William Jessop (23 January 1745 – 18 November 1814) was an English
civil engineer
A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering – the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructure while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing ...
, best known for his work on
canal
Canals or artificial waterways are waterways or engineered channels built for drainage management (e.g. flood control and irrigation) or for conveyancing water transport vehicles (e.g. water taxi). They carry free, calm surface f ...
s,
harbour
A harbor (American English), harbour (British English; see spelling differences), or haven is a sheltered body of water where ships, boats, and barges can be docked. The term ''harbor'' is often used interchangeably with ''port'', which is ...
s and early railways in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
Early life
Jessop was born in
Devonport, Devon, the son of Josias Jessop, a foreman shipwright in the Naval Dockyard. Josias Jessop was responsible for the repair and maintenance of Rudyerd's Tower, a wooden lighthouse on the
Eddystone Rock. He carried out this task for twenty years until 1755, when the
lighthouse
A lighthouse is a tower, building, or other type of physical structure designed to emit light from a system of lamps and lenses and to serve as a beacon for navigational aid, for maritime pilots at sea or on inland waterways.
Lighthouses m ...
burnt down.
John Smeaton
John Smeaton (8 June 1724 – 28 October 1792) was a British civil engineer responsible for the design of bridges, canals, harbours and lighthouses. He was also a capable mechanical engineer and an eminent physicist. Smeaton was the fi ...
, a leading
civil engineer
A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering – the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructure while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing ...
, drew up plans for a new stone lighthouse and Josias became responsible for the overseeing the building work. The two men became close friends, and when Josias died in 1761, two years after the completion of the lighthouse, William Jessop was taken on as a pupil by Smeaton (who also acted as Jessop's guardian), working on various canal schemes in
Yorkshire
Yorkshire ( ; abbreviated Yorks), formally known as the County of York, is a Historic counties of England, historic county in northern England and by far the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its large area in comparison with other Eng ...
.
[Rolt, L.T.C., "Great Engineers", 1962, G. Bell and Sons Ltd, ISBN]
Jessop worked as Smeaton's assistant for a number of years before beginning to work as an engineer in his own right. He assisted Smeaton with the Calder and Hebble and the Aire and Calder navigations in Yorkshire.
[
]
Grand Canal of Ireland
The first major work that Jessop is known to have carried out was the Grand Canal of Ireland. This had begun as a Government project in 1753, and it had taken seventeen years to build fourteen miles (21 km) of canal from the Dublin
Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 ...
end. In 1772 a private company was formed to complete the canal, and consulted John Smeaton. Smeaton sent Jessop to take control of the project as principal engineer. Jessop re-surveyed the proposed line of the canal and carried the canal over the River Liffey, via the Leinster Aqueduct. He also drove the canal across the great Bog of Allen
The Bog of Allen ( ga, Móin Alúine) is a large raised bog in the centre of Ireland between the rivers Liffey and Shannon.
The bog's 958 square kilometers (370 square miles) stretch into County Offaly, County Meath, County Kildare, County Lao ...
, a feat comparable with George Stephenson's crossing of the Chat Moss bog with the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. The canal was carried over the bog on a high embankment. Jessop also identified sources of water and built reservoirs, so that the canal was in no danger of running dry. Having seen to all of the important details Jessop returned to England, leaving a deputy in charge to complete the canal. This was finally done in 1805. It seems that Jessop was closely involved with the canal in Ireland until about 1787, after which time, other work flowed in.[
]
Relationship with other engineers
Jessop was a very modest man, who did not seek self-aggrandizement. Unlike other engineers, he was not jealous of rising young engineers, but rather encouraged them. He would also recommend another engineer if he was too busy to be able to undertake a commission himself. He recommended John Rennie for the post of engineer to the Lancaster Canal
The Lancaster Canal is a canal in North West England, originally planned to run from Westhoughton in Lancashire to Kendal in south Cumbria ( historically in Westmorland). The section around the crossing of the River Ribble was never compl ...
Company, an appointment that helped to establish Rennie's reputation. When Jessop was consulting engineer to the Ellesmere Canal
The Ellesmere Canal was a waterway in England and Wales that was planned to carry boat traffic between the rivers Mersey and Severn. The proposal would create a link between the Port of Liverpool and the mineral industries in north east Wales ...
