| Chester’s Quay. | Dice Quay. |
| Brewer’s Quay. | Smart’s Quay. |
| Galley Quay. | Somer’s Quay. |
| Wool Dock. | Lyon’s Quay. |
| Custom-house Quay. | Botolph Quay. |
| Porteus’ Quay. | Hammond’s Quay. |
| Bear Quay. | Gaunt’s Quay. |
| Sab’s Quay. | Cock’s Quay. |
| Wiggan’s Quay. | Fresh Wharf. |
| Young’s Quay. | Billingsgate. |
| Ralph’s Quay. |
It will be seen that this list includes several of those selected by the earlier commission, and comprised a total river frontage of 1,464 feet only, the whole of it lying between the Tower and London Bridge. As might be expected, this limited accommodation practically left the importer of goods entirely at the mercy of the proprietors of these wharves, because there was no legal limit to the charges to be imposed, similar to the restriction placed upon the Dock Companies when they started. The result was that, as the business of the port increased without any proportionate increase in the accommodation for it, so the wharfingers raised their charges. And they not only did this, but by acting in concert they contrived to evade their responsibilities for losses inseparable from the limited and imperfect nature of the accommodation which they afforded. It was a common complaint amongst the merchants that, owing to the carelessness of the servants of the wharves, lighters were sunk when alongside, goods stolen from the lighters or off the quays; that losses by fire, &c., &c., constantly occurred; and that as the associated wharves were not a corporate body, the parties aggrieved never knew where to look for redress. Now, when it is remembered that these complaints were the subject of a petition from the merchants of London to the Privy Council so early as 1674, and that from that period until the opening of the West India Dock in 1802, not an additional foot of Legal Quay accommodation had been provided, some impression may be obtained of what our commerce must have suffered in the interval. It cannot be doubted that, but for the unrivalled natural facilities of the river for trade, London must have sunk into a third or fourth-rate port. And that such a state of things should have been so long tolerated by London, while Bristol, and Hull, and Liverpool supplied three or four times the extent of Legal Quay accommodation, is all the more surprising. So unsparing were the exactions of the earlier wharf proprietary, that it was ascertained on enquiry that they had trebled their charges in the course of eight years; and justified this proceeding by alleging it to be the only means by which they could repair the losses which they had sustained by the Great Fire.
Now it is commonly supposed that there were no docks in London in existence at this time. Nor were there on the north side of the river, where they were most wanted, and where the City interest always attracted the landing of the most valuable classes of merchandise. But for many years prior to the date to which I have brought my lecture a most interesting dock had been in existence at Rotherhithe, known as the Howland Great Wet Dock. Stowe tells us that when Canute laid siege to London he commenced to dig a canal on the site of this dock in order to divert the course of the river to Battersea; and in 1209 the current was so diverted to admit of the rebuilding of London Bridge, which in 1176 had been destroyed by fire; and the large opening thus made from the river is said to have formed the nucleus of the dock before you. But, be this as it may, the dock actually existed in 1660 as here represented, and may fairly claim to be the first public dock in Great Britain. As shown in this view, the dock was 1,070 feet from east to west, 500 feet in width, and had a depth of water of 17 feet. It will be observed that on the north and south sides it is thickly planted with trees, the object being to protect the ships in the dock from the fierce gales which in winter swept over the open country surrounding it. On the development of the Greenland Fisheries the dock was specially laid out for the ships engaged in that trade, and was for many years known as the Greenland Dock. Extensive premises, with the necessary boilers and tanks, were erected for boiling the blubber and extracting the oil; and for many years upwards of a thousand tuns of oil were produced annually. At the commencement of the present century this profitable business not only rapidly sunk, and finally left the port of London, but the United Kingdom itself. But simultaneously with the decline of the Greenland trade the timber and corn trade with the Baltic ports increased, and the dock became the principal resort of vessels engaged in them.
Howland Great Wet Dock.
in the PARISH of ROTHERHITHE.
FORMERLY BELONGING TO MRS HOWLAND OF STREATHAM
About the year 1807, the period of the inception of the Commercial Dock Company, a Mr. Moore, who owned some forty-five acres of land in the neighbourhood of this dock, projected a Company to be known as the Baltic Dock Company, and succeeded in obtaining from the Treasury a promise of an exclusive right to bond timber in the docks he proposed to construct, provided that they furnished sufficient accommodation for the business. Strange to say, this concession was granted by the Treasury and even notified to the Customs for their information, although the proposed docks were never even commenced. Mr. Moore subsequently sold his land and transferred the exclusive privileges he had acquired to the promoters of what was afterwards known as the Commercial Dock Company.
