HALFPENNY BRIDGE

1087: Lechlade in The Domesday Book
IN ‘BRIGHTWELLS BARROW HUNDRED' HENRY de Ferrers holds LECHLADE. Siward Barn held it. There were 15 hides in the time of King Edward paying geld. But the king himself granted 6 hides quit of geld. The whole shire bears witness to this, and the man himself who bore the king’s seal. In demesne are 4 ploughs; and 29 villans and 10 bordars and 1 Frenchman holding the land of 1 villan. Among them all they have 16 ploughs. There are 13 slaves, and 3 mills rendering 30s, and a fishery rendering 200 eels, less 25. From the meadows, £7.7s, besides the hay for the oxen. In Winchcombe 2 burgesses pay 16d, and 1 in Gloucester pays nothing. The whole manor was worth £20 in the time of King Edward; and now the same.

1909: Lechlade in The Stripling Thames by Fred Thacker
1910: Thames Valley Villages, by Charles G Harper
The Thames Path - Lechlade Area in foxysislandwalks

Going upstream just as you come into the more or less straight reach, at the end of which is Halfpenny Bridge, on the Right bank are trees concealing the old wharf.
Halfpenny Bridge pronounced "hayp knee bridge"!

MOORING in Lechlade

Below bridge on the left bank. Open field often with cattle. Sometimes they are a nuisance - and are not above eating your mooring lines, flags, tea towells etc. Dog walkers should keep dogs on short lead and beware of calves galloping about. The frequent RAF jets tend to panic them.

Below bridge on the right bank is the garden of the New Inn.


Mooring on New Inn Garden, Lechlade

If you moor here buy a drink (and a meal) in the New Inn. They do good meals and have rooms (starting at £45 in 2018). The hotel is to the right as you walk up into Lechlade. The Lynwood Café is to the left.

Camping: Bridge House

Camp Site, Bridge House, Lechlade, Glos. GL73AG. 01367 252348.
200 yards from river, up road away from Lechlade on left, 45 pitches 1st March to 31st October. WC, Showers, Waste disposal, Laundry, Wash basins, Shaver points, power.

Lechlade Ferry (and now a small slipway)


Small Boat slip at the end of Bell Lane

Before the bridge there was a ferry (and it is said, ford).
The town side is useable as a launching site for car topped boats. From the bridge turn left at the lights and then left into the tiny Bell lane. You will have to park elsewhere.

NOTICE 2020:
Lechlade on Thames Free Wharf access
This is maintained by Lechlade on Thames Town Council for the benefit of the community.
No vehicle parking is allowed in this area.
Vehicles may off-load small craft before parking in the town.
Unattended craft may be removed, and boats must not be left moored at the Free Wharf. All dogs must be kept on leads.

Lechlade: an inland Port
Fives Wharves in Lechlade

Lechlade Wharves 1876
Map surveyed 1876 -Five inlets (known as canals)

Running from west to east - left to right - these were:

The Two Free Wharves


The two Free Wharf inlets

1 & 2: The Free Wharf with its two entries, with a combined Malthouse/Warehouse. Probably redeveloped in the mid 1600s.
The 2nd of these is the Bell Lane ferry named above.

Parkend Wharf - Eastern Headquarters of the Thames and Severn canal


The Parkend Wharf before the Canal inlet


The Parkend Wharf with Canal inlet and Cart Shed

3: Parkend Wharf is still in existence and used for boat hire just upstream of the bridge.
At the start of the 1700s Richard Gearing was using this wharf, possibly followed by a Robert Anderson, and at the beginning of the 1800s by William Hill of Cirencester. In 1813 the Thames and Severn Canal Company purchased Parkend Wharf and it became the Eastern Headquarters of the Thames and Severn Canal, instead of Inglesham lock. There was a small storeroom at the rear of the site and a five bay cart shed on the eastern boundary, and a new canal inlet 190 feet long, and a new two storey Warehouse with hoists.
The last incumbents of the Parkend Wharf were the Hicks family who had a tenancy agreement from 1856 to 1919.
Theirs were the last of the coal barges of the river trade.
The Thames and Severn finally closed to all traffic in 1927.
Four barge owners were based in Lechlade in the 1700s: Hooper, Wyart, Babcock and Crawford.

