Page 18 - Jigsaw November 2019

Glance at the past.......................................................................................
Take a trip upstream to the Waters’ Edge with Eric Franklin...
This month I am looking at Thrapston Wharf and the Waters’ Edge development.
Before 1737 the River Nene was not navigable to Thrapston. However in that year Thomas Squire, who lived at Islip House, was instrumental in making it so from Peterborough to the wharf at Nine Arch Bridge. Thus, finally goods could be brought upstream as far as Thrapston on a fleet of lighters, traditional flat bottomed barges initially horse drawn but later pulled or pushed by steam tugs. Transport costs were thus much reduced from bringing everything by horse. When the fleet of barges arrived at the wharf local merchants stood by their post, the “calling post”, offering wares. One
of these posts has survived and can be seen in Coronation Gardens, shown right.
Islip was famed for rush- work which was used for horse collars, mats and baskets as was Norwich. With the river now usable for transport, there is evidence that workers moved between these places as well as goods being transported by river.
River trade dropped off considerably once the railways arrived in town during the 1840’s and the wharf became more of a general business area housing coal merchants, blacksmiths, sawyers and many other tradesmen. In 1935 William Boulton, a timber merchant, stored his traction engine in the yard whilst during World War 2 the area was used to store army vehicles.
In 1994 there were still some cottages on Bridge Street whilst the remaining buildings in the yard were in very poor condition. These, as well as the site being cleared in 1998 are shown in the pictures below.
Over the next four years, the site was left
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