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2019

TF1839 : Pumping Station

taken 6 years ago, 4 km NNW of Northorpe, Lincolnshire, England

Pumping Station
Pumping Station
A pumping station on the South Forty Foot Drain. This is Bicker Fen pumping station, which handles 19km of drains on 851 hectares of Bicker Fen.
South Forty foot Drain and Black Sluice :: TF3242

Black Sluice and the South Forty Foot drain were part of the battle to drain the fens to create more land to harvest crops. But the Fenmen, who had rights to fish and graze their livestock there during the summer, put up a fight to save their livelihoods.
The South Forty Foot drain was first dug in the 1630s to drain Holland fen. Engineers devised a long straight channel to take the water faster to the River Witham where it flowed out to sea. The sluice was built to stop the tide running far inland. Large scale drainage of the fens took place at this time financed by speculators known as "Adventurers".
There was violent resistance and houses, farms and corn stacks on the land were destroyed. The wooden gates of the sluice were burnt leaving them charred black and useless. The fen men drove the Adventurers off the huge common fen.
Over 100 years later, a second sluice was built to relieve the flooding that had continued. The fenmen rioted in Boston, and the militia was sent to prevent the town being burned down. Several years of violence followed but this time, the drainage schemes went ahead. So began the transformation of the fens into the agricultural landscape we see today.
The South Forty Foot drain was dug by labourers using picks, shovels and barrows These tools were still used by navvies clearing silt from drains and rivers until the early 1900s.

The resident engineer to the River Witham commissioners was William Lewin (1794 to 1863), and the third and present Black Sluice was constructed in 1846.

Since 1946, water draining from Holland fen into the South Forty Foot has been pumped into the tidal section of the Witham known locally as the Haven.
The Black Sluice lock at Boston gives boaters access to the South Forty Foot drain as far as Donington High bridge, a distance of 16 km. This lock, opened in 2009, is the first phase of the fens waterways Link.
Black Sluice is the outfall of the South Forty Foot drain into the tidal section of the River Witham known locally as the Haven the sluice and the drain are part of an intricate network of waterways pumps and locks that continue to perform the essential task of draining the lands to reduce the risk of flooding.

The Fens

The Fens, also known as the Fenland, is a naturally marshy region in eastern England. Most of the fens were drained several centuries ago, resulting in a flat, damp, low-lying agricultural region.
A fen is the local name for an individual area of marshland or former marshland and also designates the type of marsh typical of the area, which has neutral or alkaline water chemistry and relatively large quantities of dissolved minerals, but few other plant nutrients.
Fenland primarily lies around the coast of the Wash; it reaches into four counties: Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire, Norfolk and a small area of Suffolk, as well as the historic county of Huntingdonshire. In whole it occupies an area of nearly 1,500 sq miles.
Most of the Fenland lies within a few metres of sea level. As with similar areas in the Netherlands, much of the Fenland originally consisted of fresh- or salt-water wetlands, which have been artificially drained and continue to be protected from floods by drainage banks and pumps.


Creative Commons Licence [Some Rights Reserved]   © Copyright Bob Harvey and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.
Geographical Context: Rivers, Streams, Drainage Flat landscapes Primary Subject: Drainage other tags: South Forty Foot Drain Black Sluice IDB Click a tag, to view other nearby images.
This photo is linked from: Automatic Clusters: · South Forty Foot Drain [10] · Bicker Fen [4] · Pumping Station [2] ·
1:50,000 Modern Day Landranger(TM) Map © Crown Copyright
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1:50,000 Modern Day Landranger(TM) Map © Crown Copyright
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Grid Square
TF1839, 22 images   (more nearby 🔍)
Photographer
Bob Harvey   (more nearby)
Date Taken
Wednesday, 3 July, 2019   (more nearby)
Submitted
Thursday, 4 July, 2019
Subject Location
OSGB36: geotagged! TF 1870 3972 [10m precision]
WGS84: 52:56.5052N 0:14.1042W
Camera Location
OSGB36: geotagged! TF 18641 39785
View Direction
Southeast (about 135 degrees)
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Image Type (about): geograph 
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