Company, in 1793, the company appointed the relatively unknown Thomas Telford
Thomas Telford FRS, FRSE, (9 August 1757 – 2 September 1834) was a Scottish civil engineer. After establishing himself as an engineer of road and canal projects in Shropshire, he designed numerous infrastructure projects in his native Scot ...
as resident engineer. Telford had no previous experience as a designer of canals, but with Jessop's advice and guidance, Telford made a success of the project. He supported Telford, even when the Company thought that the latter's designs for aqueducts were too ambitious.[
]
Cromford Canal
In 1789 Jessop was appointed chief engineer to the Cromford Canal Company. The proposed canal was intended to carry limestone, coal and iron ore from the Derwent and upper Erewash valleys and join the nearby Erewash Canal. The important features of this canal are the Derwent Viaduct, which was a single span viaduct carrying the canal over the River Derwent, and the Butterley Tunnel
Butterley Tunnel is a disused canal tunnel on the Cromford Canal below Ripley, in Derbyshire, England, opened to traffic in 1794. Along with Butterley Works blast furnaces, part of the canal tunnel and its underground wharf were declared a s ...
(formerly the Ripley Tunnel). In 1793, the Derwent Viaduct partially collapsed, and Jessop shouldered the blame, saying that he had not made the front walls strong enough. He had the viaduct repaired and strengthened at his own expense. The Butterley Tunnel was 2,966 yards (2712m) long, wide and high and required thirty-three shafts to be sunk from the surface to build it. Jessop built the Butterley Reservoir above the tunnel, extending for .[
]
Butterley Company
In 1790 Jessop founded, jointly with partners Benjamin Outram, Francis Beresford and John Wright, the Butterley Iron Works in Derbyshire to manufacture (amongst other things) cast-iron edge rails – a design Jessop had used successfully on a horse-drawn railway scheme for coal wagons between Nanpantan and Loughborough, Leicestershire (1789). Outram was concerned with the production of ironwork and equipment for Jessop's engineering projects.[
]
Grand Junction Canal
The Oxford Canal had been built by James Brindley
James Brindley (1716 – 27 September 1772) was an English engineer. He was born in Tunstead, Derbyshire, and lived much of his life in Leek, Staffordshire, becoming one of the most notable engineers of the 18th century.
Early life
Born i ...
and carried coal to large parts of southern England. However it did not provide a sufficiently direct route between the Midlands
The Midlands (also referred to as Central England) are a part of England that broadly correspond to the Kingdom of Mercia of the Early Middle Ages, bordered by Wales, Northern England and Southern England. The Midlands were important in the In ...
and London. As a result, a new canal was proposed to run from the Oxford Canal at Braunston, near Rugby
Rugby may refer to:
Sport
* Rugby football in many forms:
** Rugby league: 13 players per side
*** Masters Rugby League
*** Mod league
*** Rugby league nines
*** Rugby league sevens
*** Touch (sport)
*** Wheelchair rugby league
** Rugby union: 1 ...
, and to end at the 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 the R ...
at Brentford
Brentford is a suburban town in West London, England and part of the London Borough of Hounslow. It lies at the confluence of the River Brent and the Thames, west of Charing Cross.
Its economy has diverse company headquarters buildings wh ...
, a length of ninety miles. Jessop was appointed Chief Engineer to the Canal Company in 1793. The canal was especially difficult to plan because, whereas other canals tended to follow river valleys and only crossed a watershed when unavoidable, the new canal had to cross the rivers Ouse, Nene and others. An aqueduct was built at Wolverton
Wolverton is a constituent town of Milton Keynes, England. It is located at the northern edge of Milton Keynes, beside the West Coast Main Line, the Grand Union Canal and the river Great Ouse. It is the administrative seat of Wolverton and ...
to carry the canal across the Ouse valley. Whilst the three-arch stone aqueduct was being built, a set of nine temporary locks were used to carry the canal down one side of the valley and up the other. The aqueduct failed in 1808, and was replaced by an iron one in 1811, the iron trough design sharing a similar structure to Longdon-on-Tern Aqueduct and the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct built by Thomas Telford
Thomas Telford FRS, FRSE, (9 August 1757 – 2 September 1834) was a Scottish civil engineer. After establishing himself as an engineer of road and canal projects in Shropshire, he designed numerous infrastructure projects in his native Scot ...
. It is known as the Cosgrove aqueduct and was designed and built by Bevan.
Two tunnels also had to be built, at Braunston and Blisworth. The Blisworth Tunnel caused great problems, and was unfinished when the rest of the canal was ready. In fact Jessop considered abandoning it and using locks to carry the canal over the ridge. Jessop's temporary solution was a railway line laid over the ridge to carry traffic until the tunnel was completed. The Grand Junction Canal
The Grand Junction Canal is a canal in England from Braunston in Northamptonshire to the River Thames at Brentford, with a number of branches. The mainline was built between 1793 and 1805, to improve the route from the Midlands to London, b ...
was enormously important in encouraging trade between London and the Midlands.[
]
West India Docks
The West India Docks, built on 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, which includes the Cubitt Town, Millwall and Canary Wharf districts. The area was historically part of the Manor, Ha ...
