3-021-075 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Bursting of the Napton and Warwick Canal, 1869. Engraving from a sketch by Mr. J. Burgess of an accident: '...the bursting of the embankment of the Warwick and Napton canal, near Emscope Bridge, and the flooding of the country around. It seems that Mr. Baylis, contractor for the local board of Warwick, was engaged in constructing a portion of the main sewer beneath the canal which here crosses the Avon and flows some 40 ft. above the meadows. The traffic on the canal is usually suspended during Whitsun week; and it is supposed that the contractor's workmen, in order to take advantage of this circumstance to the utmost, approached the watercourse too closely before the water was drawn off. This caused a leakage which sapped the embankment until a fissure was made about 40 ft. wide. The water dashed through in a roaring cascade, carrying with it and wrecking a large canal-boat...Some trees of large size were thrown down and carried over the fields towards the Avon and the embankment of the Great Western Railway. The canal authorities, on being informed of what had taken place, dammed the water at the neighbouring bridges, but did not succeed in stopping the flow until the canal was reduced to a mere pool'. From "Illustrated London News", 1869.