An occasional look at the ebb and flow of the Thames
Following on from last week’s Riverwatch in which I outlined an idea for closing off Walton Lane at the Walton Bridge end that was put forward by Doug Myers from Weybridge, I’ve had a note from Nick Pollard, the chairman of the Sunbury and Shepperton Local History Society.
I knew from a very young age that I loved the water. It didn’t matter whether it was pottering about in a small rowing dinghy on the Thames at Twickenham where I was born or flinging myself through breaking waves on the beach at Holland on Sea in Essex where we used to stay with my uncle and aunt most summers – I just loved the water.
For some time now, my good friend Peter Bailey at the Sunbury and Shepperton Local History Society has been reminding me that in the society’s Aladdin’s Cave of treasures about the history of the river and the surrounding area, they’ve had these four photos of the Thames frozen over in 1940.
As regular readers of this column will doubtless have gathered by now, I’m a keen student of the history of the Thames in these parts and I love reading accounts of life on the river from days gone by.
News of a couple of riverside walks taking place in the near future is top of the agenda this week.
It never ceases to amaze me what you good people can dig up when it comes to the history of the Thames in Surrey and Middlesex.