Sport and Leisure

The Thames has not only been a place of work, it has also been a place of leisure. People have fished, sunbathed, mudlarked, and gone for boat trips. The river has also hosted sporting events for hundreds of years. In this theme we recount and provide background to memories of sporting and leisure activities including from an Olympic rower and stories of days on the beach by the Tower of London.

The following stories have been collected and researched by our London Lost Waterways oral history volunteers.

Fishing

Elizabeth Wood interviewed by Graham Strudwick. Recording subsequently researched by Graham.

The other thing that has changed a lot that I have witnessed that we have here a local fishing club, the Francis Francis Angling Club. They date back to about 1904, something like that they were formed, they fish from punts and sadly they are a dwindling band both in numbers of punts and of men that fish, and they are down to three punts now and they used to very carefully monitor their catches and send details of their catches to the Natural History Museum and I don’t think they do that anymore and as I say they are a rather unusual organisation.

ThamesDiscovery · Punt Angling On The Thames – E Wood 20171208

Images of the Francis Francis Angling Club can be found here and here

Holiday and Youth activities

Stephen Manning interviewed by Elaine Tedder and researched by Shirley Regan.

Stephan recalled being a member of the Sea Cadets band

I was the first silver bugler to commemorate Dunkirk as part of a cadet band…. that was May 65”.

There is a British Pathé news recording of the trip made by the little ships and WW2 war veterans in 1965 to mark the 25th anniversary of the Dunkirk Landings. This is probably the event that Stephen remembers being part of as a young sea cadet.

He remarked of mudlarks

they are always digging, and they don’t fill them in……any precious metal you hand into the Museum of London.

Fortunately most mudlarks today don’t dig deep holes and those that are licensed to do so are careful to fill them in afterwards.

Pelican Stairs and the Prospect of Whitby

Stephen advised “If you want some good photos (of the river) you go down by pelican stairs”

The Pelican stairs date back to 1520 alongside what is thought to be London’s oldest riverside pub, now known as the prospect of Whitby. The pub was originally called The Pelican, with the nearby stairs having a reputation as a place for smugglers and thieves to meet. The stairs were used by watermen to transport people across the river by boat.

Wapping Map (Map from Open Street Map: Free use licence)

The Captain Kidd pub

Stephen told us “I live in Haggerston… it takes me just under a half hour to get into the Captain Kidd at Wapping…and you’ve got a nice view of the river.”

Originally a coffee warehouse, the building became a pub from the 1980s and was named after the C17th pirate William Kidd. Captain Kidd had been executed for piracy at the nearby execution dock in 1701. The pub is now a Grade II listed building.

Rowing on the Thames

Ken Dwan interviewed by Graham Strudwick

ThamesDiscovery · A River Family – K Dwan 20180716

Ken was most at home on the river and started rowing at a very early age. His family had worked on the river and he qualified as a lighterman. He was also a keen rower and joined Poplar Blackwall and District Rowing Club at the age of 12. He won the Doggett’s Coat and Badge in 1971. Since then the badge has been won by the Dwan family three more times. In 2002 it was Nicholas Dwan, in 2004 it was Robert Dwan and in 2012 it was Merlin Dwan making this a proud heritage.

Winning the badge was a step along the way for Ken’s rowing career as he took part in two Olympic Games. In 1968 he went to Mexico and was 3rd in the semi-finals ending up 6th overall. In 1972 he went to the Munich games as one of only two who had also competed in the Mexico games. He was third in his quarter-final heat slipping to sixth in the semi-finals and although third in his final heat the other heat was much faster and so he was ninth overall.

Social & Leisure activities on Tower Beach

Pat Wilson Researched by Shirley Regan

Pat shared memories of walking to Tower Beach from Camberwell as a child aged about 9, with her mum dad and two younger sisters – Valerie (aged about 4) and Victoria (aged about 2).

We walked all the way – in those days you couldn’t get on the bus with a pram.

The walk from Camberwell to Tower Bridge would have taken Pat and her family at least an hour each way. “It was lovely, wonderful, to us it was like going to the seaside or abroad like people do today. That was like our holiday – it was always Sunday afternoons, full of excitement whenever the weather was good’.