, was the first large wet docks built in the Port of London
The Port of London is that part of the River Thames in England lying between Teddington Lock and the defined boundary (since 1968, a line drawn from Foulness Point in Essex via Gunfleet Old Lighthouse to Warden Point in Kent) with the North ...
. Between 1800 and 1802 a wet dock area of was created with a depth of , and accommodating 600 ships. Jessop was the Chief Engineer for the docks, with Ralph Walker as his assistant.[
]
Surrey Iron Railway
In 1799 separate proposals were put forward for a canal from London to Portsmouth
Portsmouth ( ) is a port and city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. The city of Portsmouth has been a unitary authority since 1 April 1997 and is administered by Portsmouth City Council.
Portsmouth is the most d ...
and for a tramway carrying horse-drawn carriages over the same route. The first part of the proposed Surrey Iron Railway was to be from Wandsworth
Wandsworth Town () is a district of south London, within the London Borough of Wandsworth southwest of Charing Cross. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London.
Toponymy
Wandsworth takes its nam ...
to Croydon
Croydon is a large town in south London, England, south of Charing Cross. Part of the London Borough of Croydon, a local government district of Greater London. It is one of the largest commercial districts in Greater London, with an exten ...
, and Jessop was asked for his opinion on the two opposing schemes. He declared that the tramway was a better scheme, as a canal would require too much water and would unduly reduce the supply in the River Wandle
The River Wandle is a right-bank tributary of the River Thames in south London, England. With a total length of about , the river passes through the London boroughs of Croydon, Sutton, Merton and Wandsworth, where it reaches the Thames. A sho ...
. It was agreed to build a tramway from Wandsworth to Croydon, as well a building a basin at Wandsworth. Jessop was appointed Chief Engineer of the project in 1801. In 1802 the Wandsworth Basin and the line were completed. There seems to be doubt as to the gauge of the line with some estimates stating and others stating 4 ft 8½ in.[
In 1803, the next phase was authorized for a line from Croydon via Merstham to ]Godstone
Godstone is a village and civil parish in Surrey, England, east of Reigate at the junction of the A22 and A25 roads, near the M25 motorway and the North Downs. Godstone railway station is separated from it by agricultural land. Blindley H ...
in Surrey. Jessop was again appointed Chief Engineer, with his son Josias as his assistant. The line reached Mestham but was never continued to Godstone. The total distance of the tramway from Wandsworth was . The tramway was eventually overtaken by the advent of steam locomotives.[
]
Later life
From 1784 to 1805 Jessop lived in Newark in Nottinghamshire, where he twice served as town mayor.
In his later life, Jessop became increasingly inflicted by a form of paralysis, and 1805 marked the end of his active career. He died at his home, Butterley Hall
Butterley Hall is an 18th-century country house near Ripley, Derbyshire. It is a Grade II listed building. The site is now the headquarters of the Derbyshire Constabulary.
The manor of Butterley was owned by Darley Abbey until the Dissolution ...
, on 18 November 1814. The Jessop Memorial Jessop is a surname, and may refer to:
* Bob Jessop (born 1946), British Marxist theoretician
* Carolyn Jessop (born 1968), American author
* Charles Minshall Jessop, mathematician
* Christine Jessop, Canadian child murdered in 1984
* Clytie Jes ...
was erected a year after his death, this can be seen east of Ripley in Codnor park. The Doric column can no longer be scaled due to being unsafe. His son Josias became a successful engineer in his own right.[
]
Legacy
Jessop was in the unusual position of bridging the gap between the canal engineers and the railway engineers who came later. His name did not gain the lasting fame that it deserved because of his modesty. Indeed some of his works have been wrongly attributed to engineers who acted as his assistants. Unlike some engineers, such as George Stephenson, Jessop did not stoop to undignified wrangles with fellow professionals. He was highly regarded by almost all those who had worked with him or for him.[
]
List of Jessop's engineering projects
*the Aire and Calder Navigation
*the Calder and Hebble Navigation (1758–1770)
*the Caledonian Canal
The Caledonian Canal connects the Scottish east coast at Inverness with the west coast at Corpach near Fort William in Scotland. The canal was constructed in the early nineteenth century by Scottish engineer Thomas Telford.
Route
The canal ...
*the Ripon Canal
The Ripon Canal is located in North Yorkshire, England. It was built by the canal engineer William Jessop to link the city of Ripon with the navigable section of the River Ure at Oxclose Lock, from where boats could reach York and Hull. It ...
