Dead River: An Environmental History of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1850-1968CE

Scott, John. The Opening of the Tyne Dock. 1859. Oil on canvas. South Shields Museum and Art Gallery, South Shields. Bridgeman Images.

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For men may come and men may go,

But I go on forever.

- Alfred Tennyson, ‘The Brook’.

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CONTENTS

List of Figures……………………………………………………………...……4

Introduction...………………………………………………………………...….5The Significance of River History……………………………………………5

Methodology and Historiography……………………………………………8

Chapter 1. More Lasting Value Than Californian Gold ……………………....10The Deep History of the Tyne………………………………………………..10

Preservation for Profit: The Corporation of Newcastle……………………..11

Ballast Dumping in the 18th Century…………………………………………13

Proto-Industrialisation and The Enlightenment……………………………..15

Chapter 2. A Great Highway of Industry………………………………....……19Reconceptualising the River…………………………………..……………..19

Dredging the River…………………………………………………………..22

Reconstructing the River…………………………………………………….30

Chapter 3. Neither Salmon nor Children………………………………………34

Industrialising the River……………………………………………………..34

Turning Away from the River………………………………………………..37

Conclusion……………………………………………………………………..39

Bibliography…………………………………………………………………...40

Printed Primary.…………………………………………………….……….40

Manuscript Primary………………………………………………………….40

Secondary Works..……………………………………………………………42

Figures………………………………………………………………………..45

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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1. A reconstruction drawing of 16th century Newcastle-upon-Tyne (Watercolour: John Storey)……………………………………………..................................................................11

Figure 2. A view of proto-industrial Gateshead in 1830 (Engraving: Sydney Middlebrook)…………………………………………………………...16

Figure 3. Coat of Arms of the TIC above the doorway into Bewick House, Newcastle (Photograph: Andrew Curtis)………………………………………………………………...21

Figure 4. Figure 4. “King’s Meadow” island being dredged from the Tyne 1885CE (Photograph: S.N)………………………………...……………………………………….….24

Figure 5. Scotswood Suspension Bridge in 1832, Tyneside’s first industrial era bridge (Engraving: Illustrated London News)…………………………………………...…………..28

Figure 6. North Shields pier collapsing into the sea, 1897 (Photograph: S.N)……………....32

Figure 7. Elswick Engineering Works, 1900 (Photograph: S.N)…………………………….37

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INTRODUCTION

The Significance of River History

When searching for a location to build a home, the humans who founded the first settlements

on the Tyne had several priorities in mind. First and foremost, they needed access to a

sustainable source of food and water, but they were also looking for a site that was

defendable, sanitary, and well connected, to facilitate fast travel and trade with the outside

world; the river was the only logical place that satisfied these objectives. Soon many human

settlements had clustered around the Tyne’s banks and over time the people of Tyneside built

their houses, economies, and cultures around the river upon which they relied for survival and

expansion.1 As time progressed this bond grew tighter as they discovered that the waters

could be utilised for other purposes; generating power, producing chemicals, concrete, oil,

and many other industrial materials, as well as in being a source of recreation.2 In this way

they followed the global human trend of using the river as a basis for civilisation. Likewise,

the Tyne itself, alongside all the other life it supported, found its fate acutely entwined with

human developments.

As historical agents, rivers and the life they support have never acted as passive

resources to merely be consumed; time and again they have proved to human populations that

they can knock civilisations down as easily as they built them up. In c.5000BCE, the fortunes

of the peoples of Mesopotamia were dashed against the banks of the Tigris-Euphrates after

repeated flooding, partially blamed on their own attempts to direct the path of the river.3 In

c.2000BCE a 200 year drought hit the Indus river and spelled equal disaster for the peoples of

1 James Guthrie, The River Tyne: Its History and Resources (Newcastle-upon-Tyne; London: Longman, 1880), 7.2 “History of the Tyne,” Tyne Rivers Trust, accessed 7 December 2018, https://www.tyneriverstrust.org/the-river/.3 Walstra Heyvaert et al., "The Role of Human Interference on the Channel Shifting of the Karkheh River in the Lower Khuzestan Plain (Mesopotamia, SW Iran)," Quaternary International 251 (2011): 52.

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the Indus Valley civilisation.4 In c.350BCE, it is theorised that the Guadalquivir river delta

rose up to completely submerge the wealthy city of Tartessos based upon it, thus creating the

origin of the Atlantean myth.5 In contemporary times rivers have become more entwined with

human societies than ever, relied on as sources of food, water, culture, trade, and recreation,

however they are also facing some of their greatest threats from the same source. The

quantity of pollutants being discharged into waterways such as the Nile,6 the Ganges,7 and the

Yangtze8, as well as the effects of landscaping and unsustainable water use, is resulting in

ecosystem collapse.9 This has resulted in ever-increasing quantities of resources being spent

in efforts to save these unique environments both for their own sake and for humanity at

large. The story of the relationship between human and river is an ancient one, and in the

modern day is as important as it has ever been.

Across history the story of the River Tyne is one that parallels that of the modern

Nile or Ganges, and it maybe holds some lessons for them. The pertinent period to assess in

regards to this began in 1850 when a body named, in retrospect perhaps ironically, as the

“Tyne Improvement Commission” was appointed by parliament to increase the volume and

profitability of trade on the river.10 This organisation’s conservatorship of the river would last

until 1968, and whilst not solely accountable, it was predominantly responsible for the

transformation of the river during this time from a natural estuary into, in their own words, ‘a

4 Andrew Lawler, "Unmasking the Indus. Indus Collapse: The End or the Beginning of an Asian Culture?," Science 320 (2008): 1282.5 R. W. Khune, "Did Ulysses Travel to Atlantis?," in Science and Technology in Homeric Epics, ed. S. A. Paipetis (New York: Springer, 2009),511.6 “The Death of the Nile,” British Broadcasting Corporation, accessed 25 November 2018, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-sh/death_of_the_nile.7 “India’s dying mother,” British Broadcasting Corporation, accessed 25 November 2018, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-aad46fca-734a-45f9-8721-61404cc12a39.8 “World’s Top Ten Rivers at Risk,” World Wildlife Fund, accessed 25 November 2018, http://d2ouvy59p0dg6k.cloudfront.net/downloads/worldstop10riversatriskfinalmarch13_1.pdf.9 Ibid.10 P. J. Messent and Tyne Improvement Commissioners, River Tyne Improvement with chart of the River Tyne from the sea to Wylam (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: s.n, 1881), 251.

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great highway of industry’.11 Environmentally speaking, their century of “improvements”

meant that in 1957, when the Tyne’s waters literally bubbled with noxious chemicals, the

river was officially classified as ‘biologically dead’.12

Methodology and Historiography

The focus of this article is therefore upon the Tyne Improvement Commission (TIC) and the

unprecedented changes that they oversaw during their 118 years of authority. The primary

route of analysis is through the extensive records that the organisation kept of their

proceedings, documenting step-by-step how they went about their program of transformation.

From an environmental perspective, these sources are used to assess the impact of the TIC’s

works upon the river and its ecology and how those impacts then affected humanity in turn.

Their discussions are also analysed to come to an understanding of the philosophy behind

their actions. Ultimately it is a study of the relationships, both physical and intellectual,

between humanity and the rest of the natural world as they developed during the TIC’s tenure

and the ways in which they intersected with one another. A river is a complex, interconnected

ecosystem where disturbances on the waters can ripple outward beyond foresight, therefore it

only makes sense to assess it as such.