The City interest always opposed the recognition of this dock as a Legal Quay, for a reason sufficiently obvious, and it was not until 1851 that the Commercial Dock Company obtained an Act empowering them to land here nearly every description of goods, if sanctioned by the Customs. But the development of the timber trade pointed to the necessity of providing accommodation for it, and the owners of this dock, which in the year 1808 received the name of the Commercial Dock, encouraged by the prospects of the restriction acquired from the Treasury through Mr. Moore, which, as you are aware, was never practically operative, considerably enlarged and improved it; large tracts of land adjoining were purchased and converted into timber ponds, and in 1810 their first Act of Parliament was obtained by the Commercial Dock Company. Granaries, wharves, &c., were subsequently built, and between the years 1810 and 1815 four additional ponds, or docks, were opened. You will thus observe that the Howland Dock was the nucleus of the existing Surrey Commercial system of Docks—a plan of which is now before you. In 1811, the year after the Commercial Dock Company obtained their Act, an Act was obtained for completing and maintaining what was known as the East Country Dock, the history of which seems very obscure. Under their Act of 1851 the Commercial Dock Company purchased this dock. Meanwhile, side by side with the Commercial Docks, the Grand Surrey Canal and Docks had been steadily growing. In the year 1800, Dodds, an eminent engineer, had recommended the Greenland Dock as a suitable entrance to a tidal canal for ships to Vauxhall and Lambeth, along the line now partly occupied by the Surrey Canal. This scheme was never carried out, but the expense and danger of the river navigation indicated the desirability of some similar means of reaching points above bridge by water; and the result was the Grand Surrey Canal, commenced in the year 1800. It was intended to make a cut from Rotherhithe to Battersea, with collateral cuts to Croydon, Merton, Tooting, Wandsworth, and Camberwell. Although empowered by their Act of Parliament to build docks, the Surrey Company did not exist as a Dock Company until 1854. Ten years afterwards this Company united with the Commercial Company, and thus formed, under the title of the Surrey Commercial Docks Company, the interesting and extensive network of water-communication which you see before you. Including the new dock recently opened, the total extent of these docks—land and water—is nearly 370 acres.
Now returning to the north side of the river, I would ask you to bear in mind my reference to the petition of the London merchants in 1674. But anything like redress from a Privy Council of which King Charles II. was the president, was by no means easy of attainment. The king wanted money. As is well known, his favours generally went to the highest bidder. Moreover, the wharf proprietary consisted for the most part of the leading City magnates, and to conciliate them—or, rather, not to do anything to offend them—was obviously a great point with this most worthless of merry monarchs. So the merchants petitioned in vain. But in spite of these serious drawbacks the trade of the port steadily increased. An immense impetus was given to the manufacturing industries of the country by the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. This measure had the effect of sending from 50,000 to 70,000 of the most skilled of the French artisans to this country, and some £10,000,000 of French money. The result was increased activity in the manufactures of the country, and a great accession in the trade of the port. Thus, while in the year 1613 the total value of the exports and imports had been a little over £4,800,000, in the year 1700 they represented a value of £13,272,891, of which London alone contributed £10,263,325. It will, of course, be readily understood that in the absence of easy and cheap means of internal communication, the only method by which the manufacturing districts could get their goods into the London markets would be by coasting-vessels. Hence this class of business constituted the bulk of the shipping frequenting the river. Thus, in the year 1728, while 1,839 British and 213 foreign vessels entered the river, the number of coasting-vessels, colliers, &c., was not less than 6,837. At this time most of the foreign trade was in the hands of the East India Company, the Russia Company, the Levant Company, the South Sea Company, the Hudson’s Bay Company, and the African Company. With the exception of the cargoes carried by the ships of the East India Company, much of the business conducted by these great companies could be accommodated at the Sufferance Wharves, and did not present the inducements to plunder offered by the valuable productions of the East and West Indies. The conquests of Clive in the East Indies resulted in an immense augmentation of the shipping of the East India Company, and the acquisition of many of the West India Islands about the same time led to a vast increase in the importations of sugar and rum, which, from their value and the high duties to which they were subject, offered tempting baits to the organised bands of river thieves which the crowded state of the port and the unprotected condition of the shipping and merchandise gradually called into existence. The Legal Quays could accommodate 32,000 hogsheads of sugar only; whereas, so early as 1756, the annual importations reached upwards of 60,200, and over 5,000 puncheons of rum. The Sufferance Wharves could accommodate 60,200, and in the year 1793 the Government were compelled to sanction the landing and storage of sugar at these places, although laid out for, and principally used by, the coasting trade. In the year 1796, the Sufferance Wharves on the south side of the river were known as: