Day 104 - history lesson and then southwards past Nuneaton

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0 lochs, 424 in total.







Atherstone has an interesting history and the locals are very proud of it. It was a centre for millinery for 200 years and also a mining district. I bought a leaflet at the information centre and will reproduce large sections in this blog as it really caught my imagination.







Atherstone is a settlement on Roman Watling Street and remained unchanged until the Enclosure Act of 1765 when land to the north and south of the town were enclosed, preventing Atherstone from expanding. When hatting manufacture, previously done in attics, became industrialised the only place for the new factories and extra workers' houses was in the back gardens of the houses along Watling Street. From the 1780s tiny houses were packed into the available strip of land, in the shadow of the hat factories with the smoking chimneys and noise of the felting hammers. The houses were built back to back in terraces running at right angles to the street and had one room downstairs and one upstairs; 30 or more families shared an earth closet and a pump. Access to these 'yards' was through a small entry from the main road. Because the houses were built for renting on private land they often lacked any amenities. There were 53 of these yards in Atherstone, not all for the hatting industry. In 1911, the town's Medical Officer reported that in one yard there were 22 houses, 84 adults and 39 children – 123 occupants in 44 rooms, making it more crowded than the worst parts of Birmingham at that time. More land was made available and conditions very slowly improved; the last yards were demolished in 1965. I'm sure that many towns and cities also had these yards – I think it's just the scale of yard dwelling in such a small town that astounds me.



What else about the town? - really warm swimming pool, thriving main street, biggest Co-op I've ever seen and a great mix of boaters where we moored. After lunch we set off in pleasantly warm sunshine, heading southwards and seeing how far we'd get before dinner.



We passed through Nuneaton without stopping – there was nothing that appealed and we certainly didn't fancy staying overnight. We found a lovely mooring beyond the town - open countryside, sunny aspect – just closer to a busy road than we should have liked but that's just being picky.

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Photos

A 1932-built Grand Union Canal craft....
....used for towing rubbish barges from Paddington to the gravel pits at Slough.

Stern of the 1932 vessel...
...I couldn't back far enough to get everything in properly.

St. Mary's, Atherstone.
Founded in 1385 as a chapel-of-ease, it only became the parish church in 1835. Until 1863 the chancel housed the grammar school.

Around the Market Square are buildings dating back 500 years.
18th and 19th century frontages are deceptive, hiding much older timber-framed buildings.

Hartshill Yard - 1840s
This is now a waterways maintenance yard. There is a covered dry dock, restored 19th century blacksmith's shop (only open to group bookings), a derrick crane and a rather lovely clocktower. All rounded windows, arches and curved walls to allow horses to pass with loads of wood for narrowboats.

Mount Judd
Between Hartshill and Nuneaton there were many mining spoil heaps. Since the 1970s these have been landscaped to produce some rather lovely shapes to the land. Mount Judd is actually a slag heap.

I like the extra stripes around the stern....
... makes the boat look a little fierce!

Nuneaton...
... a path up to the canal and then this and a load of bottles were tipped in - makes you despair.