What this article also provides is a counternarrative to the traditional histories of the

region. Much of Tyneside’s modern identity has been built on its industrial heritage, for

which it is proud, and a significant majority of its written history has forwarded a narrative

where the river’s “golden years” are the same as those which resulted in the pollution and

destruction of much of its natural resources. The modern Port of Tyne describes the

11 Richard William Johnson, Richard Aughton, and Tyne Improvement Commissioners, The River Tyne, Its Trade and Facilities: An Official Handbook Issued under the Auspices of the Tyne Improvement Commission, the London and North Eastern Railway Company and the Corporations of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Gateshead, Jarrow, South Shields and Tynemouth (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: A. Reid, 1925), 7. 12 “Salmon Cubes, Kielder Water,” Geograph, accessed 5 March 2019, https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/4207324.

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appointment of the TIC as the beginning of ‘the heyday of the river’, but from the perspective

of the river itself this is far from the case.13 It would be untrue to say that environmental

concerns have been omitted in entirety across the historiography, although this is sometimes

the case, but it would be fair to state they have been largely disregarded. The history of the

Tyne’s shipyards, mines, and factories is far from something to be ashamed of, but it is, this

article argues, something to be reconsidered and taken in duality in the light of an

understanding that the benefits of industry came at a significant cost.

The predominant concentration of previous histories of the river has been on the

human activities that took place upon it; the history of export statistics, employment rates,

and commerce. In 1880 James Guthrie’s The River Tyne: It’s History and Resources gave

little attention to ecological concerns, focussing on the feats of engineering that had been so

successful in remodelling the river’s form in his recent years.14 Throughout the 20th century

this trend continued with texts that also focussed predominantly on human achievement and

engineering such as Life on the Tyne,15 The Origins of Newcastle upon Tyne,16 and Maritime

Heritage: Newcastle and the River Tyne.17 The same is true for the texts of the 21st century,

such as The Story of the Tyne18 and River Tyne.19 All of these are fine publications which

competently examine many aspects of Tyneside’s history, and indeed all were useful in the

writing of this article, but it must also be said that they neglect environmental angles. Not all

histories can or should be environmental histories, but the extent to which the natural history

of the river has been buried beneath fascination at industrial achievement, even to this day, is

surprising. 13 “Heritage Sites,” Port of Tyne, accessed 27 November 2018, https://www.portoftyne.co.uk/about-us/history/heritage-sites.14 Guthrie, The River Tyne: Its History and Resources.15 Daniel M. Turner, Life on the Tyne (North Shields: White Wings Publishing, 1957).16 Robert Fulton Walker, The Origins of Newcastle upon Tyne (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Thorne's Student Bookshop, 1976).17 Ken Groundwater, Maritime Heritage: Newcastle and the River Tyne (St. Michael's: Silver Link, 1990).18 Ken Smith, Tom Yellowley, and David I. Hepworth, The Story of the Tyne and the Hidden Rivers of Newcastle (Newcastle upon Tyne: Newcastle Libraries, 2015).19 Steve Ellwood, River Tyne (Stroud: Amberley, 2015).

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One text, however, has acted as an exception to this rule, and has taken an ecological

approach to the river’s history, this being Leona Skelton’s Tyne after Tyne: An

Environmental History of a River’s Battle for Protection 1529-2015.20 Tyne after Tyne looks

at the history of human environmental action and conservation on the river and therein

Skelton analyses how approaches and attitudes to the Tyne have varied over time regarding

conservation of its natural resources. This study has opened the field of environmental history

on the Tyne and has revealed a forgotten and often ignored, yet fundamentally integral, facet

of its past. Where Tyne after Tyne covers a broad time period however, this article more

tightly directs its attention toward one specific stage of the Tyne’s environmental history,

exploring it in greater detail and looking at the physical effects of that environmental action

upon the biosphere.

The importance of the relationship between human and river is one that has always

been appreciated on the Tyne, but the importance of an environmentally sustainable

relationship is one that is now having to be re-remembered. Indeed, for a majority of its

history before the formation of the TIC, the citizens of Tyneside managed to live in

comparative harmony with their river, and not because they lacked the technology to do it

harm, as the Mesopotamians prove. It is crucial therefore that we understand the pre-

industrial history of the river as both comparison and context within which to assess the

momentous changes it would face post-1850 which so fundamentally shifted the ecological

landscape.

Chapter 1

20 Leona J. Skelton, Tyne after Tyne: An Environmental History of a River’s Battle for Protection 1529–2015 (Winwick: White Horse Press, 2017).

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MORE LASTING VALUE THAN CALIFORNIAN GOLD

The Deep History of the Tyne

The history of the River Tyne began at the same time the British Isles rose from the sea 30

million years ago. Just north of Kielder at the Scottish border the north Tyne emerged and

meandered eastwards before travelling south towards Hexham.21 The south Tyne began in

Cumbria, flowing over the limestone rocks of Cross Fell and feeding into the north river at

Warden Rock.22 At this meeting point they then processed eastwards, sculpting a valley out of

the chalk which had formed 40 to 80 million years before.23 The formations made during

these early chapters in the Tyne’s history have proved influential on its development

thereafter, the movement of glaciers and other fluvial processes being the key instruments

which created the landscapes and habitats that have dictated the character of the valley ever

since.24 The result of these processes was that the Tyne region became naturally isolated from

other parts of the country, establishing an environment that was ecologically unique for the

plants and animals that occupied its banks. After humans arrived, this isolation drew people

closer to the river as it created a greater need for water-borne trade.25

These ancient geological processes created the environments on which all life in the

region has since been based, the Tyne’s mudflats, riverbanks, and tributaries encouraging the

specific types of flora to grow and fauna to breed that have since become local to the region.

Pink salmon, river otters, and water voles alongside rarer creatures like the kittiwake, white-

clawed crayfish, and the freshwater pearl mussel all chose the Tyne for these characteristics,

21 T. H. Rowland, Waters of Tyne (Morpeth: T.H. Rowland, 1991), 17.22 Ibid, 53.23 “History of the Tyne.”24 Ibid. 25 Solmaz Tavsanoglu, and University of Newcastle upon Tyne, Transforming the City: Capital, State and Redevelopment in Newcastle City Centre (1960-1990) (Newcastle upon Tyne: University of Newcastle upon Tyne, Dept. of Town and Country Planning, Centre for Research in European Environments, 1998), 4.

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as did the human.26 Outside of wildlife, the prevalence of lead and coal on the banks of the

Tyne has been extremely influential on its history ever since mining started in the 2nd century,

and the abundance of gravel on its riverbed became a valuable resource in the creation of

concrete in the 20th.27

Preservation for Profit: The Corporation of Newcastle

The corporation of Newcastle could be described as the progenitor of the TIC, although the

two organisations took considerably varying approaches to managing the river. It rose to

prominence in 1319 when it was granted royal conservatorship of the Tyne between Sparrow-

Hawk and Hedwin streams at the expense of rivals south of the river (in this context

“conservatorship” meaning the preservation of commerce, not ecology).28 Soon after it

acquired exclusive royal licenses to dig coal in 1330 and by 1530 it had been made illegal to

load or unload goods anywhere along the river except from the city of Newcastle.29 Through

taxes, trade, and tolls the corporation absorbed the majority of the Tyne’s profits and became

efficient in preventing other townships from tapping its wealth. Alongside hundreds of minor

blockages it brought major successful petitions against South Shields, Jarrow, and the Bishop

of Durham to prevent them loading ships, building wharfs, and exacting tolls.30 In this way,

the Newcastle Corporation acted as an unlikely force for ecological preservation, preventing

redevelopment of the river as a means of blocking rivals’ opportunity to turn a profit.

