Description
Published in 1994 to celebrate the bi-centenery of the Hudderfield Narrow Canal, the book draws together a series of ten articles, originally published in the Bulletin, portraying different aspects of the canal’s construction and history. The story of its construction is told from Canal Company Records, also the role and function of the transhipment warehouse at Woolroad and its restoration by Saddleworth Historical Society in 1977-79. Original engineering drawings of the canal cross section and the aqueduct at Smart Roads are illustrated and the iron aqueduct at Stalybridge constructed by the pioneering canal engineer Benjaim Outram is described. A tragic event, the bursting of a canal reservoir in 1810, on the eve of the opening of the new Stanedge tunnel, and the ensuing damage and loss of lives in Marsden is vividly recounted. There are accounts of three key individuals who played a part in the canal’s fortunes: Thomas Telford, the famous engineer who rescued the failing Stanedge tunnel project, John Rooth, supervisor of the tunnel’s construction and the first operator of through canal traffic from Manchester to Hull, and Thomas Bourne, traffic regulator of the tunnel, who from its opening, at the age of 12 until his retirement 37 years later, walked four times a day over Standedge, Sundays included, leading the canal horses.
