History of Barking and Dagenham through the ages

Below are a selection of photos documenting the history:

 http://www.flickr.com/photos/barkingdagenhamarchive/


Dagenham Breach 

In 1707, the River Thames had broken through the protective sea defences in south Dagenham and flooded the marshland beyond. After many failed attempts, the defences were finally repaired by Captain John Perry, RN in 1719. However, a large lake was left in the landscape, which became known as Dagenham Breach.

The Breach became a popular fishing area and the earliest MinisterialWhitebait Dinners were held there. Elizabeth Fry and her family leased two holiday cottages at the Breach in the early 19th century. The area was later industrialized, and a remnant of the Breach survives as a lake within the Ford Motor Company site.

An earlier breach in the river wall was repaired by Sir Cornelius Vermuyden in the 17th century.

  • In 1887, Samuel Williams, a barge builder, purchased 30 acres of land at Dagenham Breach. He built a deep-water dock, which was used in 1911 to fit out the last great ship built on the River Thames, the battleship HMS Thunderer, an Orion class Super Dreadnought.

    Part of the lake was filled in with gravel and other material generated by the rebuilding in London. This created new land, which was available for rent. By 1891 the company had constructed a timber dock, with a railway connected to the London, Tilbury and Southend Railway line, and two new jetties to create a tidal quay.
    Samuel Williams and Co. joined forces with John Hudson and Co. to form a successful shipping company. Land beside the dock was either used for their shipping and haulage business or sold to organisations such as Union Cable Company and Ford Motor Company.

    Visit the River industries gallery at Valence House Museum to find out more.

    The Archives and Local Studies Centre collection includes fascinating 1960s archive film of the Samuel Williams site.

    Brief history of the Barking Fishing Fleet 

    Looking around Barking today, it is hard to believe that the town was once Britain's busiest fishing port. By 1850 at least 220 fishing smacks were operating out of Barking, their crews averaging eight men and boys. This success was overwhelmingly due to the Hewett family, who owned the Short Blue Fleet.
    The town was full of businesses supporting the fishing industry, such as shipwrights, mast makers, sail makers, ships' chandlers, water keg makers, pork cask makers, net makers, knitters of fishermen's sweaters, makers of waterproof clothing and boots, and ships' biscuit bakers.
    The fishermen and boats of Barking were also regularly employed by the Royal Navy in times of war.

    Barking's fishing industry came to an end in the 1860s when the Short Blue Fleet was transferred to Gorleston in Norfolk. The Hewetts retained a ship repair yard at Barking until 1899, when it became the epicentre of a devastating boiler explosion which killed ten people.

    Visit the River industries gallery at Valence House Museum to discover more.

    Barking Fishing Fleet information sheet
    • The Town Quay/Mill Pool is situated on the River Roding approximately two miles north of where the Roding joins the River Thames.
      A wharf of some kind must have existed near Barking Abbey from its foundation in 666, as water was then the chief means of transport and communication.
      Provisions for the Abbey, corn and meal for the nearby mills, the growing trade of the town, and the local fishing and allied industries were all dependent on the wharf.
      When the Barking fishing industry was at its height in the 1840s and 1850s the Town Quay must have been bustling with activity. The Old Granary at the Town Quay was built in 1870, and is all that remains of Barking Mill.
      arking and Dagenham is surrounded on three sides by water, and the River Industries Gallery looks at how this has influenced the industrial development of the Borough. 
      The gallery is divided in to two sections. The first looks at the Barking Fishing Fleet, and how the genius of one Barking family, the Hewetts, transformed the entire process of North Sea fishing. The objects displayed here include a fully-rigged model of the Saucy Jack, a Barking fishing smack. You can also see a transom board from a fishing smack that was tragically lost at sea with its whole crew.
      The second half of the gallery tells the story of the entrepreneur Samuel Williams, who established Dagenham Dock. Look out for the wheel from the Duke, a Samuel Williams tug which took part in the evacuation from Dunkirk in 1940.  We also discover how much of the Dagenham Dock land was later bought by the Ford Motor Company, becoming Europe’s largest car plant.
      Captain John Perry:

      Barking Fishing Fleet:

      Dagenham Breach:

      Sir Cornelius Vermuyden:

      The Ford Motor Company:
      Samuel Williams and Sons:

      The names of both Barking (from Berecingum, meaning Berica's people) andDagenham (Daeccanham, meaning the 'ham' or farmstead of a man named Daecca) were first recorded in Anglo-Saxon times. Both were among the earliest Saxon settlements in Essex.  

      Yet people had already been living in the area for a very long time. Click the links below for further information, and visit the Archaeology gallery at Valence House Museum to see fascinating artefacts from the Stone Age onwards.
      • Hand axes and other flint implements from the Paleolithic Era (around 10,000 years ago) have been found at various sites in the Borough, including Chadwell Heath, Ripple Road, Gale Street, Five Elms, Beacontree Heath, Goresbrook and the Beam Washlands.
        The most remarkable object from the Neolithic period (between c4000 and 2000 BC) is the Dagenham Idol, uncovered in 1922 in marshland just south of Ripple Road. It is carved from Scots Pine and is around 4,300 years old, making it almost 1,000 years older than Stonehenge and one of the earliest examples of human representation in Europe.
        The Idol is believed to have been an offering to the gods to increase the fertility of the land. Buried beside it was the skeleton of a deer, possibly sacrificed for the same reason.
        The Dagenham Idol is currently on loan to Valence House Museum from Colchester and Ipswich Museums, so why not visit Valence House and see it for yourself?We now go forward to the Bronze Age (c2000-700BC) and Iron Age(c700BC-43AD).

        The Barking Riverside Timber Trackway, a raised timber path dating from 1510-1250BC, provided a dry route through the marshes. In 1950 a Bronze Age axe head was discovered in Selinas Lane in Dagenham.
        In 2004 late Bronze Age and early Iron Age pottery was found at Blackborne Road, Reede Road and the Dagenham Park School site. A dig carried out in 2003-4 alongside the Heathway in Dagenham revealed a late Bronze Age settlement of roundhouses surrounded by a defensive ditch.
        Large quantities of burnt material indicated that it had been destroyed by fire at one time. The Iron Age people of this area belonged to theTrinovantes tribe. They lived in fortified settlements such as the fort atUphall, to the north of Barking, which dates to 500BC.
      THE FUTURE - GREEN INDUSTRY MECCA AND SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITY.
Posted by