to Lambeth Bridge, which is red, the same colour as the seats in the House of Lords and is on the opposite side of the Houses of Parliament.

Hungerford Bridge

As we head towards Westminster we pass under our first of today's Brunel's Bridge. Hungerford Bridge.

The first Hungerford Bridge, designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, opened in 1845 as a suspension footbridge. It was named after the then Hungerford Market, because it went from the South Bank to Hungerford Market on the north side of the Thames.

In 1859 the original bridge was bought by the railway company extending the South Eastern Railway into the newly opened Charing Cross railway station. The railway company replaced the suspension bridge with a structure designed by Sir John Hawkshaw, comprising nine spans made of wrought iron lattice girders, which opened in 1864. The chains from the old bridge were re-used in Bristol's Clifton Suspension Bridge. The original brick pile buttresses of Brunel's footbridge are still in use, though the one on the Charing Cross side is now much closer to the river bank than it was originally, due to the building of the Victoria Embankment, completed in 1870. The buttress on the South Bank side still has the entrances and steps from the original steamer pier Brunel built on to the footbridge.

Walkways were added on each side, with the upstream one later being removed when the railway was widened. Another walkway was temporarily added in 1951 when an Army Bailey bridge was constructed for the Festival of Britain. In 1980 a temporary walkway was erected on the upstream side while the downstream railway bridge and walkway were refurbished. It is one of only three bridges in London to combine pedestrian and rail use; the others being Fulham Railway Bridge and Barnes Railway Bridge.

The Bridge, which took pedestrians to Hungerford Market (now Charing Cross Station), was taken down in 1864 and replaced with a railway bridge.

“The railway uses brick piers built by Brunel,” Gill tells us and that the piers are hollow to save on bricks. I imagine that Brunel would be proud to see his bridge still in use daily today by thousands.

Hungerford Bridge

We pass under the bridge again and head down river to today's second Brunel Bridge , Blackfriars Bridge.

Blackfriars Railway Bridge was constructed in 1886 . Intriguingly, Blackfriars is the first railway station in the world to span over a river. This Bridge was actually completed after Brunel’s death, but his son, also an engineer, finished it off with his partner Sir John Wolfe Barry.

We pass the OXO Tower on the South Bank.

Around 1900 a power station was built on the site of Oxo Tower Wharf to supply electricity to the Post Office.

In the late 1920s it was purchased by the Liebig Extract of Meat Company which demolished much of the building but extended its riverside frontage – look carefully next time you visit and you will see where it bends.

The company made the famous OXO beef cube and its architect, Albert Moore, incorporated the design as windows on a tower to get around a ban on skyline advertising!

The second bridge, built slightly further downstream (to the east), was originally called St Paul's Railway Bridge and opened in 1886. It was designed by John Wolfe-Barry and Henry Marc Brunel and is made of wrought iron. It was built by Lucas & Aird. When St Paul's railway station changed its name to Blackfriars in 1937 the name of the bridge was changed as well.

At the southern end of the bridge was Blackfriars Bridge railway station which opened in 1864 before closing to passengers in 1885 following the opening of what is today the main Blackfriars station. Blackfriars Bridge railway stationcontinued as a goods stop until 1964 when it was completely demolished, and much of it redeveloped into offices.

There have been two structures with the name. The first bridge was opened in 1864 and was designed by Joseph Cubittfor the London, Chatham and Dover Railway. Massive abutments at each end carried the railway's insignia, preserved and restored on the south side. Following the formation of the Southern Railway in 1924, inter-city and continental services were concentrated on Waterloo, and St Paul's Station became a local and suburban stop. For this reason, the use of the original bridge gradually declined. It eventually became too weak to support modern trains, and was therefore removed in 1985 – all that remains is a series of columns crossing the Thames and the southern abutment, which is a Grade II listed structure.

We pass the Golden Hind Replica Boat

On our left we pass The Tower Of London.

HMS Belfast

Now we reach our 3rd and surprise Brunel Bridge, Tower Bridge! I had no idea of Brunel's connection to this bridge.The bridge was officially opened on 30 June 1894 by the then Prince of Wales (the future King Edward VII), and his wife, The Princess of Wales (Alexandra of Denmark).

Tower Bridge. associated engineer. Sir John Wolfe Barry Henry Marc Brunel. date April 1886

“This bridge is one of the most famous in the world, but the Victorians hated it. They thought it dishonest. The bridge is made of steel but clad with masonry to fit in aesthetically with the Tower of London. Tower Bridge is the drawbridge for London, but the Victorians thought if you build a steel bridge, it should look like a steel bridge. If you want it to look like a masonry bridge, build it out of masonry.”

Yacht owned by The Owner of Tottenham FC So we are told

Canary Wharf now comes into view

We pass Execution dock ( a red building with a 'E' on it).

Execution Dock was a place in the River Thames near the shoreline at Wapping, London, that was used for more than 400 years to execute pirates, smugglers and mutineers who had been sentenced to death by Admiralty courts. The "dock" consisted of a scaffold for hanging. Its last executions were in 1830.

This global structure has been constructed from more than a mile of galvanised steel rod. The discs show the route of Sir Francis Drake's circum-navigational voyage around the earth which was completed at this waterfront in 1581. Circumsphere is mounted on a Dolphin which is the name given to many small mooring structures which sit out in the river Thames. These structures provided low-tide moorings for ships, barges, tugs and lighters.

We now pass Greenwich and the Cutty Sark ship.

We dock at Malt House Pier after about a 40 minute boat trip.

Just across from the pier is the building and launch site of Brunel's SS Great Eastern.

At the South Eastern tip of Millwall, near Canary Wharf in the East End of London, lie the remains of the SS Great Eastern’s launch ramp. Designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, the SS Great Eastern was built to carry passengers and cargo between England and Australia, and at the time of her launch in 1858 was the largest ship the world had ever seen. She was also the first ship of her time to be constructed almost entirely of metal.

Perhaps it is strange then that the launch site that was chosen for this behemoth was at a tight meander on the Thames, between the Isle of Dogs and Deptford. Why was this?

Right from the outset, Brunel and his business partner Scott Russell were under the constraints of an extremely tight budget for the building of the SS Great Eastern. Originally estimated to cost £500,000, this soon had to be whittled down to £377,000, and then further to £258,000. Because of these cost restraints it was decided that building a brand new dock to accommodate the ship was simply not feasible. Instead, Brunel and Russell were forced to look for an existing site suitable to build and launch the ship.

In the end a site called “Napier Yard” was chosen, which just so happened to sit next to Scott Russell’s own – albeit smaller – Millwall Dock. Napier Yard was also ideally placed right next to the Millwall Iron Works (also owned at the time by Scott Russell), and had good transport links to the rest of the country via the numerous railway lines that had recently been built in the area. Finally, being at the centre of 19th century shipbuilding, Millwall had a highly skilled shipbuilding workforce, something that was invaluable for a ship of the Great Eastern’s size and complexity.

Work began on the SS Great Eastern in the spring of 1854 and was completed by November 1857. It was planned that the ship was to be launched sideways into the Thames as it was too long for a conventional launch. To support this sideways launch, Brunel had ordered the construction of two slipways into the Thames which would support the Great Eastern into the water. This wasn’t the preferred solution however; Brunel had originally opted for a single, 700ft slipway but these plans were dropped due to cost concerns.

In the end the launch date was set for the 3rd November, and thousands of spectators turned up to see the event (much to the annoyance of Brunel who, due to the previously untried sideways launch method, had hoped for a quiet affair). However, when the words “I christen this ship… Leviathan” were spoken, nothing happened and the ship simply stayed put.

Rather embarrassing!

Over the next few days various investigations were carried out to determine why the ship did not move, and in the end it was decided that the steam winches were simply not up to the job of pulling the Great Eastern into the Thames. In fact, it took another three attempts and three months to finally get the ship into the water.

For centuries all of Millwall and Cubitt Town was an occasionally flooded but fertile meadow land, supporting a small Middlesex fishing, watermen and farming community. By the 19th century Millwall Iron Works had been built on this land. From 1855-58 Sir William Fairbairn built early iron ships here and undertook the model tests for the development of the box girder original Britannia Bridge[1] which connected Anglesey until damaged by fire and replaced with a different type of tall bridge.

John Scott Russell bought the works and was instrumental in building here The SS Great Eastern, where it was launched. This was a steam and sail ship designed by engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel, and the largest ship in the world for its time, when built in 1858. The ship may not have lasted long in its commercial use, but the shipyard and site where it was launched have fared better.

Some of the land developed in the 20th century into a pigment/dye factory, having immediate access to the various imports required in Poplar. According to local lore, the local bird-life would get into the factory buildings and become contaminated with the dyes: it was reputedly common to see pigeons in various unusual colours flying around the area. The factory relocated elsewhere in the late 1980s, with the decline of the Poplar docks as a functioning commercial port in favour of larger facilities for container ships.

In 1988 Burrells was converted to residential use and consists of c. 400 apartments with central leisure facilities.

Burrells Wharf is a riverside residential estate, owned by its leaseholders, in London, England in the south-central Docklands. Rectangular and adjoining on a shorter side the River Thames (facing Deptford) Burrells Wharf is in part of Poplar historically and sometimes termed Millwall on the Isle of Dogs close to that part of Poplar which became Cubitt Town in the 19th century.

We walk into Island Gardens where Gill points across the river, to where you can just make out the statue of Peter The Great.

This oddly proportioned and somewhat disturbing statue of Peter the Great with a throne and a Court Dwarf stands in a pocket park near the Millenium Quay housing development in Deptford.

It was installed here in 1998 to commemorate the tercentenary of Peter the Great's time studying shipbuilding at the Royal Shipyard and the Old Royal Naval College in Greenwich.

Peter and a Dwarf with a throne stand on a platform of granite, framed by two plinths. The plinths are engraved with inscriptions, topped with bronze cannon, and fronted with grinning chimeric figures.

Peter the Great appears to be about 2 times life size, and the dwarf may be 1 1/2 times life size. The figures are cast in bronze, and wear fine period costumes with elaborate hats, the curly wigs that were in fashion at the time, and buckled shoes.

The dwarf is dressed elaborately in fine clothes that he might wear in a court visit with the Tsar. He wears a topcoat covered with bug beads, over a buttoned best and short knee-length breeches. His oval hat is lined with ribbon and is festooned with a flower. A cherub playing the flute sits on his shoulder, the dwarf holds an armillary sphere and what appears to be part of a scale.

Peter wears breeches that end at the knee, under a long 3/4-sleeve coat festooned with his badge of rank as Tsar. Underneath the coat, he wears a fine garment with what looks like studs or beads in the shape of crowns and tails. The garment is belted at the waist with a large buckle. Underneath that, he wears a blouse with ruffled sleeves, and a ruffled collar that cascades down his chest. he holds a curved pipe with a small bowl in his left hand, and a ship's spyglass in his right. His three-cornered hat is lined with ribbon and bears a badge of rank and a ribbon extending.

The monument is engraved in English on the left plinth and Russian on the right plinth. We will not transcribe the Russian inscriptions, but the English inscription reads as follows:

"Peter the Great

Russian Czar, Peter the Great, arrived in England in January 1698 and stayed in Sir John Evelyn's house, Sayes Court in Deptford for four months.

This monument is erected near the royal shipyard where Peter the Great studied the English science of shipbuilding.

The monument is a gift from the Russian people and commemorates the visit of Peter the Great to this country in search of knowledge and experience.

[Rear of left plinth:]

Sculptor Mihail Chemiakin, USA.

Architect Viacheslav Bukhaev, Russia."

Cutty Sark.

We walked away from the Island Gardens passing The Ferry House Public House.

There has been a ferry to Greenwich from the site of the pub since the 1300s, and it is likely there was a building or shelter serving refreshments to waiting passengers from very early on. The first mention of the name Ferry House was in about 1740, and was applied to a building that was formerly known as the Starch House.

According to ‘Survey of London’:

This was probably a starch factory rather than a place for starching linen … the main requirements for starch-making would have been a plentiful supply of clean water and an area of open ground, together with a wooden shed. Starch in the eighteenth century was generally prepared from refuse wheat. The whole grains were steeped in vats of water, left in the sun to hasten fermentation, and, when sufficiently soft, put into canvas bags and beaten out over a plank laid across the top of a receiving vessel, leaving the husks behind. The flour paste was further steeped in water until a thick sediment of starch was obtained, which was left in the sun to dry.

View from the river to Greenwich Maritime Museum

We made our way to Island Gardens and onto the Docklands Light Railway.

We pass through the financial centre of London, Canary Wharf. Once a working dock, now home to the rich and big banks.

We pass the Limehouse Basin and alight at Shadwell, where we get the Overground train (ironically goes straight underground) to travel through Brunel's tunnel.

This is the only way to travel through now, shame you don't get to see it.

The Thames Tunnel is an underwater tunnel, built beneath the River Thames in London, connecting Rotherhitheand Wapping. It measures 35 feet (11 m) wide by 20 feet (6 m) high and is 1,300 feet (396 m) long, running at a depth of 75 feet (23 m) below the river surface measured at high tide. It was the first tunnel known to have been constructed successfully underneath a navigable river and was built between 1825 and 1843 using Marc Isambard Brunel's and Thomas Cochrane's newly invented tunnelling shield technology, by Brunel and his son Isambard Kingdom Brunel.

The tunnel was originally designed for horse-drawn carriages, but was never used for that purpose. Since 2010 it forms part of the London Overground railway network under ownership of Transport for London.

The tunnel was dug between 1825 and 1843, and was the first tunnel ever excavated beneath a major river. It was originally pedestrian-only, but was later converted to rail use. It remains in service today on the London Overground network.

When it opened in 1843 the Thames Tunnel was described as the Eighth Wonder of the World. People came from far and wide to see the first tunnel under a river.

On the first day, fifty thousand people descended the staircase and paid a penny to walk through the tunnel. By the end of the first three months there were a million people, or half the population of London. This was the most successful visitor attraction in the world.

In the age of sail and horse-drawn coaches, people came from all over the world and bought souvenirs and listened to the entertainment in the cross-tunnel arches.

The idea, of course, was not entertainment but to move cargo and turn a profit. So what happened?

The trade of the world came up the Thames, and there were three thousand tall masted ships in the river everyday. A tunnel was the only to get cargo across the river without stopping the tall masted ships, but no-one had tunnelled under a river before.

Brunel invented the Miners’ Cage, or tunnelling shield. Miners would dig inside a protective frame, and bricklayers would build the wall as they advanced. Horses would pull loaded carts down huge double helix ramps down into the tunnel and across to the other side.

Work started in 1825 but conditions were appalling. Inside each cage, the miner would carefully dig out the wall in front, but in strips four inches wide. When he was done, and the man above and below as well, the whole row would be pushed forwards using screw jacks. Bricklayers working behind them made everything secure and the process began again. The Thames was tunnelled in four inch strips by miners using short handled spades.

Shield in use during construction

As they worked, the miners showered in raw sewage and dodged flames from ignited methane gas. It was the worst job in the world, but the men only worked four hour shifts. They collapsed after four hours, and were replaced by men who were still breathing, and they worked until they fell over and were replaced in their turn…

The Tunnel flooded five times, and in the worst flood six men drowned and Isambard Kingdom Brunel barely escaped with his life.

The tunnel finally opened eighteen years later in 1843, but only for pedestrians. They ran out of money and could not afford to build the ramps to get cargo into the cargo tunnel. The tunnel opened as a visitor attraction.

Even under construction, the Tunnel was a tourist attraction, and when complete millions of people came to pay a penny to walk through the ‘Eighth Wonder of the World’

The East London Railway company bought the tunnel in 1865 with the intention of digging new tunnels to link up from the North and South to link the Thames Tunnel to the national railway network. Four years later, in 1869, trains started to run through the tunnel meant for horses and carts. For the first time the tunnel was doing what it was intended to do – carrying freight across the river.

In 1869 electric trains had not yet appeared on the national network, so the trains running through the tunnel were hauled by steam engines. Entering the tunnel the trains would go downhill towards the low point at mid-river before starting the hard climb back up to the surface. The harder a steam engine works the more smoke it produces. In railway tunnels on land there are frequent shafts to allow the smoke to escape to the surface. No ventilation shafts could be built in the river so The Thames Tunnel was full of smoke making life very unpleasant for the steam engine drivers and firemen.

In 1913 the railway was electrified and incorporated into the London Underground as the East London Line, making the Thames Tunnel the oldest tunnel in the oldest underground system in the world. This is the birthplace of the tube!

A scale model of the tunnelling shield at the Brunel Museum at Rotherhithe

Full info on the Thames Tunnel can be read here

We leave the station and take the short walk to The Brunel Museum along Rotherhithe street.

Entry is included free with the walk and we are taken down below in the shaft that used to lead to the tunnel.

The museum is a Scheduled Ancient Monument housing a collection of prints, watercolours, statues, peepshows and models that tell the dramatic story of Brunel’s first and last projects: the Thames Tunnel and the Great Eastern. A long battle against flood, death and disaster to triumphal opening and launch.

Lighted panels, original artefacts and a film about the life of Britain’s most famous engineer.

Now the Brunel's London walk is over , I wander up the road and pass The Mayflower Pub, I'll come back in a bit.

Just down the road is St Marys Church.

St Mary's Church dates back to the 12th century and was rebuilt by local shipbuilders in the Georgian era.

The nautical connections of the area are reflected in the construction of the church.

The barrel roof was made to look like an up turned ship and the supporting pillars are complete tree trunks encased in plaster.

The communion table and two chairs are made from wood from the 98-gun ship the Temeraire, second in command at the Battle of Trafalgar.The graveyard holds some interesting stories.

Three of the four owners of the Mayflower ship are buried here including Christopher Jones, captain when the ship sailed to America with the Father Pilgrims in 1620.

A statue by Jamie Sargeant for Christopher Jones was unveiled on July 2nd 1995 and paid for by The Sons and Daughters of the Pilgrims.

You will also find the tomb of Prince Lee Boo.

In September 1782 three Rotherhithe men sailed to China aboard the East India Company's ship the Antelope.

It took Captain Wilson and his men nine months to reach China before returning a different route north east of the Philippines.

They passed a group of unknown islands, later called the Palau Islands, where they were shipwrecked after a storm.

They took refuge on the Island of Ulong and a friendly relationship was born with the chief, Abba Thulle.

Food was given to the English sailors and local trees were used to build a new boat to get them to China.

The King watched as the ship was built using grindstones, anvils and other tools.

Abba Thulle was so impressed by the skills he had witnessed, he hoped that his second son, Lee Boo, would learn what they knew.

Three months later the English set sail with Prince Lee Boo onboard.

Eighteen days later they reached China before the long voyage back to England.

The ship, Morse, arrived back in England on 14 July 1784 where Lee Boo was taken to the home of Captain Wilson in Paradise Row, Rotherhithe.

He settled in London where he attended church services, school, learned the language and dressed as an Englishman.

In mid-December, only months after arriving in London, Lee Boo contracted smallpox.

He died on 27 December and lies buried to the left of the church entrance.

Rotherhithe had the last case of the Great Plague in 1679 and it is thought the last victim is buried at St Mary's Church.

To the memory of Christopher Jones 1570 - 1622, master of the Mayflower. He landed 102 planters & adventurers at Plymouth Massachusetts 21.Dec.1620. They formed the Mayflower Compact & the first permanent colony in New England.

The statue represents Jones looking back at England, while the child is looking towards the New World. It was paid for by the 'Sons and Daughters of the Pilgrims'.

St Mary's Free School.

You will notice the two statues of schoolchildren wearing uniform from the 18th century.

The school was founded in the 1600s by Peter Hills and Robert Bell, two Elizabethan seafarers, to teach the sons of local seafarers.

They funded the school with the sum of £3 per annum and a brass plaque and other objects can be found in the church.

The original school was founded in 1613 and later moved in 1797 to the building you see today.

It is thought to be the oldest elementary school in London.

Next to the school is the Watch House from 1821.

This was used by the local watchman or constable to watch out for wrongdoers, particularly body-snatchers raiding graves.

Watchmen wearing white overcoats and carrying lanterns were meant to be seen and heard, they called the time and weather.

Watchmen wearing blue were 'silent' and checked dark corners of the local area.

This watch house consisted of 1 beadle, 1 constable and 14 watchmen.

Bodysnatching was common in this area as surgeons at the local Guy's hospital required fresh corpses and body parts for medical research.

his practice was common around London and 'Resurrection Men' would take bodies from graves and disguise them as merchandise.

Legally, only bodies of convicted criminals could be taken.

In 1832, The Anatomy Act was passed, making it an offence to rob a grave.

It was only legal to dissect the unclaimed bodies of people who had died in hospitals or poor houses.

Thames Tunnel Mill

This is a listed mid 19th century former mill building and warehouse. It is one of the earliest warehouse residential conversions in Docklands.

I am now back at The Mayflower Pub where I stop for a pint of Sharps Atlantic Ale.

The Mayflower pub stands on the site of The Shippe pub that dates back to around 1550.

