River Witham
The River Witham is a river almost entirely in the county of Lincolnshire in the east of England. It rises south of Grantham close to South Witham at, passes through the centre of Grantham, passes Lincoln at and at Boston,, flows into The Haven, a tidal arm of The Wash, near RSPB Frampton Marsh. The name "Witham" seems to be extremely old and of unknown origin. Archaeological and documentary evidence shows the importance of the Witham as a navigable river from the Iron Age onwards. From Roman times it was navigable to Lincoln, from where the Fossdyke was constructed to link it to the River Trent. The mouth of the river moved in 1014 following severe flooding, and Boston became important as a port.
From 1142 onwards, sluices were constructed to prevent flooding by the sea, and this culminated in the Great Sluice, which was constructed in 1766. It maintained river levels above Boston, and helped to scour the channel below it. The land through which the lower river runs has been the subject of much land drainage, and many drains are connected to the Witham by flood doors, which block them off if river levels rise rapidly. The river is navigable from Brayford Pool in Lincoln to Boston. Its locks are at Lincoln, Bardney and the Grand/Great Sluice. Passage through the latter is restricted typically to 4-hour intervals during daylight when the tidal levels are suitable. The river provides access for boaters to the Witham Navigable Drains, to the north of Boston, and to the South Forty-Foot Drain to the south, which was reopened as part of the Fens Waterways Link, a project to link the river to the Nene flowing through the city of Peterborough. From Brayford Pool the Fossdyke Navigation links to the Trent.
Route
The Witham's course, which flows to the north and then to the south-east may be the result of glaciation redirecting older rivers. The source of the river is on high ground near South Witham, Lincolnshire, at around above ordnance datum. After briefly flowing to the east to reach South Witham, it flows generally north, passing through Colsterworth where it is crossed by the A1 road, which largely follows the line of the river to Newark on Trent. At Great Ponton, it is joined by the Cringle Brook on its left bank, and continues through Grantham, where it has already descended to AOD. After Barkston it turns to the west to pass through Marston. Foston Beck joins on the left bank, and at Long Bennington it resumes its northerly course. Beyond Claypole and near Barnby in the Willows it forms the border between Lincolnshire and Nottinghamshire for about, before passing through an Army training area near Beckingham. The River Brant joins on the right bank, before it passes through North Hykeham to reach Lincoln, where it is only AOD.The upper waters are important for agricultural water extraction, and for coarse fish such as roach, common bream and pike; small mammals like water voles, and native crayfish. A gap in the limestone scarp near Ancaster may represent an earlier course of the River Trent towards Boston, but is now occupied by the River Slea.
In Lincoln, the river flows into Brayford Pool and exits along a narrow channel that passes under the medieval High Bridge. The bridge not only restricts navigation due to its small size, but the volume of water that can pass through the gap is limited in times of flood. This is alleviated by the Sincil Dyke, which leaves the main channel at Bargate Weir and runs for through the industrial areas to the south of the main city centre. It used to rejoin the main channel at Stamp End, but was re-routed into the South Delph, a drainage ditch constructed by John Rennie in the early 19th century that joins the main channel below Bardney lock. The origins of the Sincil Dyke are unknown, but it is known to have been used as a drainage channel in the mid-13th century and is thought to be pre-medieval or even Roman. Parts of it were culverted in 1847 to allow the construction of Lincoln Central railway station.
From Lincoln, the river again turns first east, then south, making a cut through a belt of upland known as the Lincoln Gap. This section has also been suggested as a lower course of the Trent during and before periods of glaciation.
From Dogdyke near Coningsby to Boston, the north bank of the was used by a section of the Great Northern Railway from Lincoln to Boston.
A long-distance footpath, the Water Rail Way, follows the course of the river from Lincoln to Boston. The path uses sections of the river towpath and abandoned railway tracks, and has been opened in stages, with the final being completed in September 2008. The path is now part of Route 1 of the National Cycle Network and features a number of sculptures along its length, each commissioned from local artists. They include Lincoln longwool sheep at Stixwould, Lincoln Red cows at Washingborough, and Lincoln curly pigs, which became extinct in 1972, at Southrey.
History
The name "Witham" seems to be extremely old, apparently predating Anglo-Saxon, Roman, and even Celtic influence. The meaning is uncertain, although one possibility is Wye-om, meaning river plain, and the river has been known as the Witham since Saxon times. However, it was known as the Grant Avon in Ancient British times, meaning divine stream, and the fact that the main town on the upper river was Grant-ham may support this. John Leland writing in the 16th century noted that it was also called the Lindis, and others referred to it by that name. The present course may be a combination of two rivers, with the upper river originally emptying into Brayford Mere, to the west of Lincoln, and draining along the course of the Fossdyke, while the Langworth River emptied into another mere to the east of Lincoln, located between Washingborough and Chapel Hill. From there, the water flowed along a tidal creek to reach the sea. There was a ridge of high ground between the two meres, and the Romans cut a channel through it as part of some drainage works.Archaeological evidence points to river navigation as far back as the Iron Age. Artefacts such as the Iron Age Witham Shield, found in the river near Washingborough in 1826, and the Fiskerton Boat, a log boat found near Fiskerton during flood defence work in 2001 have been recovered and are on display at the British Museum in London or The Collection in Lincoln.