26 “Biodiversity Action Plan,” Newcastle City Council, accessed 12 December 2018, https://www.newcastle.gov.uk/sites/default/files/wwwfileroot/planning-and-buildings/planning/web_version_of_ncc__nt_bap_final_versionb.pdf.27 “History of the Tyne.”28 Leona J. Skelton, “Regulating the Environment of the River Tyne’s Estuary, 1530–1800,” in Environmental History in the Making, ed. Cristina Joanaz de Melo, Estelita Vaz, and Ligia Costa Pinto (New York: Springer, 2017), 241.29 Mackenzie, “The river Tyne,” 738.30 “History of the Tyne.”

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The nature of the corporation’s trade, being predominantly in hides alongside wool,

fish, and corn (although coal was profitable and growing) also acted as a force for

environmental conservation.31 These industries, being based on natural products, were

considerably more reliant on the health of the river than those, such as coal, which would

dominate the Tyne in later centuries and so this gave financial incentive for the Newcastle

corporation to care for it. Local flora and fauna was also what the population of Tyneside

predominantly survived upon in terms of sustenance as well as economics.32 Additionally,

even if it did not fully understand the science behind the impacts of dumping in the river, the

corporation was still very aware that its relationship with the Tyne was a ‘two-way process’,

that their fortunes were bound; knowing the river’s tides and currents, and knowing where it

was shallow or deep, or the best spots for fishing, was integral knowledge for the

corporation’s success.33 It knew that the status-quo was profitable, and was therefore wary of

change.

The way the corporation managed this was through a “river court”, which it set up in

1613, soon followed by a conservancy commission in 1614.34 The river court, complete with

river jurors and water bailiff, was held weekly and was used to impose fines on those who

would ‘do harm’ to the water. This was meant in an economic sense, but it is clear that

environmental and economic prosperity were inseparable in these cases, as they were so

closely tied together.35 This approach was very effective, and Newcastle-upon-Tyne grew

wealthy as a result of it. William Brereton, after a visit to Newcastle in 1635 remarked that it

had become ‘the fairest and richest town in England’.36

31 Mackenzie, “The River Tyne,” 739.32 John Bell, “Cleaning the Tyne,” in Collections for a History of the Municipal Government of the Borough, Town and County of Newcastle upon Tyne, and Its Conservancy of the River, ed. John Bell (s.l.: s.n., 1850), 70.33 Rowland, Waters of Tyne, 258.34 Ibid, 257.35 Ibid, 131.36 William Brereton, Travels in Holland, the United Provinces, England, Scotland and Ireland, 1634–1635 (Manchester: The Chetham Society, 1844), 1635.

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Figure 1. A reconstruction drawing of 16th century Newcastle-upon-Tyne.37

Ballast Dumping in the 18th Century

However, the impression must not be given that the river laid completely unsullied before the

advent of the TIC. The Newcastle Corporation was not an environmentalist organisation and

its river court was not created out of a desire to protect the natural world for its own sake.

This is best shown by looking at the 18th century, in which the extent of trade on the river

began to increase substantially. For many years beforehand ships had been dumping ballast

into the river with less than stringent regulation; the entirety of Newcastle-Gateshead’s

quayside had been created via a slow process of the filling in of old docks with silt to

eventually form a platform of land.38 By the 1700s however, the extent of these depositions

was causing the already narrow and shallow waters to grow narrower and shallower; indeed,

at low tide you could wade across the river at the point where the present swing bridge

stands.39 More importantly for traders however, the tides were pulling the ballast downstream

37 John Storey, Newcastle upon Tyne in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth, 1828-88, watercolour, Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Bridgeman Images.38 Rowland, Waters of Tyne, 126.39 Johnson, Aughton, and Commissioners, The River Tyne, Its Trade and Facilities, 6.

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towards the mouth of the river where it was feared the ports would become clogged to such

an extent that commerce might be halted altogether.

The health of the ecosystems within in the river were also being affected, as the

sediments were burying habitats, thus reducing aquatic diversity.40 However, ultimately the

environmental impact was not highly significant because it did not fundamentally change the

environs of the river as the dredging of the same material would do in later centuries. The

Tyne was already a shallows environment and the ballast, whilst causing some damage, did

not alter this and was composed of non-toxic natural materials such as sand, mud, and rock.41

The ecological records available from the time, concerning concentrations of fish in the river

(important to the fisheries of Tyneside) endorse this point, suggesting that the river was not

only as healthy as it had ever been but was, in fact, healthier. It was recorded that on a single

day on the 12th of June in 1755 more than 2,400 salmon alone were caught from the river.42 In

comparison, over the entire month of June in 1996, only 338 salmon were recorded in the

Tyne.43 The 1755 numbers may have been even higher without the dumping of ballast, but

levels of local life were evidently not notably adversely affected.

In principal the corporation had always been against unlicensed ballast dumping into

the river, this was partly the reason behind setting up the river court. In this case, however, it

did not strongly push back against this process. Predominantly this was because these build-

ups of sediment were creating new land along the riverbank, valuable land which, under the

law, automatically belonged to the corporation.44 In this case, even after it was allotted

40 “Understanding Water Quality: Pollutants,” The Open University, accessed 13 December 2018, https://www.open.edu/openlearn/nature-environment/environmental-studies/understanding-water-quality/content-section-1.2.41 Conrad Gill and William George Hoskins, Industry, Trade, and People in Exeter, 1688-1800 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1935), 101.42 Smith, Yellowley, and Hepworth, The Story of the Tyne, 3.43 “River Tyne Fish Counts,” Environment Agency, accessed 16 December 2018, https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/792069/Tyne_monthly_counts.pdf.44 Rowland, Waters of Tyne, 131.

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government money to clear the silt in 1765, the corporation took the opportunity to turn a

profit at the environment’s expense.45 Given the catastrophic impact that dredging would

have on the river under the TIC however, it could equally be argued the corporation

unwittingly took the more environmentally conscious approach in this decision. Either way,

complaints from navigators on the state of the Tyne continued well into the 19th century.

The Enlightenment and Proto-Industrialisation

Whilst humans’ physical relationship with the Tyne may not have changed substantially in

the 18th century, what did change was their attitudinal relationship; a shift which laid the

groundwork behind the ideology of TIC. The enlightenment was the primary movement

behind this change in relations, a philosophy with humanism at its core and a belief that

scientific empiricism would lead humanity towards the conquering of the natural world.46 For

the rational, orderly ideals of the enlightenment, the mercurial, muddy, meandering Tyne was

something antithetical, something to be controlled. However, after these philosophies became

popular the Newcastle corporation did not immediately set off on a crusade against the Tyne

as the TIC later would, for three main reasons. The first reason was, as previously explained,

that the corporation had been made extremely profitable by specifically avoiding tampering

with the river’s natural systems. The second was that it lacked the technological ability to

landscape a waterway such as the Tyne, or at least the ability to do it in a way that would not

be prohibitively expensive. Thirdly was the fact the organisation’s frameworks and

regulations had been set up hundreds of years before the advent of the enlightenment and

adapting to fit this new ideology would mean a reinvention of what the corporation had stood

for since 1400, a reinvention which never took place.47 It was also the case that enlightenment 45 Mackenzie, “The River Tyne,” 739. 46 Timothy Tackett and Stewart Brown, Enlightenment, Reawakening, and Revolution, 1660-1815 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 13.47 Sydney Middlebrook, Newcastle upon Tyne: Its Growth and Achievement (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Newcastle Chronicle & Journal, 1950), 5.

