Drained Welsh Harp reveals its secret river - and a lot of rubbish.

 

After several grey days of leaden skies and rain it was great to escape to the Welsh Harp and Fryent Country Park today when there was a glimmer of something that resembled sunshine at times. Of course I got caught in a thundery shower with hail stones on the way home but that's the way the pickle squirts. 

The Harp is being drained to enable maintenance works to be carried out on the dam. The low water level has enabled volunteers  to collect litter and other materials dumped in the waters. Today a volunteer swan rescue group were checking out the swans now confined to the original river that was dammed. Its meandering course can be clearly seen.

Fish have been removed and the reservoir will be restocked once works are completed. 

 The danger of sinking in the treacherous mud is real - keep off.

 

The meander visible here

The river from Cool Oak Bridge, West Hendon

Debris under Cool Oak Bridge

Flooding at Cool Oak Lane

Philip Grant has also visited the Welsh Harp recently and has kindly given me permission to post these photographs from the Neasden side:

 The view from Neasden Recreation Ground looking towards the dam and sailing club

Mid reservoir view from the south bank to the rural looking north bank

 Looking towards the controversial West Hendon development

 The meander from the south bank

Maintenance work to start at the end of the month on Welsh Harp Reservoir - including fully draining it and fish rescue

 

The Welsh Harp (Brent Reservoir) from the dam

From the Canal and River Trust

Towards the end of October, we are planning to carry out a five-month programme of essential maintenance work at Brent Reservoir Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), also known as the Welsh Harp.

What will this include?

The reservoir works, which are supported by players of People's Postcode Lottery, will include repairs to the chains and rods that operate the reservoir's sluices; and repainting the Valve House Tower from where the sluice gates which control the water levels in the reservoir are operated.

To complete the statutory works, which are required under the Reservoir Act 1975 and were identified during an inspection in 2021, the reservoir will need to be fully drained.

A fish rescue will be carried out whilst the reservoir is being drained. As well as employing our own dredging contractor to clear debris from the reservoir, we are planning to work with volunteers and our partners to clear the rubbish that is expected to be revealed when water levels are reduced.

A significant urban wild space

Ros Daniels, our director for London & South East, explains: “The Welsh Harp, with Brent Reservoir at its heart, is one of London's most significant urban wild spaces. We are planning to carry out these essential statutory repairs to the reservoir's structures over the winter months so as not to impact nesting birds, including great crested grebes.

KEEP YOUR CHILDREN OFF THE MUDDY DRAINED AREA

“The Reservoir will remain open to the public throughout the works, but signs will be up warning people not to walk onto the Reservoir's drained area and mud.

“Sadly we are expecting to see a lot of rubbish again when the Reservoir is fully drained, just as we did back in January 2021, when we partially drained the reservoir to inspect the dam and Valve House.

“We’d like to work with volunteers and our partners to take the opportunity to clear as much of the rubbish that will be revealed as possible, and we are planning to launch a Crowd Funding campaign to help support that work”

A joint vision

Also known as The Welsh Harp, Brent Reservoir was built in 1835 to supply water to the Grand Union Canal. Today, surrounded by buildings and fast roads, it provides valuable green open space for people and wildlife.

Made up of representatives from us, the Greater London Authority, London boroughs of Brent and Barnet, London Wildlife Trust, Thames21, the Welsh Harp Strategy Group was formed in 2019 to work together to create a Joint Vision for the future of the site as a place for wildlife and people. The group is planning to publish its Joint Vision for the site on 28 July.

Timeline

Monday 25 September

We started two-week programme of reed marsh habitat improvements at the East Marsh, using our specialist contractor Land & Water Services.

Monday 2 October

Our Crowd Funding campaign is live, and we're asking for your support for rubbish removal once the reservoir is drained.

Monday 30 October

We plan to start draining the reservoir ahead of statutory maintenance works, including repairs to the chains and rods that operate the reservoir’s sluices and repainting the Valve House tower.

Wednesday 1-3 November

Our contractor Rothens will begin a three-day programme of debris removal from the reservoir.

Friday 10 and Wednesday 22 November

We are planning some volunteer clean-up events. People will be able to sign-up to take part via our Eventbrite links.

Around mid-November

We will carry out a fish rescue.

