Coal to Runcorn Gasworks
Picturing the Past: NarrowBoat, Autumn 2019
A selection of images from the Jack Parkinson Collection provides an insight into the carriage of coal on the Bridgewater Canal in the early 1960s
The two craft are typical deep-draughted Bridgewater narrowboats, built six planks deep with the cabin superstructure being quite low due to the greater depth inside the hulls. The leading boat, Richard, dated from late 1912 and was built as a horse-boat before later being converted into a motor – though it was rebuilt quite differently from most horse- to motor-boat conversions on the south Midlands canals. These craft retained the original stern, except with the hull above the waterline being built up either side to form a counter from which a horse-boat elum was hung. The cabin was built marginally taller to allow for the stern tube and was extended to accommodate the engine room. Butty Winifred was built a little earlier, dating from the winter of 1910. For many years the boats were worked as a pair by William Horsefield, then, in the latter years of trade, by Harry and Sarah Bentley. In the distance, on the extreme right, is an accommodation bridge called Green Bridge, which takes a private road to the remains of Norton Priory. All the land to the left of the cut is part of the Priory estate and Windmill Hill is also visible.
Jack Parkinson CollectionThese two images convey perfectly the wide, wellmaintained Bridgewater Canal in 1961 shortly before this important coal traffic ceased. They appear to be taken in late summer as the grass looks rather parched and in need of rain. The location is Norton Prior, near Halton, due east of Runcorn. The NB Spring 2019 issue featured Gordon Waddington of Bolton whose boats carried coal to Runcorn Gasworks. However, he was not the only boat-owner involved, another being Jonathon Horsefield Ltd of Runcorn. This was an old established coal-dealing and canal-carrying family business based at Runcorn by the late 1840s, with some family members working as boatmen in later years. Horsefield operated a fleet of about a dozen horse-boats on the Bridgewater, mainly working in the coal trade between Lancashire and Cheshire. Later generations were also publicans. After Jonathan Horsefield’s death in July 1905, his coal and canal-carrying business was continued by his executors before eventually becoming a limited company. By the mid1950s it was managed by a firm of accountants from their offices on High Street, Runcorn. At the time these images we were taken, the company’s boats undertook regular trips from the collieries at Marsland Green on the Bridgewater’s Leigh Branch, loading washed beans for Runcorn Gasworks, or loading at Boothstown with washed slack for tanneries at Runcorn.
Looking in the opposite direction, we see the same pair taking the turn towards Astmoor. In the distance, beyond the treeline, is the Manchester Ship Canal, the Mersey Estuary and, just visible, the north bank at Widnes. Both images clearly show the boats moving at full speed, having overtaken the leisure boat on which Jack Parkinson is standing to take the photos. Despite their ungainly appearance above the waterline, these deep Bridgewater craft had fine swim lines below. The traffic to Runcorn Gasworks ended abruptly in 1962 and both Gordon Waddington and Jonathan Horsefield Ltd ceased carrying. At the end of April that year a member of the firm of chartered accountants running the business was appointed liquidator, and Horsefields went into voluntary liquidation, ending well over 100 years of carrying in the coal trade of the North West.
Jack Parkinson Collection