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ideals were not fully pervasive, and many people, especially those in nature-based industries

such as fishing, were sceptical of attempts to control it. Even in 1850, on the formation of the

TIC and at the height of frustration with the Tyne’s unnavigability, the Shields Gazette wrote

an endorsement of the river’s natural state, saying it was ‘of more lasting value than…

Californian gold’.48

Figure 2. A view of Proto-Industrial Gateshead in 1830.49

By the beginning of the 19th century however the physical landscape of Tyneside was

beginning to match its ideological, despite the inactivity of the corporation. At Derwentcote,

Winlaton, and Lemington were ironworks, and two glass manufactories.50 At Blaydon was a

lead refinery, a flint mill, and a large pottery and at Derwenthaugh was a coke manufactory

and coal tar ovens.51 The first Tyne tunnel was built at Wylam to transport coal under the

48 Shields Gazette, “Tynemouth Past and Present,” in Collections for a History of the Municipal Government of the Borough, Town and County of Newcastle upon Tyne, and Its Conservancy of the River, ed. John Bell (s.l.: s.n., 1850), 4. Rowland, Waters of Tyne, 258.49 John Carmichael, Gateshead, 1830, engraving, Bridgeman Images.50 Rowland, Waters of Tyne, 113.51 Bell, “Cleaning the Tyne”, 71.

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river.52 The river was also home to two coal staithes and a number of lead mines, both

materials having been mined on Tyneside since the Romans built its first bridge in 122AD.53

These were the first buildings to begin washing substantively harmful substances into the

waters such as coke breeze, benzene, naphtha, ammonia, and phenol.54 55 However, without

chemical testing, at this stage these industries were too new and too few for people to

properly appreciate the harm they were causing to the river. An 1827 report from the

topographer Eneas Mackenzie does approach this topic however, noting that levels of salmon

in the river may be declining because of the ‘deleterious mixtures that are carried into the

stream from the lead-mines and various manufactories on the banks of the river’.56 It is

evident from this statement that Mackenzie was somewhat aware of the environmental

damage being done to the river but what is also evident is that he does not consider the

decline in river life to be an inherently bad event. The fact is only mentioned off-hand and

quickly forgotten in his excitement around the wonders of industry.

In 1816 the corporation commissioned the engineer Sir John Rennie to create a

report of suggested changes to the riverfront. Therein he recommended the construction of

two piers at Tynemouth, embankments along the river as far up as Newcastle, and multiple

quays; all of which would have to be accommodated through a program of extensive

dredging and landscaping.57 His stated goal was to ‘direct the river in a straight, or at least a

uniform course’, an idea very much in line with enlightenment ideals.58 The corporation

however, still unwilling to instigate change, did not act to implement Rennie’s suggestions

52 Rowland, Waters of Tyne, 108.53 Ibid, 136.54 Dilek Olmez, Tanju Karanfil, and Ulku Yetis, "The Environmental Impacts of Iron and Steel Industry: A Life Cycle Assessment Study," Journal of Cleaner Production 130 (2016): 200-201.55 Charles E. Williams, “Iron and steel: environmental impact,” in The Industrial Revolution in America, Volume 1: Iron and Steel, ed. K. Hillstrom (New York: ABC-CLIO, 2005), 179.56 Mackenzie, “The River Tyne,” 742.57 Ibid, 744.58 John Rennie, “Improvement of the Tyne,” in Collections for a History of the Municipal Government of the Borough, Town and County of Newcastle upon Tyne, and Its Conservancy of the River , ed. John Bell (s.l.: s.n., 1850), 3.

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and this increased the growing frustration at the state of navigation on the river. Thus, the

Tyne Navigation Act was passed in 1850, which resulted in the formation of the TIC. The

organisation immediately set about its work of dramatically altering the landscape of

Tyneside and by the end of the century, it had implemented all of Rennie’s suggestions and

more so, creating a deep and orderly channel.59 This quickly resulted in the decline of

Tyneside’s keelmen, whose entire trade had been built on the premise that large ships could

not navigate the river’s shallows, but it also resulted in severe declines in plant and animal

life, as well as the overall health of the river.60

Chapter 2.

A GREAT HIGHWAY OF INDUSTRY

59 Marshall, Turning Tides, 12.60 Ibid, 33-35.

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Reconceptualising the River

The works of the Tyne Improvement Commission completely transformed the face of the

river on a scale that had only ever been previously achieved through millions of years of

geological landscaping; they also began an era that would result in the worst pollution the

river has ever seen.61 The men, and unsurprisingly for this time they were all men, who

constituted the commissioners for the TIC were a mix of local councillors and business

owners who’s trade was located in the riparian zone, the majority of which were based in the

coal and shipbuilding trades.62 Whilst this commission was officially unbiased, the more

wealthy and powerful members were often able to exert their influence for their own ends. In

their proceedings for 1875 for example, we can see how Lord William Armstrong was able to

rush through expansion plans for his factory at Elswick without the usual scrutiny period of

one month.63

Together however, the commissioners were united in a common goal, to make the

Tyne as profitable as possible. This was the very purpose that the TIC had been set up for and

its members ‘deeply’ believed in that task, with no thought towards environmental affairs

unless they were to infringe on profits.64 Indeed, across all their proceedings papers of over

100 years of history the TIC demonstrates no discernible changes in attitude towards the river

or their own purpose upon it; their proceedings in 1894, 1902, and 1945 all specifically

stating that their prerogative as “conservators” of the river was not to look after its natural

state, only to keep it in a condition suitable for facilitating trade.65 One proceeding from 1958,

as the commission was reaching the end of its lifetime and as environmental concerns 61 “River Tyne's story revealed.”62 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 95.63 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1875–1876 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1895), 185.64 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1878–1879 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1879), 86.65 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1894–1895 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1895), 314. Also: Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1902-1903 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1903), 1246. Also: Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1945-1946 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1946), 208.

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towards the river were growing in popularity, best demonstrates this intransigence. When the

commissioner who represented South Shields, Mr. Gompertz, inquired as to the ‘risks we are

running in further pollution of the river’, in relation to allowing sewage to be discharged

directly into the water, the chairman, after some debate, responded that they had ‘no powers

on that matter at all’.66 This statement is astounding given that the TIC specifically was the

body that was responsible for the approval and regulation of sewage systems at this time.

