Summary

Lock with Swing Bridge, c.1818, by George Leather for the Pocklington Canal Company.

Description

MATERIALS: Red brick with gritstone dressings, with iron swing bridge.

PLAN: The lock chamber has parallel sides, splayed at each end beyond the gates. The original wooden lock floor was removed during restoration and the foundations were replaced with steel piles. Between the gates is a manually operated swing bridge with iron girder substructure and metal handrails. The curved recess for the bridge has stone ridges along the top to provide purchase. The lock gates and manual and hydraulic gearing mechanism have been restored to traditional design.

History

The Pocklington Canal was constructed at the beginning of the C19 to transport mainly agricultural goods from the East Riding to the larger urban centres to the south and west. A Bill was placed before Parliament in 1814 and the canal was designed by George Leather Jnr, an experienced navigation engineer who worked on Goole Docks and the Knottingley and Goole Canal. The canal was opened in 1818, running for 9.5 miles from the River Derwent at East Cottingwith to a mile south of Pocklington. The cost was £32,695, which was actually less than the original estimate.

Coal, lime, fertiliser and industrial goods were carried to Pocklington, and agricultural produce was sent to the West Riding. After 1847, when the canal was sold to the York and North Midland Railway, there was a decline in trade and the last cargo was carried on the canal in 1932. In 1963 ownership passed to British Waterways. It is now navigable as far as Melbourne, and some of the locks have been restored by the Pocklington Canal Amenity Society (formed in 1969), but it is a remainder waterway and there are no plans to restore the canal fully.

Gardham Lock was restored in 1975.

Reasons for Listing

* Date: it is a pre-1840 canal structure and forms part of a sequence of listable structures along the length of the canal;
* Historical Associations: the lock was designed by George Leather, a well-known navigation engineer and designer;
* Intactness: the principal brick and stone superstructure of the lock remains intact, with restoration of the lock floor using steel piles and the re-establishment of the lock structure carried out to traditional design.

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26673109

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Hertfordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Sussex: East with Brighton and Hove (Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Devon (Pevsner Buildings of England)
• 
  Listed Buildings, Conservation Areas and Monuments
• 
  Berkshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Pevsner's Architectural Glossary (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Introductions)