Barnet Library Service premiere new video on the Golden Age of the Welsh Harp

 

Barnet Council today premiered a video about the history of the Welsh Harp made be their Local Studies Department:

The Golden Age of the Welsh Harp – continues the series of descriptions of the 1st edition 25 inch to mile ordnance surveys from the London Borough of Barnet’s library service local history collection by examining sheet 11/10. At first it looks as if there is very little on the map, but film explores the rich history of the Brent Reservoir (universally known as the Welsh Harp), during it’s golden age in the mid 19th century from the building of the lake, to the building of the railways and the coming of the suburbs. Stories include, monks, floods, drownings, pumps and propellers. Most interesting of all is the story of William Perkins Warner, and his endeavour to create London’s foremost holiday and visitor attraction.

The Welsh Harp Reservoir Story – Part 4

Fourth of the guest series by local historian Philip Grant

The Welsh Harp Reservoir Story – Part 4

Thank you for joining me again, as we sail towards the finishing line of our local reservoir’s story. If you missed Part 3, you will find it here.

1. A sailing race on the Welsh Harp Reservoir, 2011.

Sailing became an important use of the Welsh Harp in the years after the Second World War. Several large companies, such as Handley Page and Smiths Industries from Cricklewood, set up their own sailing clubs for employees. Others were local organisations, such as the Wembley Sailing Club (formed in 1953) and the Sea Cadets. The various clubs have since come together under an umbrella organisation, the Welsh Harp Sailing Association, based at Birchen Grove, which leases the reservoir for all water-based sports and leisure activities.

2. Sir Frederick Handley Page (left) at a dinghy naming ceremony for his company's sailing club, c. 1954.
    (Photo courtesy of the Handley Page Association)

The reservoir had come into public ownership in 1948, as part of the post-war Labour Government’s nationalisation of transport industries, which eventually saw it managed by the British Waterways Board. Under another environmental innovation from that time, the reservoir and its shoreline were made a Site of Special Scientific Interest in 1950, particularly for their importance to rare bird species, but also for the plant life at the water’s edge.

Most of the land around the Welsh Harp was still in a mixture of private and local authority ownership. I mentioned in Part 3 that Willesden Urban District Council had purchased 40 acres of land on the north side in 1928. We saw in the articles on Church End and Chapel End that Willesden had opened a new cemetery in 1893, but because of the district’s large population, this was already filling up. It planned to put a cemetery here, but Kingsbury Council objected, saying that it wanted the area used for housing. After a public inquiry, the Government agreed to loan Willesden the money for a cemetery, but said it must sell Kingsbury 14 acres nearest to the reservoir for recreational use. This later became the Welsh Harp Open Space.

3. Willesden's 1950 plans for its Kingsbury Lawn Cemetery, and Garden of Rest. (From the National Archive)

After Kingsbury merged with Wembley in 1934, Willesden’s plans were further delayed, as the new council tried to buy the land from it, for its own cemetery needs. The only thing that the two councils managed to agree on, when war came in 1939, was that they could both use what is now the Birchen Grove allotments site for mass civilian burials, if the need arose (thankfully, it didn’t!). Under the new post-war planning regulations, Willesden applied again in 1950 to use their land as a burial ground. Approval was eventually given and their Kingsbury Lawn Cemetery was consecrated in 1954, with the superintendent’s house and chapel built by 1956. Despite this, the ornamental gates at the top of Birchen Grove have never welcomed a funeral! 

 

4. Sculling finalists and the British eight at the Women’s European Rowing Championships, 1960.
    (Source: Brent Archives – Willesden Chronicle photographers’ negatives)

On some websites, you will read that the Welsh Harp was the venue for the rowing events at the 1948 London Olympic Games. That’s incorrect (in fact, they were held at Henley, on the River Thames), but the reservoir did host the 1960 Women’s European Rowing Championships (“click” for a detailed article on these). That event was organised by Willesden Borough Council, and the competitors were accommodated at the then recently opened John Kelly Girls School (now part of Crest Academy), just up Dollis Hill from Neasden Recreation Ground.

5. Brent Regatta ad. from 1966, and the 1969 inter-Council rowing race. (Brent Archives online image 9787)

The Council had run a Whit Monday Willesden Regatta on the reservoir for many years, and this continued as the Brent Regatta after it merged with Wembley in 1965. One of the highlights for the crowds was watching teams of local councillors from a number of London Boroughs taking part in rowing race over a 500-metre course. The photo above shows the Brent boat winning the 1969 race – I wonder who would be in the crew if the race was still held today (any nominations?). This annual bank holiday regatta ended in the early 1970s.