Evidently, they did not feel that environmental concerns constituted a legitimate reason for

regulation in 1958, just as they hadn’t in 1850. They had similar reactions when requested in

1881 to help with the building of recreational facilities such as a rowing and sailing club,

denying that this was their responsibility.67

This consistency of approach and unified direction of purpose is one of the

astounding facets of the TIC, and perhaps one of the reasons behind its success in so

categorically remodelling the river. This was not an organisation that passively and

indifferently carried out its task, it actively pursued a vision and cared deeply about its

planned “improvements”. The Tyne needed to be competitive in a global context, with the

infrastructure capable of matching other industrialising rivers such as the Thames, Clyde, and

Rhine, which could also be called inspirators for the TIC.68 In 1876, long before most of their

works were close to completion, they had already proclaimed that the Tyne was ‘the finest

port in England… and the world’, listing its safety, capacity, and possibility as reasons for

this.69 This attitude is completely maintained 75 years later in a document the organisation

published in 1951 entitled A Century of Progress. In a manner that could almost be viewed as

fanatical they write that ‘commerce is our life blood’; this was a capitalistic institution in its

66 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1957–1958 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1958), 233.67 Dale Porter, The Thames Embankment: Environment, Society and Technology in Victorian London (Akron: The University of Akron Press, 1998), 10.68 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 95.69 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1876–1877 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1895), 86.

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purest sense.70 In this manner the TIC bares some resemblances to the former corporation of

Newcastle, both being organisations that were granted conservatorship of the river and both

primarily being concerned with its economics. However, where the Newcastle corporation

stood to profit from preservation of the river’s natural state, the TIC’s business model meant

that it was indifferent to such concerns and payed them little attention. Indeed, as it stated in

1908, it would use ‘all that science and nature can offer’ to achieve its ends.71

Figure 3. Coat of Arms of the TIC above the doorway into Bewick House, Newcastle.72

Dredging the River

In order for any of the infrastructural projects the TIC would undertake during its tenure to be

worthwhile, such as the construction of docks, piers, and bridges, it first had to ensure that

ships would be able to pass up the river far enough to access them. The solution to this was to

dredge the river by removing the sand, rock, and mud that lay on the riverbed and dump them

70 Tyne Improvement Commission Centenary 1850-1950 (a history of the River Tyne, its harbour and industries) (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1951), 3.71 Herbert Shaw and Tyne Improvement Commissioners, The River Tyne: Its Advantages and Possibilities (Newcastle upon Tyne: Andrew Reid, 1908), 7.72 Andrew Curtis, Tyne Improvement Commission window above doorway, Bewick House (2014, Geograph).

22

out to sea, a monumental task that had only been made recently comprehensible by the

invention of the steam powered bucket dredger, the first ever of which had been employed in

the neighbouring harbour in Sunderland.73 In 1850 the commission had access only to one

steam dredger, which it had brought down from the river Tweed, but in 1853 they bought a

second and by 1920 they had six all working to deepen and widen the river. 74 These dredgers

were tasked with ‘working day and night’ and so the citizens of Tyneside were forced to

become used to their metallic clanks and churning coal-fired turbines.75

The commission’s reports comprehensively documented these dredger’s activities,

as the organisation was very interested in maximising their efficiency, but they did not

monitor the environmental repercussions that came with such work. The tests they did carry

out, the first of which was in 1895, were concerned with the dumping of solid waste into,

rather than the dredging of it from, the river.76 This was not because of environmental

concerns however, but because the commission saw that this would result in an inefficient

dredging process, the material being removed only to be replaced again overnight. The same

reports make no attempt to measure or regulate the chemical composition of the water, only

the solid material.77 Even in the TIC’s earlier years it cannot be argued that this was because

of a lack of scientific understanding as the Tyne Salmon Conservancy (TSC, the body which

represented the Tyne’s fisheries) carried out its own rudimentary chemical tests as early as

1866, being understandably concerned about the unhealthy state of the river.78 79

73 “Dredging History,” Swansea Docks, accessed 19 December 2018, http://www.swanseadocks.co.uk/Dredgers.htm.74 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 101.75 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1893–1894 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1894), 168.76 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1890–1891 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1891), 108.77 Ibid, 108.78 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 123.79 Tyne Salmon Conservancy, River Tyne Salmon Fishery Conservancy Board 1866-1947 (Hexham: Tyne Salmon Conservancy, 1947), 11.

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As the TIC was not concerned with such issues however, the dredgers continued

their work and over a period of 70 years they deepened the Tyne from where it had lain

previously at 1.83 meters to 9.14 meters.80 The commission’s own estimation for the extent of

matter removed from the riverbed during this time amounts to the staggering figure of 149

million tons.81 This, alongside the TIC’s other infrastructural projects, had a huge impact on

the capacity of Tyneside to trade on the river, with the Tyne becoming the largest repair port

in the world by 1880, and the largest for the exportation of coal, producing 8,131,419 tons

that year.82 Trade in total doubled on the river and the Tyne carried 1/9th of the total tonnage

of the United Kingdom, second only to the Mersey, and built more ships than any other river

aside from the Clyde.83 The cost of this was substantial to the TIC, over £3.5 million pounds

(equivalent to £206 million pounds in today’s currency84) which it managed to source from

government grants, fundraising from local businesses, and its own taxation schemes.85

However, the cost was substantially higher for the flora and fauna of the river that soon found

their habitats ripped from beneath them, a destruction which it is estimated will take hundreds

of years to recover from.86

80 “Tyne Improvement Commission," Port of Tyne, accessed 16 December 2018, https://www.portoftyne.co.uk/about-us/history/our-history.81 Johnson, Aughton, and Commissioners, The River Tyne, Its Trade and Facilities, 7. 149 million tons is roughly equivalent to the weight of the great pyramid of Giza, 23 times over.82 Ibid, 36.83 “1880,” Tyne Built Ships, accessed 13 December 2018, http://www.tynebuiltships.co.uk/Year1880.html.84 “Currency Converter,” The National Archives, accessed 2 February 2019, http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/currency-converter.85 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 2.86 Nick Bray, Environmental Aspects of Dredging (London; New York: Taylor & Francis, 2008), 34.

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Figure 4. “King’s Meadow” island being dredged from the Tyne 1885CE.87

The first and most evident effect of this dredging was the replacing of the river’s

natural shallow environments with much deeper, faster-running waters. The problem with

this was that much of the local plant life, including reeds, lilies, pondweed, and willows, were

not suited to surviving in such a habitat and so soon began to disappear from the riverbank, as

well as smaller fare like phytoplankton, algae, and zooplankton.88 The resulting collapse of

the ecosystem overall was then the result of a domino effect as each creature in the food

chain found its food sources diminished.89 Much of the plant life had also acted as a habitat

and spawning ground for many shallow-water life forms such as crabs, worms, shrimps, and

fry as well as for insects like dragonflies, water boatmen, and other small invertebrates like

the caddis and the mayfly.90 This in turn meant a decline in the predators that eat such

creatures such as the mackerel, flounder, and seal alongside birds like the heron, turn, and

kingfisher.91 In areas of significant dredging, the result was the complete removal of a

shallow-water habitat and the creation of a deep-water habitat, which significantly

destabilised the local biosphere.

87 S.n, A view of Kin'gs Meadow Scotswood (1885, Summerhill Books).88 “Understanding Water Quality: Living Organisms,” The Open University, accessed 13 December 2018, https://www.open.edu/openlearn/nature-environment/environmental-studies/understanding-water-quality/content-section-1.2.2. 89 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 55.90 Ibid, 55-56.91 “Understanding Water Quality: Living Organisms.”