(1767)
*the Chester Canal (May 1778) as a contractor with James Pinkerton
*the Barnsley Canal (1792–1802)
*the Grand Canal of Ireland between the River Shannon
The River Shannon ( ga, Abhainn na Sionainne, ', '), at in length, is the longest river in the British Isles. It drains the Shannon River Basin, which has an area of , – approximately one fifth of the area of the island of Ireland.
The Sha ...
and Dublin
Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 ...
(1773–1805)
*the Grand Junction Canal
The Grand Junction Canal is a canal in England from Braunston in Northamptonshire to the River Thames at Brentford, with a number of branches. The mainline was built between 1793 and 1805, to improve the route from the Midlands to London, b ...
(1793–1805), later part of the Grand Union Canal
The Grand Union Canal in England is part of the British canal system. It is the principal navigable waterway between London and the Midlands. Starting in London, one arm runs to Leicester and another ends in Birmingham, with the latter ...
*the Cromford Canal, Derbyshire/Nottinghamshire
Nottinghamshire (; abbreviated Notts.) is a landlocked county in the East Midlands region of England, bordering South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west. The trad ...
*the Nottingham Canal (1792–1796)
*the River Trent Navigation
*the Grantham Canal
The Grantham Canal ran 33 miles (53 km) from Grantham through 18 locks to West Bridgford, where it joined the River Trent. It was built primarily for the transportation of coal to Grantham. It opened in 1797 and its profitability stead ...
(1793–1797), the first English canal entirely dependent on reservoirs for its water supply
*Engineer of the Ellesmere Canal
The Ellesmere Canal was a waterway in England and Wales that was planned to carry boat traffic between the rivers Mersey and Severn. The proposal would create a link between the Port of Liverpool and the mineral industries in north east Wales ...
(1793–1805), detailed design undertaken by Thomas Telford
Thomas Telford FRS, FRSE, (9 August 1757 – 2 September 1834) was a Scottish civil engineer. After establishing himself as an engineer of road and canal projects in Shropshire, he designed numerous infrastructure projects in his native Scot ...
)
*the Rochdale Canal (1794–1798)
*the Sleaford Navigation
The Sleaford Navigation was a 12.5 mile (20.1 km) canalisation of the River Slea in Lincolnshire, England, which opened in 1794. It ran from a junction with the River Witham, near Chapel Hill to the town of Sleaford through seven locks ...
(1794)
*the West India Docks and 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, which includes the Cubitt Town, Millwall and Canary Wharf districts. The area was historically part of the Manor, Ha ...
canal, London (1800–1802); John Rennie was a consultant on the Docks project
*the Surrey Iron Railway, linking Wandsworth
Wandsworth Town () is a district of south London, within the London Borough of Wandsworth southwest of Charing Cross. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London.
Toponymy
Wandsworth takes its nam ...
and Croydon
Croydon is a large town in south London, England, south of Charing Cross. Part of the London Borough of Croydon, a local government district of Greater London. It is one of the largest commercial districts in Greater London, with an exten ...
(1801–1802), arguably the world's first public railway—albeit horse-drawn
*the ' Floating Harbour' in Bristol
Bristol () is a City status in the United Kingdom, city, Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county and unitary authority in England. Situated on the River Avon, Bristol, River Avon, it is bordered by the ceremonial counties of Glouces ...
(1804–1809)
*the Kilmarnock and Troon Railway
The Kilmarnock and Troon Railway was an early railway line in Ayrshire, Scotland. It was constructed to bring coal from pits around Kilmarnock to coastal shipping at Troon Harbour, and passengers were carried.
It opened in 1812, and was the ...
(1807–1812; the first railway in Scotland authorised by Act of Parliament
Acts of Parliament, sometimes referred to as primary legislation, are texts of law passed by the legislative body of a jurisdiction (often a parliament or council). In most countries with a parliamentary system of government, acts of parliame ...
)
*harbours at Shoreham-by-Sea
Shoreham-by-Sea (often shortened to Shoreham) is a coastal town and port in West Sussex, England.
The town is bordered to its north by the South Downs, to its west by the Adur Valley and to its south by the River Adur and Shoreham Beach on t ...
and Littlehampton, West Sussex[
]
See also
* Canals of the United Kingdom
*History of the British canal system
History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbrella term comprising past events as well ...
References
External links
Codnor & District Local History & Heritage website
– Jessop Monument webpage
{{DEFAULTSORT:Jessop, William
1745 births
1814 deaths
English inventors
English civil engineers
English canal engineers
Engineers from Devonport, Plymouth
People of the Industrial Revolution
Harbour engineers