The Red Lion Wharf


The Red Lion inlet downstream of bridge

4: The Red Lion wharf immediately downstream of the bridge, now no longer accessible.
It was said in 1719 by an elderly resident that the wharves in Lechlade were built around 1630-1650, including the Red Lion Wharf, the Free Wharf and Parkend Wharf.
The Red Lion Wharf canal arm, where the toll house stands today, ran back towards the rear of the Red Lion Inn, where the loading wharf was situated.
It is thought to have closed in 1792 when the Halfpenny Bridge was built.
A boat hire and repair yard used the inlet to the wharf until the 1950s.

The Old Wharf


The Old Wharf restored 1957

5: The Old Wharf, the furthest downstream.
First mentioned in 1633 it is now in the grounds of Church House (a private residence) at the end of Wharf lane and next to the School.
There were originally two canal arm inlets (see the dotted outline on the map above) and a loading area joining them more or less where the school building now is.
In 1678 Church House and the grounds and wharf were purchased by John Ainge of Cirencester.
His son Richard, who died in 1721, was then succeeded by his son Richard who turned the wharfs into a very succesful enterprise.
In 1758 Richard Ainge made an arrangement with two Gloucester Wharfingers for the conveyance of goods which "invited criticism by other Lechlade Wharfingers".
Richard died in 1778 and his sister Catherine and her husband inherited Church House and the wharf, but it is not known whether they or a later owner carried on the business.
In 1950 Mr Bousted purchased the estate and in 1957 reinstated a section of the wharf and canal arm.
There is no access for boats of any size.

1720: Camden’s Magna Britannia -

Here (the river) begins to be navigable;  and is here able to bear a Barge of 50 tun.

1792: Halfpenny Bridge built by James Hollingworth, to replace a ferry when Lechlade was becoming a busy inland port with all the new canal traffic. Before that (and presumably before St John's Lock) there was a ford here.

Fred Thacker, Thames Highway, 1920 -

Lechlade Town Bridge was built under the Act of 1792.
Camden's Magna Britannia of 1720 says that here the River
"begins to be navigable: and here he is able to bear a Barge of 50 Tun."
A Lechlade bargemaster stated in 1793 that the chief goods he carried down to London were:
"Iron, Copper, Tin, manufactured and pig Iron, Brass, Spelter, Cannon, Cheese, Nails, all Iron goods and Bomb Shells."
He took back
"Groceries, Deals, Foreign Timber, Merchandise of every Kind, a few Coals, and of late Raw Hides for Tewkesbury and Worcester and Gunpowder to Bristol and Liverpool:
has been applied to last Time he was up, to take Sugars to be carried to Bristol, but did not take them, for when they came to enquire the Price, they found they could go cheaper by the Kennet to Newbury, and the rest of the way by Land Carriage."

In 1812 Rd. Gearing and Wm. Saunders, both of Lechlade, had each one barge on the River.

Text from 'Views on the Thames' by William-Bernard Cooke, George Cooke, Samuel Owen, Peter de Wint -

Lechlade, or Leach Lade, which is described by Leland -
"a praty old village with a stone spire to the church"
is now a small market town in the south-eastern extremity of the county of Gloucester.
It derives its name from the river Lech, which directs its course through the north side of the parish, and the Saxon word Ladian, to empty, as it here falls into the Thames. This river derives its name from the British word Lech, signifying a stone, from the petrifying quality of its water.
The parish church is large and handsome, with a lofty spire, which offers a pleasing object to the surrounding country.
The Thames, at this place, begins to be navigable for vessels of considerable dimensions. Some of sixty tons burden and upwards reach this little town, and give it a commercial character: but the frequent deficiency of water in the summer, as well as its floods in the winter, have hitherto rendered the navigation of the river so uncertain, as to deprive Lechlade of many advantages which it might be supposed to derive from its particular situation.
The Thames Committee have indeed made several improvements in the upper part of the river; and the patriotic spirit, which, in defiance of expense and almost insurmountable difficulties, has completed the canal that unites the Severn with the Thames, promises to continue its zealous and indefatigable efforts to remove every existing impediment; or, by opening new channels, to facilitate the navigation between this place and the metropolis.