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If dredging only resulted in this alone there would have been a possibility of

ecological recovery in a relatively short time frame as whilst much of the local flora was

forced out, some of the hardier specimens could have survived in the new environment;

plants such as the sedge, plantain, starwart, and sharp rush.92 Other plants better suited to the

new environment would have also moved in, such as cordgrass and seagrass.93 However, the

impact of the steam dredgers went further than habitat destruction. All dredging by necessity

causes disturbance to the riverbed but this early form of bucket dredging was particularly

dangerous in this regard.94 The scoops dug far enough down into the riverbed to reach the

benthic zone, the sediment sub-surface at the lowest level of a body of water, and if they

didn’t, the explosives which were also used as part of the dredging process certainly did.95

The reason this was dangerous was that the benthic zone of the Tyne contained many

chemicals of a toxic nature such as lead, biphenyl, and tributyltin, which were not protected

from being released into the water as with modern dredgers, and as such they acted as

biocides which weakened or killed plant and animal life in the river. 96 This is especially the

case when considering this period of disturbance lasted as long as 70 years, the prolonged

deviations from natural water turbidity also affecting the metabolism and spawning of certain

creatures such as trout and the seeding of vegetation like sea grass.97

Whilst unenlightened as to the chemical specifics, the TIC could still observe the

very clear fall in biodiversity on the Tyne and was to some extent aware that this was a result

of its own work. Indeed, when writing a promotional piece for their port in 1925 the TIC not

only acknowledges this, but is very much proud of this achievement, and not wholly unjustly

92 “Aquatic and Marginal Plants,” British Flora, accessed February 3 2019, http://www.britishflora.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Britishflora-Marginals-Aquatics.pdf.93 Ibid.94 Bray, Environmental Aspects of Dredging, 31.95 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 107.96 Todd S. Bridges et al., "Dredging Processes and Remedy Effectiveness: Relationship to the 4 Rs of Environmental Dredging," Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management 6 (2010): 619.97 Ibid, 624.

26

due to the monumental feats of engineering that it required. Therein they write that whilst the

old river may have been ‘picturesque’ it was now ‘the Tyne of yesteryear’, thus positioning

the TIC’s modern creation specifically as the antithesis to ‘picturesque’.98 Overall the

commission’s language in this document is indicative of their view on their own

accomplishments, that they had made the post-1850 Tyne into something that was,

conceptually, a completely different body of water to the pre-1850 article. In their

proceedings of 1875, they wrote that their goal was to make the Tyne ‘equal to a dock’, to

remove its status as a river entirely, by 1925 they believed they had achieved this.99 It would

not be entirely incorrect to agree with the TIC on this point, as the ultimate result of their

dredging program was the effective conversion of the Tyne from a river into a very large

canal from Dunston downwards, as it remains today. What previously had been merely a

river was now, in their own words, a ‘great highway of industry’.100 ‘Highway’ is the notable

word to examine here, as it distinctly encapsulates the perspective toward the river which

resulted in its conversion; that being a view of the river as simply a road made of water, a

transportation device. The commission valued the river just as much as the Newcastle

corporation or the TSC, perhaps even more so, but the nature of their occupations meant they

no longer valued it as an environmental resource, only as a logistical one.

However, the relationship between the TIC and the Tyne was not so unidimensional,

and the commission soon discovered that their program of dredging would, to some extent,

need to bend to fit the Tyne’s will. Erosion was their primary difficulty, as the TIC soon

found swathes of riparian land collapsing into the river, much of it their own, although they

were reluctant to admit in their proceedings that this was a problem of their own causing.101

The problem persisted throughout the TIC’s administration, and they had to deal with the

98 Johnson, Aughton, and Commissioners, The River Tyne, Its Trade and Facilities, 7.99 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1875–1876, 169.100 Johnson, Aughton, and Commissioners, The River Tyne, Its Trade and Facilities, 5.101 Proceedings of the TIC 1902–1903, 1246.

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erosion problems caused by dredging into the 1950s and 1960s, long after they had stopped

deepening the riverbed, in places as far up the river as Haydon Bridge on the South Tyne. 102

The reason this was occurring was because the dredging process had increased the gradient of

the river, heightening its power on its new steeper course, and thus causing more aggressive

deterioration of the banks.103 This effect was intensified because of the straightening of the

river, which meant much greater force was exerted against the riverside, and this

consequently created the need for weirs and embankments to be built along much of the

quayside, although much of the time the commission was forced to concede and allow the

river to carve at the land as far in as it required.104

Further to this the dredging resulted in the forces that the tides exerted on the river

becoming far stronger, making the waters more turbulent and unsafe to travel on, as well as

causing further erosion and silting up the docks, ironically creating much more work for the

dredgers.105 In 1881 tenants in North Shields complained to the TIC that the force of the river

‘shakes the building’106 and the northern rowing club also complained the following year that

their casting-off point had been made ‘excessively deep and dangerous’ because of this.107

Such problems also affected large structures such as the Scotswood bridge, the company for

which wrote to the TIC in 1884 complaining that its foundations were being undermined and

it was at risk of collapse.108 The use of unpredictable explosives for the purposes of dredging

was even more dangerous, as proved when, in 1894, the dredgers came within ‘90-100 feet’

102 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 114.103 “Tide Stone,” Bridges on the Tyne, accessed February 2 2019, https://www.bridgesonthetyne.co.uk/tide.html.104 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 118.105 Ibid, 107. 106 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1880–1881 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1881), 215.107 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1882–1883 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1883), 30.108 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1884–1885 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1885), 307.

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of breaking through the roof of a mine that ran under the river owned by the Montagu

colliery.109

Figure 5. Scotswood Suspension Bridge in 1832, Tyneside’s first industrial era bridge.110

The sheer scale of the dredging operation was also causing difficulties as the TIC

found it increasingly difficult to regulate the process. Whilst there were only a handful of

steam dredgers, there was a considerably larger number of ships known as “hoppers”, barges

which were responsible for taking the silt from the dredging ships and dumping it into the

North Sea.111 Two problems arose from this process. The first was that a number of hoppers

were dumping their cargo too close to the shore and as a result it being washed back in to the

river again, a problem which was expanded by the building of the piers at North and South

Shields because they increased the area the TIC was obligated to manage.112 To combat this

the TIC set a bylaw in 1885 that the silt had to be deposited outside of a three mile radius, but

109 Proceedings of the TIC 1894–1895, 314.110 Illustrated London News, The Great Skiff Race in the Tyne on Tuesday Week, Arrival of Chambers (The Champion) at Scotswood Suspension-Bridge, 1859, engraving, Bridgeman Images.111 Skelton, “Regulating the Environment of the River Tyne’s Estuary,” 260.112 Proceedings of the TIC 1884–1885, 12.

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they still found that they were not always obeyed.113 Indeed, it was in the hopper operator’s

financial interests to create more work for themselves.

The second problem arose slightly later in 1900, after the program had been running

for a while; what they discovered was that the sheer amount of material being dumped into

the sea was beginning to threaten the passage of ships into the port because it was ‘raising the

bed of the sea’.114 This also created problems for anglers both on the sea and the river, who

found their nets and pots periodically smothered with ‘masses of refuse’, and often submitted

complaints to the commission.115 With all of its technological might the TIC clearly thought

of itself as an organisation that was above nature, that could do with the Tyne as it pleased,

but the river proved time and again to be a force that could not be easily constrained and

occasionally it would remind the commission that they were sometimes bound to playing on

its terms.

Reconstructing the River

The dredging of the Tyne was only the preliminary stage, however, in the TIC’s plan. The

removal of 149 million tons of material from the riverbed being simply the groundwork

required which would allow larger ships to utilise the commission’s key infrastructure

projects, these namely being the piers at north and south shields, the Albert-Edward,

Northumberland, and Tyne docks, and the Tyne commission quay.116 A lot of resources were

113 Proceedings of the TIC 1884–1885, 12.114 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1889–1900 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1900), 508.115 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1937–1938 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1938), 730.116 “Tyne Commissioners Riverside Quay,” University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne SINE project, accessed 27 November 2018, https://web.archive.org/web/20120319170009/http://sine.ncl.ac.uk/view_structure_information.asp?struct_id=1614.

30

also spent on supporting projects to these large constructions such as the building of

embankments, the swing bridge, and the destruction of rocky outcroppings.117

The construction of the Northumberland Dock in 1857 and the Tyne Dock in 1859

were the first major schemes to be completed under the TIC’s oversight, and work soon

followed on another that would be named “Albert-Edward” in 1884.118 Significant

excavations and further dredging was required for these projects, including the removal of

tens of thousands of cubic meters of mud, gravel, clay, and sand; fortunately for the

commission they received a good amount of private assistance in the removal as much of this

material from firms such as the Wallsend cement company in 1877. This was especially true

in regard to the gravel and clay, some of which was then used to create the base on which the

docks stood.119 The Tyne commission quay, opened later in 1928, was built in the same

manner and also with a small hydroelectric power station, an example of how the quickened

current as a result of the dredging was utilised by the TIC to their advantage.120 This dredging

caused all the same environmental problems as it did in the rest of the river but with the

additional issue that the space was then entirely filled in with solid concrete, the Albert-

Edward dock alone taking over 32,000 concrete blocks to construct, meaning the riverside

and seaside ecosystems had no possibility of recovery.121

The single project which caused the TIC the most strife was the construction of the

piers at North and South Shields. Partly due to the fact that dredging had caused dangerous

tides to progress up the river, work was forced to begin ahead of plan in 1854 in order to

protect ships in harbour, but the piers would not be completed until 1895 at a much higher

cost than the commission intended of £1,000,094 pounds due to repeated damage from the 117 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 97.118 Proceedings of the TIC 1884–1885, 375.119 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1877–1878 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1878), 3.120 R. F. Hindmarsh, "Tyne Commission Quay, North Shields (Includes Plate at Back of Volume)," Minutes of the Proceedings of the ICE 230 (1930): 37-38.121 Proceedings of the TIC 1884–1885, 183.

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force of the currents around the mouth of the river.122 After completion the saga was not over

however as the north pier lasted only two years before being destroyed in a storm in 1897,

and was only rebuilt by 1910 after bringing the total cost of the project up to £1,544,000.123

During all of this difficulty, in 1878, the TIC decided not to remove the “black middens”

which were situated in front of the north pier because of their function as natural breakers

which protected the coastline and, importantly, the walls of the pier, stating they were to a

‘general advantage’.124 These middens were infamous dangers to vessels, wrecking five ships

in three days in a storm in 1864, but they were nevertheless so useful to the TIC that they

were preserved.125 This case demonstrates that the TIC did not see itself as being on a mission

against the natural world in all contexts. If a feature did not hinder, or even helped with their

work, as with the black middens, they would be happy to leave it alone. By the same token

however, they would not pause a second for anything which obstructed them, no matter its

beauty or significance.

122 Ron Wright, Beyond The Piers (London: The People’s History, 2002), 98. 123 Ibid, 99.124 Proceedings of the TIC 1878–1879, 25.125 Charlie Steel, The Black Middens (Tynemouth: Roundabout, 2011), 9.

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Figure 6. North Shields pier collapsing into the sea, 1897.126

Generally, the TIC was quite happy to remove natural rock formations along the

river however, if they were to get in the way of their “improvements”. As example to the fact

that not everybody agreed with the prerogative of the TIC, two petitions were set up by the

general public, the first in 1881 and the second in 1882, which were filed against the

commission in attempts to save two popular natural beauty spots, Frenchman’s Bay and

Lady’s Bay.127 Neither of these were successful, despite the fact they were signed by a great

number of people of noteworthiness, including the mayor of Newcastle, the naturalist John

Hancock, and a number of scientists with interest in the areas.128 Therefore the TIC carried

on, removing a number of ‘protrusions’ at Felling Point, Whitehill Point, and Bill Point

(amongst others) during the 1880s and significantly widening the river in one area near the

mouth to create the Tyne main turning circle; both of these projects required the determined

use of explosives over decades to complete.129 This is an example of the power of the TIC

itself but also of the belief in the importance of its work, both from the organisation itself and

from outside. The industrialisation of the river was an imperative, this was “progress”,

unarguable and inevitable.

126 S.n, North Pier breached (1897, Port of Tyne).127 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1881–1882 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1882), 129.128 Ibid, 129.129 Proceedings of the Tyne Improvement Commission 1891–1892 (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Tyne Improvement Commission, 1892), 398.

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Chapter 3.

NEITHER SALMON NOR CHILDREN

Industrialising the River

The TIC’s tentpole projects such as the docks, piers, and dredging program, whilst being the

most impactful single enterprises on the environment on the river, were ultimately a drop in

the water compared to the wider industrialisation that was taking place along the Tyne. The

TIC was responsible for approving and regulating all new industries set up in the riparian

zone, this task including the regulation of waste discharged into the river, but for the most

part they took a laissez-faire approach to this duty. Their purpose as an organisation was to

help, not to hinder, the growth of industry, and as environmental regulation would have

34

hindered, they left it alone. Instead they acted as facilitators for the mass production of coal,

coke, oil, timber, pottery, concrete, meat, iron, steel, glass, a vast array of chemicals, and all

of their waste products.130 All these industries were built around the river (along with a

multitude of smaller businesses) and they used it to help produce their goods, to transport

them when complete, and to discharge their wastes into. Alongside these were the sewers of

Tyneside, which were also approved and regulated by the TIC, and the number of which

consistently grew across the TIC’s tenure until there were 270 active sewers draining into the

Tyne when the TIC was replaced by the Port of Tyne Authority in 1968.131

The Tyne was thus party to a vast array of industrial processes and substances that it

had never encountered before after the TIC took control, and a dramatic increase in those

which it had. The primary categories for these substances in terms of environmental concern

break down to organic material, organic chemicals, inorganic chemicals, sediments, and hot

water.132 The effects of heat on natural ecosystems can often be overlooked but the amount of

water from the Tyne which was used for coolant and then ejected back into the river still

warm was enough to deal considerable environmental damage, this hot water predominantly

coming from iron works, steel mills, and refineries such as Crowley’s iron works at

Swalwell. The warmer a body of water is, the less oxygen is dissolved into it, whilst at the

same time warmer water increases the metabolic rate of organisms within it, thus increasing

their demand for oxygen.133 A reduction in oxygen in the Tyne therefore meant a reduction in

the amount of plant and animal life that could survive there.

