Bow Creek is a long tidal estuary of the English

River Lea The River Lea ( ) is in the East of England and Greater London. It originates in Bedfordshire, in the Chiltern Hills, and flows southeast through Hertfordshire, along the Essex border and into Greater London, to meet the River Thames at Bow Cr ...

and is part of the

Bow Back Rivers Bow Back Rivers or Stratford Back Rivers is a complex of waterways between Bow, London, Bow and Stratford, London, Stratford in east London, England, which connect the River Lea to the River Thames. Starting in the twelfth century, works were ca ...

. Below

Bow Locks Bow Locks No. 20 () is a set of bi-directional locks in Bromley-by-Bow in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets and Newham. The locks link the tidal Bow Creek to the River Lee Navigation, which is a canalised river. These locks were first buil ...

the creek forms the boundary between the

London Borough The London boroughs are the current 32 districts of England, local authority districts that together with the City of London make up the administrative area of Greater London, England; each is governed by a London borough council. The present ...

s of

Newham The London Borough of Newham () is a London boroughs, London borough created in 1965 by the London Government Act 1963. It covers an area previously administered by the Essex county boroughs of County Borough of West Ham, West Ham and County ...

and

Tower Hamlets The London Borough of Tower Hamlets is a borough in London, England. Situated on the north bank of the River Thames and immediately east of the City of London, the borough spans much of the traditional East End of London and includes much of ...

, in East London. Bow Creek

History

The

rises in the town of

Luton Luton () is a town and borough in Bedfordshire, England. The borough had a population of 225,262 at the 2021 census. Luton is on the River Lea, about north-west of London. The town's foundation dates to the sixth century as a Saxon settleme ...

Bedfordshire Bedfordshire (; abbreviated ''Beds'') is a Ceremonial County, ceremonial county in the East of England. It is bordered by Northamptonshire to the north, Cambridgeshire to the north-east, Hertfordshire to the south and the south-east, and Buckin ...

, and flows to the east and then the south to reach the

River Thames The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the The Isis, River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the Longest rivers of the United Kingdom, s ...

Leamouth Leamouth is a locality in the Blackwall area of Poplar, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. The area takes its name from the former ''Leamouth Wharf'' and lies on the west side of the confluence of the Bow Creek stretch of the Lea, at it ...

in Poplar. The final are known as Bow Creek, and follow a

meandering A meander is one of a series of regular sinuous curves in the channel of a river or other watercourse. It is produced as a watercourse erodes the sediments of an outer, concave bank ( cut bank or river cliff) and deposits sediments on an inn ...

route across a low-lying area formerly called Bromley Marsh, but now occupied by gas works and trading estates. The river is one of the oldest navigations in the country, but the creek is tidal, providing insufficient depth for navigation at low tide. Use of the river for navigation is recorded in documents dating from 1190 and it became the first river in Britain where improvements were authorised by an act of Parliament, the River Lee Navigation Act 1425 (

3 Hen. 6 3 (three) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 2 and preceding 4, and is the smallest odd prime number and the only prime preceding a square number. It has religious and cultural significance in many societies ...

. c. 5). The River Lee Navigation Act 1571 ( 13 Eliz. 1. c. 18) allowed the Lord Mayor to make cuts and improvements to the river and to construct towing paths on both sides of it. This work is thought to have included a new cut between Old Ford and Bow Locks, which is known as Bow River and, like Bow Creek, is not subject to tolls for those using it. During the great plague of 1665, bargemen on the river continued to supply food to the population of London and were granted permission to navigate the Thames without having to ask a

Thames The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the second-longest in the United Kingdom, after th ...

Lighterman A lighterman is a worker who operates a lighter (barge), lighter, a type of flat-bottomed barge, which may be powered or unpowered. In the latter case, it is usually moved by a powered tug. The term is particularly associated with the highly ...

for assistance, in recognition of the risks they had taken. Because of the importance of the river for navigation, the engineer

John Smeaton John Smeaton (8 June 1724 – 28 October 1792) was an English civil engineer responsible for the design of bridges, canals, harbours and lighthouses. He was also a capable mechanical engineer and an eminent scholar, who introduced various ...

was asked to survey it and to suggest how it could be improved in 1765. He produced a report in 1766, which recommended replacing the

flash lock A flash lock is a type of lock (water transport), lock for river or canal transport. Early locks were designed with a single gate, known as a flash lock or staunch lock. The earliest European references to what were clearly flash locks were in ...

s with more modern pound locks, and more significantly for Bow Creek, making a new cut from Bow tidal gates to the Thames at Limehouse. Although only a little further to the west, access at Limehouse avoided the long loop around the

Isle of Dogs The Isle of Dogs is a large peninsula bounded on three sides by a large meander in the River Thames in East London, England. It includes the Cubitt Town, Millwall and Canary Wharf districts. The area was historically part of the Manor, Haml ...

for traffic heading towards London. The cut was to be opened on 2 July 1770, but failure of a side wall delayed the event until September and a bridge collapsed into it in December. Traffic began to switch to the new cut, which was too narrow to allow barges to pass one another, and so a programme of widening it, which was completed in September 1777, was carried out. The channel now ends in

Limehouse Basin Limehouse Basin is a body of water east of London Bridge that is also a navigable link between the River Thames and two of London's canals. First dug in 1820 as the eastern terminus of the new Regent's Canal, its wet area was less than origi ...