Lechlade from ‘The Genius of the Thames’ by Thomas Love Peacock –

Where Lechlade sees thy current strong
First waft the unlaboring bark along;

1815: Halfpenny Bridge, Lechlade -

Lechlade Owen 1815
Lechlade. Drawn by S. Owen. Engraved by G. Cooke. July 1, 1815.

1815: Two months after the above picture was drawn, Shelley was there in Lechlade.
By Thames and Cotswold, W H Hutton -

In the churchyard, with its sober seventeenth century houses adjoining, even encroaching on, the sacred enclosure, stood Shelley and Mary, Charles Clairmont and Thomas Love Peacock on the September night in 1815 when the perfect 'summer evening' meditation was written down.
The yews stand now as they stood when Shelley saw them, and still the 'aerial pile' shines in the setting sun.


Lechlade Churchyard

Percy Bysshe Shelley -
A Summer Evening Churchyard, Lechlade, Gloucestershire.
Listen to 'A Summer Evening Churchyard, Lechlade'

THE wind has swept from the wide atmosphere
Each vapour that obscured the sunset's ray,
And pallid Evening twines its beaming hair
In duskier braids around the languid eyes of Day:
Silence and Twilight, unbeloved of men,
Creep hand in hand from yon obscurest glen.
 
They breathe their spells towards the departing day,
Encompassing the earth, air, stars, and sea;
Light, sound, and motion, own the potent sway,
Responding to the charm with its own mystery.
The winds are still, or the dry church-tower grass
Knows not their gentle motions as they pass.
 
Thou too, aerial pile, whose pinnacles
Point from one shrine like pyramids of fire,
Obey'st in silence their sweet solemn spells,
Clothing in hues of heaven thy dim and distant spire,
Around whose lessening and invisible height
Gather among the stars the clouds of night.
 
The dead are sleeping in their sepulchres:
And, mouldering as they sleep, a thrilling sound,
Half sense half thought, among the darkness stirs,
Breathed from their wormy beds all living things around,
And, mingling with the still night and mute sky,
Its awful hush is felt inaudibly.
 
Thus solemnized and softened, death is mild
And terrorless as this serenest night.
Here could I hope, like some enquiring child
Sporting on graves, that death did hide from human sight
Sweet secrets, or beside its breathless sleep
That loveliest dreams perpetual watch did keep.


"Thou too, aerial pile, whose pinacles ..."

1839: The bridge ceased to be strictly the "halfpenny bridge" when the local people refused to pay anymore ...

1859: The Thames, Mr & Mrs Hall

LECHLADE BRIDGE AND CHURCH
LECHLADE BRIDGE AND CHURCH

We are, however, now at Lechlade, where the Thames is a navigable river, and a sense of loneliness in some degree ceases; — effectually so, as far as Lechlade is concerned, for, as the reader will perceive, its aspect is an anti-dote to gloom. Lechlade is a very ancient town. It derives its name from a small river that joins the Thames about a mile below its bridge. The Lech is little more than a streamlet, rising in the parish of Hampnot, in the Cotswold district, and passing by Northleach and Eastleach. The proofs of its antiquity are now limited to its fair and interesting church, dedicated to St. Laurence. It is very plain withinside, but stately looking. It contains no old monuments, with the exception of a brass of a gentleman and lady of the time of Henry VI, and another of a man of the time of Henry VII, Close to the north porch is an interesting relic of the olden time — "a penance stone", on which formerly offenders against the discipline of the church stood enshrouded in a white sheet to do penance. The spire is a pleasant landmark all about. It is now, as it was when Leland wrote, two hundred years ago, "a praty old toune", where those who love quiet may be happy. It is clean and neat, and has a well-ordered inn, where a "neat-handed Phillis" strives to make the way-worn traveller at ease and in comfort. The priory of "Blake Chanons, at the very end of St. John's Bridge", is gone; of "the chapelle in a medow" no stone remains; the bold barons — from Baron Siward, who slew Tofte, Earl of Huntingdon, to Ferrers, Earl of Derby, and Roger Mortimer, the Talbots, Spensers, and Hollands — who once lorded over the district, are forgotten there; but the Thames still rolls its waters round the town, and blesses a generation to whom rumours of war are but far-off sounds —

All glory to the stern old times,
But leave them to their minstrel rhymes.

