Capital Ring Section 7, Richmond to Osterley Lock.

10th December 

Richmond to Osterley Lock

On a whim the previous night I decided to walk Section 7 of the Capital Ring, it being easy to get to, relatively short, and the weather promising to be dry. Much of the ground I had walked almost a year ago on an urban ramble but it needed completing as a Capital Ring walk.

To that end I got a train to Richmond’s Art Deco station, arriving at 1130, crossed the road and headed down Old Station Passage on my way to Richmond Green and the River Thames where section 7 properly begins. A steady procession of aircraft passed low over Richmond Green on their way into Heathrow Airport. At the river I turned right along Cholmondeley Walk noting that the river level was quite low, probably because of the draw off although not much of the river bed was exposed. There were a couple of partially sunken vessels near Corporation Island and the delightfully named Flowerpot Islands, victims of the unusually large tidal range during the draw off? I carried on beside the Thames passing first under the railway bridge and then under Twickenham Bridge to reach Richmond Lock.

Up the stairs onto Richmond Lock Footbridge with its ornate pale green and ivory painted ironwork I crossed the Thames to Isleworth. With the river level down there was no risk of wet feet on the path to Isleworth Promenade, a rather grand title for what amounts to a broad grass strip with some bench seats and currently not working street lamps. It does have Ring Necked Parakeets though, one of which obligingly posed for a photo in the sunshine high in a tree 😀

They get almost everywhere in their bid to oust the pigeon as London’s signature bird. The short diversion away from the Thames around Thisleworth Marina (not a typo) passes first alongside the River Crane then right onto Richmond Road where a prominent sign denotes that Isleworth is multiply twinned with Issy-les-Moulineaux in France, Ramallah and al-Bireh in Palestine, Lahore in Pakistan, and Jalandhar in India. An unremarkable gap in the high brick wall led to a footpath back towards the Thames which passed the site of the Isleworth Pottery. Joseph Shore and his son-in-law partners established the Isleworth Pottery at Railshead Creek c.1756 having acquired their skills for ceramics production in the Worcester potteries. There’s nothing of the pottery to be seen now but an information board says:

Chinese porcelain was in very high demand in Europe during the 17th and 18th centuries. Potteries in England and on the continent were eager to tap into this market and the process to produce hard paste porcelain was discovered in Meissen in Germany in 1708. The Isleworth pottery made soft-paste porcelain experimentally being one of five London pothouses to do so, the others being Limehouse, Chelsea, Bow and Vauxhall. Production was secretive and subject to industrial espionage, and their wares sold mainly locally. Archaeological excavations on the site have revealed walls and deposits of pottery waste belonging to the potteries.

The Isleworth works also made coarse earthenwares and ceramics very similar to those being manufactured in Staffordshire. After 1790 it largely made coarse and slipwares, with production ceasing around 1830 when the works at Isleworth were demolished and the site landscaped. The potteries moved to Hanworth Rd in Hounslow were it continued to operate until 1855.

Returning to the Thames the Capital ring passes Lion Wharf with the boatyards alongside Isleworth Ait and then through the outside decking of the Town Wharf pub. I resisted the temptation.

At the end of Town Wharf by the tall crane (the mechanical type not the bird) the route has to turn inland to reach the arched stone bridge across the Duke of Northumberland’s River. This eastern section of the Duke of Northumberland’s River was earlier known as Isleworth Mill stream and was built by the monks of Syon Abbey to power their mill. It was inherited, in 1594, by wife of Henry Percy, 9th Earl of Northumberland, Dorothy (née Devereux) so automatically became his property through the marriage. Sluices at Mill Plat just West of the bridge control flow into the Thames, originally via the mill, and to feed the main lake in Syon Park, Northumberland’s estate. I managed to take a very bad photo of a heron in the river channel between the Thames and the Church Street bridge 🙄

I carried on along Church Street past the London Apprentice pub (resisting the temptation once again) to waterfront Isleworth. Along the way I passed a green plaque on a house facing the river with the inscription “ARTHUR JOSEPH PENTY 1875-1937 Architect and Pioneer of Guild Socialism lived here 1926-1937”. I had to look him up, Wikipedia informs me that:

Arthur Joseph Penty (17 March 1875 – 1937) was an English architect and writer on guild socialism and distributism. He was first a Fabian socialist, and follower of Victorian thinkers William Morris and John Ruskin. He is generally credited with the formulation of a Christian socialist form of the medieval guild, as an alternative basis for economic life. Arthur Penty was born at 16 Elmwood Street, in the parish of St Lawrence, York, the second son of Walter Green Penty (1852–1902), architect, and his wife, Emma Seller. After attending St Peter’s School in York he was apprenticed in 1888 to his father. Around 1900 Penty had met A. R. Orage; together with Holbrook Jackson they founded the Leeds Arts Club. Penty left his father’s office in 1901, and moved to London in 1902 to pursue his interest in the arts and crafts movement. Orage and Jackson followed in 1905 and 1906; Penty in fact led the way, and Orage lodged with him in his first attempts to live by writing. There is a plaque on a house on the Thames riverside in Old Isleworth (near Syon Park) commemorating his residence there.

The Isleworth Draw Port at the foot of the slipway was completely empty whereas a year ago I was entertained by containers being unloaded from a vessel using a crane in a manner that looked like an accident waiting to happen at any moment.

And so after rounding the corner by the church I passed through the iron gates into Syon Park. Syon Park takes its name from the Bridgettine abbey begun in 1426, which stood on the site now occupied by Syon House. Suppressed in 1539 by King Henry VIII Catherine Howard, Henry’s fifth wife, was confined at Syon before he “suppressed” her too in 1542. Looking across the “Capability” Brown landscaped parkland I noticed the green copper cap of the clock tower at Gillette Corner on the Great West Road sticking up above the trees in the sunshine. Further along I passed Syon House on the right with its wide lawn and Ha-Ha.