The main culprit however in causing the deoxygenation of the Tyne was the

discharge of organic material such as sewage and drainage from slaughterhouses, tanners, and

130 Smith, Yellowley, and Hepworth, The Story of the Tyne, 23.131 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 119.132 Peter Isaac, The treatment of trade-waste waters and the prevention of river pollution (Durham: University of Durham Press, 1957), 25.133 “Heat,” The Open University, accessed 14 December 2018, https://www.open.edu/openlearn/nature-environment/environmental-studies/understanding-water-quality/content-section-1.2.

35

flour mills, such as the Baltic Flour Mills at Gateshead. Once discharged these organic

materials begin to decompose, the decomposition process being achieved by a flourishing of

aerobic bacteria which are highly ‘oxygen hungry’ life forms.134 In the Tyne this occurred on

such a large scale that the very first oxygenation test in 1912 concluded that there was

‘almost no oxygen’ in the river, which was alone nearly enough to end all life within. 135 Once

this had occurred it meant an increase of anaerobic bacteria, which produce foul smells. Other

bacteria and viruses which were harmful to local river life, such as those of the Faecal

Coliform or E. Coli varieties, also bred and spread quickly on this organic material.136

Organic and inorganic chemicals were likely far larger killers of river life than

bacteria and viruses however and were indeed the killers of bacteria and viruses as well.

Salts, acids, mercury, arsenic, benzene, naphtha, cyanide, lead, and phenolic wastes were all

being ejected into the river from mines, farms, sewers, oil refineries, and coking plants such

as the Derwenthaugh Coke Works which alone in 1928 pumped 1kg of cyanide into the river

for every ton of coke produced.137 These substances were toxic to almost all river life, and

toxic even at low concentrations, which they were not in the Tyne, and together were the one

factor that caused the most damage to the Tyne’s ecosystems and led to it being classed as

biologically dead in 1957.138

The dumping of sediments into the river, such as wood pulp, coal washings, and

sludge was the one area where the TIC did attempt significant regulation. This was because

of their dredging program, for which they did not want to create more work, and so they

134 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 120.135 “River Tyne spawns record number of salmon,” Northumbrian Water, accessed 13 December 2018, https://nwg-nwl.test.mandogroup.com/617_2038.aspx. 136 “Natural Organic Material,” The Open University, accessed 13 December 2018, https://www.open.edu/openlearn/nature-environment/environmental-studies/understanding-water-quality/content-section-1.2.1.137 Leslie Rosenthal, The River Pollution Dilemma in Victorian England (Farnham: Ashgate, 2015), 227.138 “Organic and Inorganic Chemicals,” The Open University, accessed 13 December 2018, https://www.open.edu/openlearn/nature-environment/environmental-studies/understanding-water-quality/content-section-1.2.4.

36

would inspect the discharges of factories to make sure nothing too solid was being ejected,

first hiring Hugh and James Pattinson in 1895 to conduct tests to help them with this task.139

One substance they also attempted to prevent entering the river was oil from plants like the

Benzol Works, which was the first place in the world to produce petrol from coal, because of

the damage it caused to their property.140 It is evident therefore that the TIC would only step

towards regulation if the environmental interests of the river aligned with their own economic

concerns.

Figure 7. Elswick Engineering Works, 1900.141

Turning Away from the Tyne

139 Proceedings of the TIC 1894–1895, 527.140 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 124.141 S.n, View of the Elswick Works (1900, Tyne and Wear Archives).

37

In 1910, a street of houses in Lemington called Bell’s Close was erected along the riverfront.

What distinguished this street from others that came before it, however, was that it was facing

backwards, away from the Tyne. Indeed, the backs of the houses didn’t even have windows,

they had turned away from the water because it had become ugly, foul smelling, and

dangerous.142 This was exemplative of the larger trend that had been taking place all along the

river, of houses and town centres moving further and further away from the river, being

demolished in favour of factories and warehouses.143 After the first and second world wars,

when industrial production on the Tyne began to decline, this resulted in the complete

abandonment of much of the riverside¸ what had historically been some of the most desirable

land available. A committee set up in 1969, immediately after the dissolution of the TIC,

wrote that where Newcastle’s quayside had previously been one of the most overcrowded

regions in the country it had now become a ‘neglected back alley’.144 Humanity’s

environmental impacts had impacted on themselves. In 100 years the TIC had overturned

what had seemed an inalienable truth for thousands, that rivers were at the centre of human

civilisation. By 1940, the 1969 committee wrote, ‘neither salmon nor children could enter its

polluted waters’.145

As the scale of the destruction became apparent, however, pressure mounted on the

TIC from both the public and other organisations to do something about it. The primary

driving force behind this was the TSC, which had been advocating stricter environmental

regulation all throughout the TIC’s lifetime, but to little avail. In 1921 they helped set up the

Standing Committee on River Pollution Tyne Sub-Committee (SCORP) which produced a

number of reports with suggestions for how to improve the water quality, including a

comprehensive sewerage treatment plan in 1936, but the TIC, the second world war, and a

142 Skelton, Tyne after Tyne, 124.143 Rowland, Waters of Tyne, 127.144 Joint Committee for the Improvement of the Banks of the River Tyne, Tyne Landscape, 7.145 Ibid, 4.

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lack of funding blocked any progress.146 A Newcastle university report in 1957 said that

public opinion ‘requires an improvement’ of the river environment and a 1958 motion in the

house of commons recommended action for tackling pollution in the Tyne, but the TIC was

as equally uncooperative with these as it would be with the Tyneside Joint Sewerage Board,

set up in 1966.147 Just as with the Newcastle Corporation before it the culture of the TIC had

become engrained, it saw itself as the heroic protector of orderly, profitable trade against the

dangerous, unpredictable natural world. To a growing number of people however, the TIC

had become the villain, too willing to sacrifice the picturesque for the profitable.

CONCLUSION

The success of the TIC was ultimately short lived when compared with its predecessor the

Corporation of Newcastle, which lasted for nearly 400 years. For an environmental historian

however this is not surprising, as they can appreciate the benefit that the Newcastle

Corporation found in achieving a balanced relationship with the river on which it was reliant.

Conversely, what the proceedings of TIC show us is that they did not look out for the health

of the river, nor did they care for it. Instead they grew wealthy on the back of ‘robber

industries’, trades that ‘carry the seeds of their own decline’.148 It cannot be denied that their

works were marvels of engineering, and for some of the human population also brought great

wealth, but to celebrate the reign of the TIC as the “heyday” of the river is a perverse

anthropocentric notion that ignores the vast majority of Tyneside’s inhabitants. It operated in

a way that was harmful to the health of all life based around the River Tyne, including the

human population, and the scars it left are costing the region in the long run in the resources

146 River Tyne Sub Committee, Condition of River Tyne; Summary of Evidence (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: River Tyne Sub Committee, 1932).147 Irene Ward, “River Tyne Pollution” (motion presented at house of commons, London, 18 February 1958).148 Joint Committee for the Improvement of the Banks of the River Tyne, Tyne Landscape, 8.

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spent attempting to heal them.149 The modern Nile, Ganges, and Yangtze, whilst being far

grander waterways, might do well to pause a moment and listen to the Tyne’s story, as they

will find parallels and lessons within which they may wish to act upon.

Author/Publisher: Louis Lorenzo

Date of Publication: 24th of August 2019

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