1883: Halfpenny Bridge, Henry W Taunt -

Halfpenny Bridge, Henry W Taunt, 1883
Halfpenny Bridge, Henry W Taunt, 1883
© Oxfordshire County Council Photographic Archive; HT3772

1885: Dickens's Dictionary of the Thames -

[At Lechlade the Thames] first becomes navigable for practical purposes, and runs, except in very dry seasons, in a goodly stream under the handsome arch of the bridge. ...
The ideas of [Lechlade's] inhabitants on the subject of paving are, it may be remarked, open to considerable exception. ...
Lechlade is the point at which boats may be taken for the trip down the river ... and boats may either be sent from Salter's at Oxford by van or by the Great Western Railway Company, who make arrangements for conveying them from the station to the river. There is a good hotel in the town (the "New Inn"), but boating parties occassionally prefer to put up at the "Trout Inn", at St John's Bridge, about half a mile down the stream, which is also favourably spoken of ...

1888: from " The Thames: Oxford to its Source" by Paul Blake -

Lechlade church spire is a prominent object for some miles before the town is reached. For Lechlade is a town, the first since Oxford; navigation ceases just beyond; it is the Ultima Thule of the hardy barge man.
Here the crew resolved to spend the night and lay in their final stock of stores, for several things were running low, especially jam and sugar.
The Swan was put up at the wharf on the right just beyond the bridge; there are coal stores there. A man was found who told them where the boat could lie in safety, secure in the possible event of the arrival of an unwieldy barge. After this they put themselves into the hands of Mrs Humphries, of the New Inn, and have not yet regretted doing so.
“Ha! Lechlade is the sleepiest old town I’ve ever seen”, was Charlton’s comment as they took a hasty run through the place before embarking next morning. The object of the exploration was provisions, of which they needed a fresh supply. Possibly Lechlade wakes up later on in the day, but at 8.30 the inhabitants seemed still half asleep, not even the rather rare sight of a “crew” rousing them to anything approaching interest.
There is no doubt now that the stone-country has fairly begun. All the houses, bridges, mills etc., are built of it, and look curiously grey after the brown, yellow, and red of the towns lower down.

1910: Thames Valley Villages by Charles Harper

Lechlade is very well on week-days, in the quiet way of all such decayed townlets, but on Sundays it is not to be recommended.
Dulness stalks its streets almost visibly, and the only sounds are the argumentative tones of the preacher in the Wesleyan chapel (a building with black doors and gilded mouldings, after the fashion of a jeweller’s shop) at one end of the street, whose raucous voice can be distinctly heard at the other: not unlike that of a man quarrelling outside a public-house.
But the fates preserve us from a Sunday at Lechlade!
It is fully sufficient to skim through the place at such a time, and make for some other that does not so completely figure the empty life.
A village is not dull, because it has no pretensions to being a town — and country life is never dull.
But at Lechlade the position is so desperate on Sunday that, for sheer emptiness of other incident, a large proportion of the population flock the half-mile that stretches between the town and the railway-station, and hang, deeply interested, upon the bridge, to witness the Sunday evening train depart.
It is a curious spectacle, and one that carries the mind of a reminiscent reader back to stories of marooned castaways on desert isles, gazing hopelessly upon the departing ship that has left them to solitude and despair. That must needs be a place of an extreme Sabbath emptiness where the grown-up inhabitants are impelled, by way of enlivening the weary evening, to walk half a mile to witness what seems an incident so commonplace to the inhabitants of places whose pulses beat more robustly.

Lantern Slide (1883-1908) - Halfpenny Bridge, Lechlade
Pictures by W.C.Hughes. Thanks to Pat Furley, research by Dr Wilson.

1920: from Fred Thacker in 'The Thames Highway' -

By Lechlade I murmur and run,
Then linger with children at play
In meadows whose lover the Sun
Has filled with the burden of May:
And love has not dimpled the face of a girl
More softly than mine as I eddy and whirl
Where islands check my way.