Syon House was built by Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of Somerset and Lord Protector to King Edward VI. Lady Jane Grey, the “Nine Day Queen” was offered the Crown at Syon in 1553. The estate was gifted to Henry Percy, 9th Earl of Northumberland in 1604, and has remained in the family’s ownership to the present day. Today it makes its money from guided tours on Mondays and Tuesdays “during the season”, self-guided entry on Sundays and Bank Holidays, and venue hire. If you fancy having your wedding reception here budget on £9000 to £26000 depending on what day you want it. This being Wednesday I moved on. The 3rd Duke made further improvements to the house and grounds, including building the spectacular Great Conservatory in the late 1820s which is now behind the large garden centre which has everything you’d expect in the way of cafes, restaurants, masses of Xmas tat etc. Probably sell plants too but I can’t confirm that since my sole reason for entering was that it also has toilets. On the way to which there is the Monastery Barn, one of the oldest recorded buildings at Syon, it dates back to the fifteenth century. Before the dissolution of monasteries under Henry VIII it belonged to the Bridgettine abbey mentioned above. The steep roof, previously thatched, was tiled after collapsing in 1910, the windows have also been replaced and extensive additions in the sixteenth century obscure much of the earlier structure. It’s the Trigger’s Broom of historic barns 😃

I exited Syon Park to London Road and turned right towards the bridge and High Street. Brentford lies where the old route west from London crossed the River Brent before the Great West Road bypassed it in 1925, relieving the notorious congestion on Brentford High Street.

Some few hundred years previously on a cold and foggy weekend in November 1642 there was a bit of a bust-up here which is now known as the Battle of Brentford. During what was called when I went to school The English Civil War but I think we’re now supposed to refer to as the Wars of the Three Kingdoms Parliamentary troops arrived here on Friday 11 November and barricaded the road at the bridge. The Royalists overcame part of Denzil Holles red-coated regiment in the late morning of Saturday 12th at Sir Richard Wynn’s house to the west of the town near where the famous lion Gate stands now. Here the overwhelming numbers of Royalists dislodged the rest of Holles’ men in under an hour. This was made easier as the Parliamentarian commanders were absent in London and the horse troops in the town scarpered when they heard the firing at Wynn’s house. Fighting continued that afternoon near Ferry Lane in the town centre. About 20 Royalists were killed in the battle, perhaps 50 Parliamentarians died in the fighting and more again drowned in the Thames fleeing the Royalists. That night Royalist soldiers stole supplies in Brentford and slept in the open. The Battle of Turnham Green took place the next day. Parliamentary barges from Kingston, laden with artillery and ammunition, sailed down river overnight and came under Royalist fire from Syon House, injuring a few men on board. Royalist cannon on the river bank downstream threatened the barges so their crews sank them deliberately to prevent the capture of their cargoes. On 13 November Syon House was damaged by firing from Parliamentary ships on the Thames; repairs listed in the Syon accounts cost £26.10s. Returning fire, the Royalists sank one boat. The Royalists failed to press any advantage that they had gained and as a result of these battles early in the Civil War King Charles was prevented from capturing London and ending the war. The struggle went on until 1646 but the Royalists were never able to attack London again.

383 years later Brentford High Street was a little more peaceful so I went and got samosas for lunch and had a picnic down by the canal past Brentford Gauging Lock. Located at the junction of the River Brent and the Grand Union Canal the Gauging Lock was used to measure the loads on boats to determine the tolls to be paid to use the canal. In 2022 the Toll House next to the lock was opened for Open House London and I paid a visit. The wide basin by the lock and bridge was until the early 1980s lined with canopied warehouses which gave protection for the loading and unloading of cargo boats. Now those have been replaced by modern flats and on the High Street side, posh restaurants.

During my picnic I was visited by a friendly doggo named Beano and afterwards a large Coot with a ring of green algae marking its waterline. It stood in the middle of the towpath staring at me. Apparently Coots are partial to Marmite & Cheese flavour corn puffs. After lunch I carried on along the canal towpath under first the Hounslow Loop railway line and then the Great West Road to Boston Manor Park. There is a recommended Capital Ring Diversion here to visit the Jacobean Boston Manor so I crossed the canal on the footbridge, passed under the M4 motorway viaduct and through the park to the house. Last time I was here the house was swathed in scaffolding, now it’s open again and free to visit but that would have to wait until I have more time, I didn’t want to risk finishing another Capital Ring section in the dark. I’ll have to come back.

I retraced my steps over the canal footbridge and turned right by a sunken boat to continue along the towpath to Clitheroe Lock noting along the way the brick ramp leading down into the water, provided to enable horses which fell in to climb out again. This section of canal was notable for the number of boats in various stages of DIY renovation and even more notable, so many Coots! It’s Coot Central here, I've rarely seen them outnumber the Mallard Ducks.

I crossed the canal at Gallows Bridge, a cast iron “turnover bridge” built by the Grand Junction Canal Co. before the amalgamation which formed the Grand Union. This type of bridge allowed horses to cross from one towpath to the other side without being unhitched from the boat. I passed under the Piccadilly Line, saw a Great Cormorant take off from the canal, then walked under the M4 motorway through a tunnel of colourful graffiti before reaching Osterley Island which lies between the canal and a loop of the River Brent. Finally I arrived at Osterley Lock, the end of Section 7 at 1435. You’ll be glad to know that I did not let the swan swim in the lock. Or the goose.

From here it was a short walk to Boston Manor tube station, albeit for the first time today it was uphill. Section 7 is remarkably level save for steps over bridges.

Capital Ring Section 7 ✅

More photos in this Flickr Album