Now I always took that tall cast iron sewer pipe beside the Swiss Tavern on the corner of Lausanne and Belfort Roads for granted.
It was just one of those bits of street furniture you grew up with and as a result I never bothered to record it.
Happily our Colin took the one just down from Bastion Road in Plumstead and although it is painted in a slightly different colour it is no different.
Now I am pretty much sure I am going to be corrected today or at the very least attract someone who knows more about 19th century sewer ventilation pipes than I do.
They were for venting the sewers of the more obnoxious and even dangerous gasses which could accumulate down below and I suppose they are still necessary today.
Colin reckoned he heard running water when he took one picture of the base.
I have not come across one in Manchester but I bet there will be someone who has, and posts the fact with perhaps a picture.
I expect they help date the area. One source I read suggested that they were erected in the years after the Great London Stink in 1858 and this would fit roughly with when my bit of Peckham was being laid out.
They were particularly necessary in hilly areas where gas could get trapped in pockets, and both my the area around Lausanne Road and Colin’s Plumstead are built on hills.
And at least one chap got in on the act and in 1895 Joseph Edmund Webb, of Birmingham, patented the
“Webb’s Patent Sewer Gas Destructor in March 1895.
At its top behind a glass, burned a small flame from the town’s gas supply.
This acted as a chimney, drawing the sewer gas up to the flame, where it was ignited, thus illuminating the street. The cleverness of Mr Webb’s patent was the way it regulated the supply of sewer gas.
North Tyneside council has restored ten in Whitley Bay and Monkseaton. Blyth council has restored five. Sheffield, though, is the capital of the destructor.
It was built on seven hills, so there were lots of folds and u-bends in its sewer system in which to trap gas.
From 1914 to 1935, it installed 84 destructors, of which 22 remain with three still at work, casting an orange glow on the Sheffield streets.*
And much to my surprise there is even a facebook page.**
Which I think might indeed be a fitting point to close on although I have yet to find Henry Eddie & Co Ltd or the Bow Foundry.
All I need now is someone to post me a picture of my old sewer pipe which will no doubt raise a verse of
“They are moving father’s grave to build a sewer," but that as they say is another story.***
Pictures; from the collection of Colin Fitzpatrick 2013
*The Northern Echo July 2008 http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/history/memories/3211527.Is_this_just_the_tip_of_the_stink_pole_/
**Sewer gas destructor lamp, https://www.facebook.com/pages/Sewer-gas-destructor-lamp/138360699526339
***Of sewers, music halls and deep deep tunnels, Barlow Moor Road in 1911, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/of-sewers-music-halls-and-deep-deep.html
 |
| Down in Plumstead |
Happily our Colin took the one just down from Bastion Road in Plumstead and although it is painted in a slightly different colour it is no different.
Now I am pretty much sure I am going to be corrected today or at the very least attract someone who knows more about 19th century sewer ventilation pipes than I do.
They were for venting the sewers of the more obnoxious and even dangerous gasses which could accumulate down below and I suppose they are still necessary today.
Colin reckoned he heard running water when he took one picture of the base.
I have not come across one in Manchester but I bet there will be someone who has, and posts the fact with perhaps a picture.
I expect they help date the area. One source I read suggested that they were erected in the years after the Great London Stink in 1858 and this would fit roughly with when my bit of Peckham was being laid out.
They were particularly necessary in hilly areas where gas could get trapped in pockets, and both my the area around Lausanne Road and Colin’s Plumstead are built on hills.
And at least one chap got in on the act and in 1895 Joseph Edmund Webb, of Birmingham, patented the
“Webb’s Patent Sewer Gas Destructor in March 1895.
At its top behind a glass, burned a small flame from the town’s gas supply.
This acted as a chimney, drawing the sewer gas up to the flame, where it was ignited, thus illuminating the street. The cleverness of Mr Webb’s patent was the way it regulated the supply of sewer gas.
North Tyneside council has restored ten in Whitley Bay and Monkseaton. Blyth council has restored five. Sheffield, though, is the capital of the destructor.
 |
| Henry Eddie & Co, Bow Foundry |
From 1914 to 1935, it installed 84 destructors, of which 22 remain with three still at work, casting an orange glow on the Sheffield streets.*
And much to my surprise there is even a facebook page.**
Which I think might indeed be a fitting point to close on although I have yet to find Henry Eddie & Co Ltd or the Bow Foundry.
All I need now is someone to post me a picture of my old sewer pipe which will no doubt raise a verse of
“They are moving father’s grave to build a sewer," but that as they say is another story.***
Pictures; from the collection of Colin Fitzpatrick 2013
*The Northern Echo July 2008 http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/history/memories/3211527.Is_this_just_the_tip_of_the_stink_pole_/
**Sewer gas destructor lamp, https://www.facebook.com/pages/Sewer-gas-destructor-lamp/138360699526339
***Of sewers, music halls and deep deep tunnels, Barlow Moor Road in 1911, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/of-sewers-music-halls-and-deep-deep.html
How far is this from Waller road school. I would walk from St Marys road to the school and cross Lausanne road at some point. This is in 1946. Mick French.
ReplyDeleteWell Mick this one is Plumstead. I would like a picture of the Lausanne Road one but haven't been back for ages and as yet no one has taken a picture for me. For copyright reasons I won't use google
ReplyDelete