 

 6. Two views of activities at the Youth Sailing Base. (Images from Brent Archives)

It was not just adults who could enjoy water sports on the Welsh Harp. In 1964, the year before it was disbanded, Middlesex County Council opened a Youth Sailing Base on the northern arm of the reservoir, where thousands of young people learned to sail or canoe safely. Another important facility for local youngsters came in 1973, when Brent Council opened the Welsh Harp Environmental Education Centre (“WHEEC”) on part of the proposed cemetery site. A large nursery, to grow plants for Brent’s Parks Service, also opened on the site in 1977.

 

 7. The 1956 cemetery chapel building, later used by the WHEEC and (here in 2011) by Energy Solutions.

The importance of the Welsh Harp for nesting water birds had long attracted ornithologists to the area. When proposals for a marina, close to a key nesting area near the Welsh Harp public house, were put forward in the early 1970s, a number of them came together to oppose this. The Welsh Harp Conservation Group was formed in 1972, and their volunteer members have helped to look after the habitats on and around the reservoir ever since (in a similar way to the Barn Hill Conservation Group, featured in my Fryent Country Park Story).

 8. Welsh Harp Conservation Group volunteers at work, winter 2008 and summer 2011. (L. by Roy Beddard)

As well as looking after nesting rafts and bird hides, and the wider vegetation of the area to encourage wildlife of all sorts, the group has played an important part in recording the natural history of the reservoir, and sharing this with visitors. From a first guided walk on a bank holiday in 1976, they expanded this to provide monthly wildlife walks. When my children were young (in the late 1980s or early 1990s) our family benefitted from one of these walks. For the first time in my life I got to see beautiful Great Crested Grebes, an unforgettable sight!

 

9. Great Crested Grebes, courting and nesting on the Welsh Harp. (Photos by Roy Beddard and Leo Batten)

While there was relative peace and quiet for the bird nesting grounds at the eastern end of the reservoir, there were major developments taking place not far away, at Staples Corner. The narrow roadway under the Victorian railway viaduct was causing major traffic problems on the North Circular Road, especially when it was planned to start the M1 motorway from here. A massive Brent Cross flyover was built in the 1960s, to carry east-west through-traffic over the top of this bottleneck. You can see this in the photo below, and I have added part of a 1921 image to help show the line of the viaduct, which you can just see in the modern picture.

 

 

 10. Staples Corner, with North Circular Road flyover and the railway viaduct (including 1921 comparison).

You may be wondering what happened to the Welsh Harp public house, which featured in Part 2 of this story. It had been replaced by a more modern building in the 1930s (the fate of a number of historic inns in our area), but it fell victim to more roadworks when the north-south A5 flyover was built over Staples Corner in the 1970s. It was demolished in 1971, and its site was where the north-bound slip road, from Staples Corner towards West Hendon, passes the entrance to Priestley Way, a service road for a small industrial estate. What a sad epitaph for the inn which gave the Brent Reservoir its more popular name!

11. The 1930s Welsh Harp public house in 1971, and the site as it is now. (1971 photo by Geoffrey Hewlett)

Going back to the reservoir, this does have to be drained occasionally, both for major maintenance work on the dam and to remove the rubbish which unfortunately gets dumped in it. One remarkable feature when this happens is that the original winding course of the River Brent can still be seen, just as it was when it marked the boundary between Kingsbury and Hendon parishes to the north, and Willesden parish to the south, when the land was first flooded to create the reservoir in 1835.

 

12. The River Brent flowing through the drained reservoir in 1974. (Photo by Leo Batten)

In 2012, responsibility for the reservoir was passed to the Canal and River Trust, a charity set up when the Government abolished the publicly-owned British Waterways Board. Questions were raised about how safe the reservoir might be in the event of a severe storm, after a similar Canal Age dam at Whaley Bridge in Derbyshire was in danger of collapse in 2019. Luckily, it emerged that as well as regular checks, further reinforcement of the dam with concrete had been carried out in 2005-07, following detailed studies of how extreme heavy rainfall might affect the Welsh Harp reservoir, and the river downstream of it. Brent Council also issued a statement following the Toddbrook Reservoir emergency, with links to information for anyone who feels the need for reassurance.

Earlier, I mentioned facilities that had been set up for young people near the reservoir. Sadly, Barnet Council closed the Youth Sailing Base, which they inherited from Middlesex County Council, in 2004, and sold off its site to a developer for building luxury waterside apartments. Instructors from the Base went on to set up the Phoenix Canoe Club, so that there is still a place on the Welsh Harp where youngsters can enjoy this sport.