It is close to where the Mayflower ship was fitted out for the long transatlantic voyage.

The pub was rebuilt as the Spread Eagle and Crown in 1780 and renamed as The Mayflower in 1957.

It was the nearby landing steps to this pub that the Pilgrim Fathers set sail aboard The Mayflower Ship.

The Pilgrims were mostly a group of separatists who had broken away from the Church of England.

They decided to opt for a new life after hearing tales of earlier settlers to the New World.

The Pilgrims sailed to Southampton on 5th August 1620 where it was joined by the Speedwell.

This ship proved to be un-seaworthy forcing them to turn back twice before The Mayflower took on some of her passengers.

She finally set sail from Plymouth, south west England on 6 September 1620 with 102 passengers aboard.

Two months later they arrived along the east coast of America and landed in Plymouth Bay, Massachusetts, on 21st December.

They were the first permanent European settlers in America.

Across The Thames I can see the Captain Kidd Pub ,drank here a few times.

Tea, coffee, sugar, rum, spices, silks, furs and tobacco were just some of the cargoes brought into Wapping during the 18th and 19th Centuries.Pirates and thieves also flourished. Pirates would ambush ships coming into the area and also steal outgoing cargoes.

Across the river you can see the Captain Kidd pub, named after the famous pirate executed at Execution Dock in 1701.

Execution Dock was located by the Thames near to this pub and dealt with convicted pirates for over 400 years.

Pirates who operated on the seas and abroad would also be tried back in London.

The gallows were located by the Thames so that the tide could wash over the body three times.

More notorious pirates, including Kidd, were left to hang in a gibbet, a type of metal cage, to deter other would be criminals.

I walk back along the Thames and pass This statue 'Sunshine Weekly and the Pilgrim’s Pocket' depicts a 17th century pilgrim and a boy.

I continue on and can see the Prospect of Whitby Pub, drank here a few times too. The Prospect Of Whitby in Wapping is London's oldest riverside pub dating back to 1520. The pub has an illustrious history.

I reach the Rotherhithe Street Biscule Bridge. If you don't know what a Bascule bridge is (I didn't), then check Wikipedia's article on them here. Bascule bridges are designed to allow unlimited vertical height with relatively low energy to open them due to the use of a counterbalance. This means they're particularly suited for bridges that tall vessels need to sail through.

This particular bridge is a 'double leaf' Bascule bridge - which simply means there's two halves that both open. These are more accurately named "Scherzer rolling bascule lift bridges" after the American Engineer William Donald Scherzer who refined the Bascule design into the rolling lift bridge. The original Bascule design used a single large axle, whereas the rolling lift bridge has the weighted counterbalance that rolls back on a hinge.

I pass The Salt Quay Pub, A Greene King pub on the riverside near the tip of the Rotherhithe peninsula.

I pass The Old Fire Station on Rotherhithe Street.

Views across to Canary Wharf

I am now walking alongside Greenland Dock.

The dock dates back to the 17th Century and was originally known as Howland Great Wet Dock.

It was used as a shelter for ships ready to unload their goods at the nearby legal quays.

It was also twice the current size and one of the largest in the world.

It was later renamed Greenland Dock in recognition of the whaling trade during the 18th Century.

Many ships sailed from London to Greenland hunting whales for blubber and whalebone.

The blubber was rendered down to produce oil for lamps, to lubricate machinery and even for use in soap.

The bones were used in umbrellas and corsets. Boilers, tanks and whaling fleets would have been the busy scene along the dock where you stand today.

As I continued along Rotherhithe Street I passed the Blacksmith's Arms.Rotherhithe Street is the longest street in London.

In the early 1900s Greenland Dock was expanded by engineer Sir James Walker, who also built Tower Bridge.

The whaling trade declined in the 19th century and gave way to timber and grain imports.

In 1806 the dock was sold to William Richie, a Greenwich timber merchant and founder of the Surrey Commercial Dock Company.

Timber, or deal, dominated Greenland Dock for over 100 years with huge warehouses and timber ponds.

The timber was imported from Scandinavian and Baltic countries and was unloaded by London's famous Deal Porters - athletic men who unloaded, carried and stacked the timber.

Bombing during WW2 devastated the docks but they did revive until the timber trade ceased and the docks closed in 1970.

A majority of the warehouses were demolished and rebuilt in the late 1980s as part of the LDDCplans. It is now mostly residential.