The Witham was an important navigation in Roman times. Lincoln —the meeting point of Ermine Street, joining London to York, and Fosse Way, leading to Leicester and Bath—was an important Roman fort that became one of only four colonia in Britain. Most important Roman cities were situated near navigable water, which enabled goods to be transported in bulk, but Lincoln did not possess this advantage, and so the Romans constructed the Fossdyke from Lincoln to Torksey on the River Trent, improved the River Witham from Lincoln to The Wash, and built the Car Dyke from Lincoln to the River Cam near Cambridge. The Witham thus gave Lincoln access to the east coast, while the Fossdyke gave access to the Trent and further on to the Humber.
There have been claims that the Witham was originally tidal up to Lincoln, but that seems unlikely. Prior to the construction of the Grand Sluice, the lower river was affected by tides, but the highest they normally reached was Dogdyke or Chapel Hill, and Lincoln is considerably higher than these locations, by some. Wheeler argues that it "would not have been possible for the tide to flow up to Lincoln," given the present geological conditions.
Trading continued throughout the medieval period evidenced by the importance of Torksey, which was then a flourishing town, now only a small village. However, the Fossdyke needed much maintenance to keep it clear of silt. Henry I had overseen the scouring of its channel, and there were inquiries in 1335, 1365 and 1518 to consider the state of the Fossdyke and to compel the inhabitants of the region to maintain it. Lincoln was a centre for the collection of business taxes, but this came at the cost of maintaining the waterways, and having finally decided it was too large a cost, James I presented the Fossdyke to the City of Lincoln.
The Witham originally flowed into The Wash at Bicker Haven, where the port of Drayton was established in the Welland estuary, and it was only as a result of massive flooding in 1014 that it diverted itself to flow into The Haven at Boston. This gave rise to the growth of Boston as a port in the 12th and 13th centuries, exporting wool and salt to the Hanseatic League, though Boston only received its charter in 1545.
File:Woodhall Spa - Kirkstead Bridge 1.jpg|thumb|left|Kirkstead Bridge
The river was affected by silting which restricted trade despite the construction of various sluices and barriers from 1142 onwards, when the first sluice was built below Boston. Other sluices were erected at Boston in 1500 and at Langrick in 1543, but navigation was again difficult on both the river and the Fossdyke by 1660. In 1671 an Act of Parliament was obtained for the improvement of the Navigation. In 1743, John Grundy, Sr. and his son John Grundy, Jr. were commissioned to produce a detailed survey of the river. They produced an engraved map in 1743 and a printed report, running to 48 pages, in the following year. The main recommendation was a new cut to eliminate the "prodigious meandering course" of the channel above Boston. Although the estimated cost of £16,200 dissuaded the landowners from taking action at the time, the report formed the basis for improvements in the 1760s.
Canalisation
Following meetings of Landowners held in 1752 and 1753, they asked John Grundy Jr, as his father had died in 1748, to re-evaluate his plans from 1744 and consider a plan for a "Grand Sluice" that had been produced by Daniel Coppin in 1745. Grundy suggested that the 1744 cut should be extended by a further into Boston, and that the sluice could then be built on the extension. The landowners moved the location of the sluice nearer to Boston, but otherwise approved his report, although no action was taken. John Grundy was again consulted in 1757, and Langley Edwards of King's Lynn was asked to review the positioning of the sluice in 1760. The landowners then asked John Smeaton to liaise with Grundy and Edwards, and the three engineers produced a joint report in 1761, with estimates of £38,000 for drainage works and £7,400 for improvements to navigation. The report was approved, although a meeting held in January 1762 decided that the new cut should revert to the alignment suggested by Grundy in 1753. The location of the Grand Sluice would be as suggested by Edwards in 1760. Grundy produced another engraved map, and parliamentary approval for the works was obtained in June 1762.Once the Act of Parliament was obtained, Edwards became the engineer for the project, and drew up the detailed plans, which Grundy and Smeaton checked and altered slightly, after which they had no further involvement with the scheme. Construction was started in April 1763, and the drainage element of the project, which included the sluice, was finished in 1768, having cost £42,000. Work on three locks and other work connected with navigation cost £6,000 and continued until 1771. The locks were located at Stamp End, Kirkstead and Barlings. The Grand Sluice was a major construction which maintained the height of water above Boston to near normal high tide level and had massive flood gates to cope with any tides above this. It was completed in 1766 and was effective in scouring the Haven below it and increasing silting of the river above it.
The 1762 act created the Witham Navigation Commissioners and the Witham Drainage General Commissioners, who continued to promote drainage schemes actively, creating a drainage network known as the Witham Navigable Drains that transformed much of northern Lincolnshire from fen to farming land. Today many of these channels are managed by the Witham First, Third and Fourth District Internal Drainage Boards and Upper Witham Internal Drainage Board. These four internal drainage boards reduce the flood risk to the surrounding properties, land and environment.
In 1791, as part of the campaign to promote the construction of the Horncastle Canal, the Commissioners of the River Witham asked the engineer William Jessop to assess the state of the Fossdyke Navigation and the Witham, with particular reference to the problems of navigating through Lincoln, where the channel was restricted by a medieval bridge. He proposed two solutions; the first avoided the route through the city entirely, by utilising the course of the Sincil Dyke to the south, while the second involved lowering the bottom of the channel through the Glory Hole bridge, which was only deep at normal water levels. The Commissioners had imposed a toll on all traffic passing under the bridge, but decided that a channel bypassing the city would have grave financial consequences. They opted for improving the existing channel and the work to remove the wooden floor, to lower the river bed under the bridge and to underpin its foundations was completed in 1795. The Commissioners dropped the collection of tolls at the bridge, but the amount they received from traffic passing through the locks increased as the volume of traffic grew in response to the easier passage through the bridge.