1922 Ha'penny Bridge in Roundabout the Upper Thames by Alfred Williams

The straight-as-a-line raised road, bordered with deep ditches full of meadow-sweet, loose-strife, and valerian, that runs down to the picturesque steeple town beyond the river, has not existed for much more than a century.
Formerly a bridle track through green fields led to the Thames, wide and deep at this point, and travellers and others wishing to go by that way were ferried across into the Gloucestershire town.
At length, on the completion of the Canal, the inhabitants decided to build a bridge over the stream and to construct a hard road in place of the green track.
Accordingly, after many difficulties, the work was completed.
The huge span of the bridge was made and a pike house built to take tolls from those crossing into the town.
The amount of the toll was fixed at a halfpenny, and the bridge came to be known far and wide as the Ha'penny Bridge.
There is a local tradition to the effect that when the bridge was about to undergo thc first severe test the master mason ran and climbed one of the high poplar trees at the Round House and declared that if the bridge gave way he would leap into the river and be drowned.
Below the bridge the river, that was flowing serenely down the deep green fields, suddenly turns and forms a double loop, sweeping majestically round and afterwards resuming its course between lines of silvery willows.
Running beneath the road is a long tunnel to assist in carrying out the water in flood time; several other shorter arches, made for the same purpose, support the highway.
Pools of stagnant water, half concealed with tall flags and rushes, he around and below the arches throughout the summer and afford a secure refuge for the waterfowl.
Here also the otters love to come and fish in the shallows and chase the half-grown pikes that were borne out of the river during the floods and left behind when the waters sank.
The frequent rising of the water in the winter has washed the mortar out of the stones in the wall and left many deep holes running within.
In these crevices a colony of sandmartins have their lodging and rear their offspring, out of the reach of mischievous boys and others, who are unable to climb down the wall and interfere with the eggs and young.
Here also the pretty blue titmice build, and hatch their numerous brood, darting in and out of the wall like sunbeams and becoming extraordinarily excited and impatient if you chance to remain near the mouth of the nest for a few moments.
In the lower boughs of the large withy trees projecting over the river the moorhens roost; the old heron perches in the scrub at the top of the trunk and sleeps during the night, ready to leap up at daybreak and take his prey, watching patiently beside the pools in the glistening meadows.
The graceful swans float beautifully beside the reeds, plunging their long necks deep down into the bluish water, and retire with dignity to the farthest shore in the bend to escape the boat that with much knocking and splashing of oars shoots into sight from behind the tall flags at the curve.
The pink flowering rush shows beside the shaded hempnettle; sneezewort and loose-strife, with spikes of blossom often sixteen inches in length, grow along the edge of the water.
Tall bulrushes, round and smooth, with a tuft of rich brown blossom growing near the spear like point, stand amid the pools and along the river bank, motionless, or gently swaying and stooping beneath the weight of the little sedgewarbler that hops to and fro and perches sideways on the quivering stems.

1929: A Thames Survey -

Halfpenny Bridge carries the main road from Swindon to Burford and Banbury. It was built under the Act of 1792, is of stone, well designed, with one large semi-circular arch and small arch over the towpath on the Wiltshire bank, and a picturesque toll-house on the Gloucestershire side which should be preserved, although the bridge is free from tolls.
The quay above the bridge is now the head of navigation, and there is water for barges and launches and a wharf at the bridge. There is an opportunity here to make a more attractive approach to the town by improving the appearance of the boat-builder's yard and sheds.

1937: "The Thames and its Story" -

Lechlade Bridge may be said to be the first worthy of the name upon the river. Well built of stone, it rises with a smart gradient, carrying the Highworth Road across on three arches, the central one of which is large enough to span the river from bank to bank.
The village, neat, substantial, and mature, rallies around the ivy-covered church whose spire crowns the slope on which the village is built.
The village is extending; organ works have been established there, and communication with the outer world is not now dependent upon the infrequent train service of the Great Western, for a motor omnibus plies between Lechlade, Fairford and Cirencester.

1955: Halfpenny Bridge, Francis Frith -

1955:  Halfpenny Bridge, Francis Frith
1955:  Halfpenny Bridge, Francis Frith.

1955:  Lechlade, Francis Frith -

1955, Lechlade, Francis Frith
1955, Lechlade, Francis Frith.

Halfpenny Bridge, Lechlade
Halfpenny Bridge, Lechlade.

2000: Lechlade Bridge -

Halfpenny Bridge
Halfpenny Bridge.

2005: Lechlade Bridge, Doug Myers -

Halfpenny Bridge, Doug Myers © 2005
Halfpenny Bridge, Doug Myers © 2005.