Long Lost Walk...
This blog will be sketchy as its been over 2 years since I did it and not fresh in my memory!
I set off on my very first walk with the friendly folk from the Facebook Page
Walking For Pleasure.
I arrived first at
PaperMill Lock near Little Baddow,Chelmsford,Essex. I parked up and used the toilets and cafe at the lock whilst waiting for the others to arrive.
Papermill lock is a popular and beautiful tourist location, although in
mid Essex, it is ideal for a day in the countryside. Papermill lock
offers canal cruises along the unspoilt Chelmer and Blackwater
Navigation.
The original water mill on the lower island at Little Baddow was
built in Saxon times, and by 1573 a second mill, Huskards, had been
built on the same island.
Both mills were run by one John Hawes, who was fined 2 shillings
because:
'by penning of his waters above his mark hath and doth
damage to all the Queen's tenants
and farmers of the honour of Bewleigh in drowning the meadows and low
grounds and for not drawing up his gates upon rage of waters in the hay
time and also hath
marred a certain highway or lane leading from Baddow bridge unto the
mill called Huskardes mill which the said miller is to repair and amend
for the avoidance of
further inconvenience'.
At that time Huskards Mill operated as both a corn mill and as a
mill for fulling cloth. In the 1750's it became the first paper mill in
Essex, run by Thomas Hodges and employing 3 men with papermaking skills
and an apprentice. In around 1800 the mill was taken over by Benjamin
Livermore who
continued to operate it as a paper mill for almost another twenty years
until it was re-converted for grinding flour.
Following the creation of the canal in 1797 a wharf was built here,
together with an overnight bothy for the bargees,
stables for the horses (now the tea house), and paddocks for livestock.
The Chelmer & Blackwater Navigation has long unbroken history
starting in June 1793 when an Act of Parliament was passed authorising the making and maintaining of a navigable waterway between the town of
Chelmsford in the County of Essex, and a place called Colliers Reach.
The great canal architect, John Rennie, was appointed Chief Engineer,
and though he rarely visited the embryonic waterway, his hallmarks can
be seen in the mellow redbrick bridges and locks. Richard Coates became
Resident Engineer, and completed the Navigation’s construction within
four years, though trade to Little Baddow had commenced within three.
Coates settled on the waterway and became a major barge owner and
merchant – his name being remembered at Coates Quay in Springfield
Basin.
In its heyday in the mid 19th century up to 60,000 tons of freight
was carried along the 14 miles of the navigation, rising 77ft via 12
locks between Heybridge Basin, on the Blackwater Estuary, and
Springfield Basin, close to the heart of Chelmsford. Much coal, corn and
timber was transhipped in Heybridge Basin between seagoing ships and
navigation barges, though local freight was carried, too, with every
parish having its waterside wharf. Wood and iron was taken to Chelmsford
to build the Great Eastern Railway, which, in turn, took freight away
from the waterway, heralding its decline. With dwindling traffic,
horse-drawn barges survived into the 1950s, and the last diesel lighter
loaded timber from a Scandinavian steamer for Browns Wharf in 1972.
Soon after the last barge “Julie” took semi-retirement, the
traditional passenger barge “Victoria” opened up the navigation’s
tranquil waters to the public, and since the 1970s the Company has
looked to leisure for its future, with moorings for private cruisers and
narrowboats, canoeing, fishing and walking. The Canal Centre at Paper
Mill, with its Old Stables Tea Rooms, river trips and hire boats, opened
in 2002.
After a while we were all present. We set off along the road and took a footpath through farmland,through fields of wheat.
I got my first introduction to
Geocaching on this walk, and I have had a go at this a few times since!
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| Crossing a Ford |
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| A Mercedes crossing a Ford |
We pass some lovely houses complete with their own Peacocks.
Opposite some houses we took another footpath past some horses.
Back out onto some more road walking.
We leave the footpath and head up towards
Ulting.
All Saints School at Ulting This is the old original Victorian school that was built in 1865 for Ulting village.
Ulting was the location of the first
sugar beet factory in England,
although its useful life was cut short by cheap imports of cane sugar.
All Saints, the village
church,
has been standing since 1150, with a major restoration taking place in
the 1870s. The church was once a place of pilgrimage ranking with
Walsingham and other famous shrines.
The
River Chelmer runs next to the church and through Ulting.
Parish Church of All Saints stands at
the S.W. end of the parish. The walls are of flint
and puddingstone-rubble with dressings of freestone; the roofs are tiled. The
Chancel and
Nave
were both built early in the 13th century, but the
the base of the walls may possibly be of earlier date.
The church was extensively restored in 1873, and
the
North Porch and
South Vestry are modern.
We stopped here for lunch behind the church beside The Chelmer.
The history of milling around Ulting, and its relationship to
waterways, goes back to Saxon times, although the first named miller in
written records is Richard Ulting in 1496.
In fact the village name 'Ult-ing' is derived from the old Anglo-Saxon
name for the river, the 'Ult', (probably the River Ter) and the
settlers or 'ingas' living there.
We set off back down the road from whence we came and took another path back into farmland.
We walked through a farm and came across a locked gate, which we had to climb to get back out onto another road to continue the walk.
We now reach the Chelmer once again and follow this again.
We reach Hoe Mill Lock.Where we crossed the river to walk along the other bank.
Hoe Mill Lock has the largest drop on the Navigation, at 8 feet and 3
inches. As a result there is a danger of swamping the boats when
filling the lock,
and so the lock paddles on the upper gates are located in underground
side culverts. The lock is named after a corn mill which had existed
near the site
from Saxon times to 1914 when it was demolished. In 1795, Hoe Mill was
bought by Robert Marriage. His sons, Robert and James, inherited the
mill.
They were both Quakers and deeply opposed to the slave trade.
They decided to build a sugar beet mill on the banks of the canal,
believing that locally
produced beet sugar would undermine the importation of cane sugar
largely produced in the Caribbean using slave labour.
Their aim was "a desire to obtain the best information and to promote
the abolition of slavery, by producing an article of free labour."
The mill was sited half a mile downstream from Hoe Mill, near where this
walk first joins the towpath.
The mill employed 30 men, women and children. The process of converting
beet into sugar consisted of first rasping the sugar beet roots and then
crushing the
beet to a pulp which was pressed. The resulting liquor was reduced by
boiling and then clarified, then finally any remaining liquid was
evaporated off and the
residue crystallised. The left-over pulp was used as cattle feed. Sadly
the mill failed after just 2 years partly, it is believed, through the
resistance of various
influential businessmen who wished to continue to import from the West
Indies.
We pass Ulting Church again on the other bank and get some nice pictures from this vantage point.
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| A Comma Butterfly |
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| Damsel Flies |
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We arrive back at Papermill Lock where we stop for tea and cake before departing to go home,about a 8 mile walk in all. A very pleasurable one at that!
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