. Access to the new navigation, now known as the

Lee Navigation The Lee Navigation is a canalised river incorporating the River Lea (also called the River Lee along the sections that are navigable). It flows from Hertford Castle Weir to the River Thames at Bow Creek; its first lock is Hertford Lock and i ...

, was still by tidal gates at Bow. There had been gates at the site since at least 1307, as a structure was erected by Henry de Bedyk during the reign of

Edward I of England Edward I (17/18 June 1239 – 7 July 1307), also known as Edward Longshanks and the Hammer of the Scots (Latin: Malleus Scotorum), was King of England from 1272 to 1307. Concurrently, he was Lord of Ireland, and from 1254 ...

. The gates were rebuilt in 1573 by the owners of the tide mill, but the City of London appointed a surveyor to inspect the plans and a committee to oversee the work. Documents from 1588 suggest that the gates opened automatically when the incoming tide reached a level with the river above them. Another rebuilding took place in 1721, again by the tide mill owners, and with the City of London appointing a surveyor to oversee the work. Smeaton, in 1766, suggested that the gates should be replaced by a conventional pound lock, but this was not carried out. However, in 1852 a lock was constructed, although the gates also remained in place. The lock was rebuilt and shortened in 1900, and a second lock constructed beside it in 1931. Higher floodgates and walls were added in 2000 to prevent the inundation of the Lee Navigation when the level of the tide in the creek exceeded the level in the navigation. Access from the creek to Bow Back Rivers was altered in the 1930s as part of an upgrade carried out to improve the waterways and to provide employment. The

Prescott Channel The Prescott Channel was built in 1930–35 as part of a flood relief scheme for the River Lee Navigation in the County Borough of West Ham, England, and was named after Sir William Prescott, the then chairman of the Lee Conservancy Board ...

was constructed to bypass the tide mills, and gave access from the creek to the Three Mills Wall River and the

Waterworks River Waterworks River is a river, at one time a tidal river, in the London Borough of Newham, one of the Bow Back Rivers that flow into the Bow Creek part of the River Lea, which in turn flows into the River Thames. The river is an artificial channel ...

. The lock and sluice structure at the mouth of the new channel became disused in the 1960s and was subsequently removed, but a new structure capable of handling 350-tonne barges has been built as part of the upgrade to the waterways for the

2012 Summer Olympics The 2012 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXX Olympiad and also known as London 2012, were an international multi-sport event held from 27 July to 12 August 2012 in London, England, United Kingdom. The first event, the ...

, recreating a navigable connection between the creek and the Bow Back Rivers. The creek gave access to Abbey Creek and the Channelsea River, which connected to the old course of the River Lea near

Hackney Marshes Hackney Marshes is an area of open space in London's Lower Lea Valley, lying on the western bank of the River Lea. It takes its name from its position on the eastern boundary of Hackney, the principal part of the London Borough of Hackney, an ...

. Most of this waterway has since been culverted. Water also entered the creek through the sluices of the tide mills at

Three Mills The Three Mills are former working mills and an island of the same name on the River Lea. It is one of London’s oldest surviving industrial centres. The mills lie in the London Borough of Newham, but despite lying on the Newham side of the Lea ...

. Ships were built at the

Orchard House Yard Orchard House Yard (known as Orchard Yard and Hercules Wharf) was an English shipbuilding yard located at Leamouth, on the River Lea at Bow Creek (England), Bow Creek . Forming part of the Orchard House estate, a number of shipbuilders occupied t ...

, in the southern reaches at

, and launched in the creek where they could travel north along the

River Lee Navigation The Lee Navigation is a canalised river incorporating the River Lea (also called the River Lee along the sections that are navigable). It flows from Hertford Castle Weir to the River Thames at Bow Creek; its first lock is Hertford Lock and i ...

or south to the

. In 1810, an iron bridge was built spanning the creek – just south of the modern A13 bridge. The abutments have been reused for the pedestrian Jubilee Bridge.

River Crossings

The crossings below are the current river crossings, from the mouth of Bow Creek on the Thames upstream to House Mill.

Bibliography

* *

References

External links

The Iron Bridge and Ironbridge Tavern — A Chronology — Bow Creek/River LeaBritish Waterways history of the Bow Back Rivers
{{authority control Rivers of London Geography of the London Borough of Newham Geography of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets River Lea 0Bow

History

River Crossings

See also

Bibliography

References

External links