ThamesDiscovery · Tower Beach – Pat Wilson 20180608

Stephen Manning also recalled the Tower Beach:

As kids we had bikes and go adventuring….one place we knew was this rotten old café down past the Tower. My mates mum would take us down the beach we’d have sandwiches and have a paddle, big cheese roll and massive cup of tea for sixpence.

The Beach had been created by the Tower Hill Improvement Trust at a time when trips to the seaside were not possible for many families from the East End. More than 1500 barge loads of sand were brought up river to create a beach between St Katherine’s step and the Tower of London. The Beach was opened to the public by the Lieutenant Governor of the Tower on 23rd July 1934. King George V actually decreed that the beach was to be used by the children of London, and that they should be given ‘free access forever’.

Pat describes many fond memories of these times on the beach with her family:

It always seemed to be full, we made sandcastles, chased children around, and sometimes you paddled in the river. You made your own entertainment…. My dad used to roll his trousers up, because all the men wore suits and hats. My dad wore a bowler. The other men wore cloth caps or the old hankie with four knots. People were very conscious then of the sun. You always took a picnic with you, salmon and shrimp paste sandwiches, mum made rock cakes and always a couple of bottles of lemonade…. You all seemed to share (food) It was all a big community.

We didn’t have any swimming costumes, mostly you either wore your vest and knickers or the boys wore vest and pants, or sometimes you would have your shorts on. They were such good parents, that was our outing, that was the best they could do for us.

It was estimated by the BBC that over 500,000 people used the beach between 1934-1939. The beach was closed in 1971 because of concerns with the quality of the water. However, by that stage the river was cleaner than when the beach was at the height of its popularity in the 30s, when tons of partially treated sewage was still being pumped into the river daily.

Pat’s memories are reflected in two short films: Children’s beach at Tower of London opens for the season and Heat Wave In London

Leisure on the West London Thames

Muriel Alexander (Born 1945) interviewed by Mags Daly.

When Muriel was a young girl, living in Strand-On-The-Green, she would take walks along the Thames tow path with her mum. Every year they would go and watch the Boat Race where there was also a funfair with all the sights and sounds that a child would love.

Sometimes she would take a walk with her father before dinner over Kew Bridge to Kew Gardens. They would wander around and go to a little funfair there which had a merry-go-round and wooden bowling alley. They lived near the Thames Road which dipped down in places so when the tide came in she had to walk with her shoes and socks off as the water came up to her ankles!

Strand-on-the-Green in December 2018 © TDP

Link:

A short history of Strand-on-the-Green

Social, Sport and Leisure at Twickenham

Graham Strudwick’s research turned up descriptions of leisure activities on the river in the Twickenham area:

A Waterman called Charlie Shore (1853 – 1911) started a Boys and Girls Regatta from the foreshore at Twickenham. It was a Water Carnival and as well as rowing there were other water based fun activities including the Greasy Pole. The event was held annually after his death in 1911 until after the end of the First World War. Charlie was also a boat builder and had a boat house on the riverside at Twickenham. In 1926 the family sold the boat house and moved away from Twickenham. The buyers were the Hammerton family. Freda Hammerton was interviewd by our oral historians and you can read about some of her recollections in the Boats and Transport page

The Twickenham Lido was built in 1935/36 and opened by King George VI in May 1936 during his Silver Jubilee year. The lido was in use for general swimming and many galas during its lifetime but was closed in the early 1970s.

Mudlarking on the Thames

Euan Graham was interviewed by Will Rathouse and researched by Graham Strudwick

Euan came to London in the early 2000s and lived in the Pimlico area. He was attracted to the river and saw people walking and searching on the foreshore. He joined them asking what they were doing and learnt from them. Key issues were about the speed of the river, the importance of safety and tidal knowledge and watching what others were doing.

He has searched on different parts of the river from Wapping up to Chelsea and been lucky with some finds. These have ranged from relatively modern toy soldiers, uniform buttons through brooches and roman coins to ammonites and Fairy stones. He has also enjoyed being on the foreshore at night which is a totally different experience. He has found some special items such as two halves of a belt buckle but at different times, roman coins for Constantine Gallus, amber gemstones and a livery button traced back to Poitiers.

He finds the river a spiritual place and this is reinforced by the number of votive offering finds as well as books he has read such as Peter Ackroyd’s book Sacred River. He has subsequently moved away from London but still visits the river whenever he has an opportunity to be in London.