13. Pond dipping at the Welsh Harp Environmental Education Centre. (Photo courtesy of Harry Mackie)

The Welsh Harp Environmental Education Centre went from strength to strength. Back in the 1980s, my daughters were among the thousands of local school children each year who have enjoyed learning about nature in a hands-on way, from enthusiastic experts. But the squeeze on local authority spending has also hit the former cemetery site. By the 1990s, Brent Council had closed its Parks Department nursery, which later reopened as the private Greenhouse (now Birchen Grove) Garden Centre. 

During the past ten years, cuts to funds allocated to youth services first saw the WHEEC receive financial support from the Careys construction group, then its threat of closure. Luckily this environmental “jewel in the crown”, celebrated in a 2015 Council video, was saved when Brent passed the Centre to the Thames 21 charity, under a Community Asset Transfer in 2016.

 

 

 

 

 

I hope you have enjoyed discovering more about “the Welsh Harp” in this series of articles. With all Brent’s Libraries now open again (with restricted hours), you can find even more information and pictures in Geoffrey Hewlett’s 2011 book, “Welsh Harp Reservoir Through Time”, in the local history section at ref. 942.185. 

14. The reservoir in 2010, and the cover of Geoffrey Hewlett's book. (Photo: London Canal Museum)

But it’s also a place to visit and enjoy, on our doorstep, if you can do so safely, whether for a walk, some wildlife watching or perhaps to learn to sail or paddle a canoe. After all, it is (officially) the Brent Reservoir!

Philip Grant

Next weekend we’ll take the No.32 northbound from the Priestley Way bus stop (by the site of the Welsh Harp Inn) for a one-off special article, then ride the same bus route southbound for a new local history series. Hop aboard “Wembley Matters” to find out where these journeys will take us.

The Welsh Harp Reservoir Story – Part 2

Welcome back to this look at the history of our local reservoir. If you missed Part 1, you will find it here (just “click” on the link).

1. The Old Welch Harp coaching inn, in a 19th century painting. (From Geoffrey Hewlett’s collection)

In the 1850s, the reservoir had been expanded, so that it covered around 400 acres. An embankment had been raised, to protect a public house from flooding. The Welsh (or Welch) Harp tavern had been built in 1736, just north of the Brent Bridge. It served as a coaching inn beside the Edgware Road, one of the main routes north-west from London, which followed the line of a Roman Road, known by Saxon times as Watling Street.

In 1858, William Perkins Warner became the landlord of the tavern. He had spent his childhood at Blackbird Farm in Kingsbury, before going to train as a butcher in London. During the Crimean War of 1854-56, he worked for the governments’ Commissariat Department, a uniformed civilian force that supplied food to the army. On his return, he married the daughter of a Kilburn builder, and at the age of 26 he began a business that would make the Welsh Harp name famous.

2. A drawing of William Perkins Warner. (From the collection of the late Geoffrey Hewlett)

A horse bus service from London to Edgware had started in 1856. Warner realised that this could bring him many extra customers, as long as he provided attractions that would make it worth their while. He rebuilt the tavern, adding a large dining room that would also stage music hall entertainment. He also leased adjoining fields, to provide gardens and sports facilities, and acquired the rights to use the reservoir for fishing and boating.

3. Parts of Warner’s song sheet for "The Jolliest Place That's Out". (From Geoffrey Hewlett’s collection)

One of the top music hall singers at this time was Annie Adams. Around 1864, Warner had new words written to one of her most popular songs, “The Merriest Girl That’s Out”. After she had performed it at his venue, printed lyrics of “The Jolliest Place That’s Out” were circulated, with an advertisement for the attractions of Warner’s Welsh Harp at the foot of the page. People knew the tune, and would be singing the chorus as they went about their daily lives!

4. A Michaux velocipede, owned by Arthur Markham. (Image courtesy of Coventry Transport Museum)

As well as the regular sporting attractions of the tavern’s grounds and reservoir, Warner staged special events to bring in larger crowds of customers. Whit Monday, the day after the Christian festival celebrating Pentecost, was often taken as a public holiday, even before this was officially recognised in the Bank Holidays Act of 1871. In 1868, Warner organised England’s first ever bicycle race at the Welsh Harp, and presented a silver cup to the winner, Arthur Markham. He was riding a “velocipede”, made in Paris by the Michaux brothers. Today, the world’s most famous cycle race is the Tour de France, and that country can claim to be the home of cycle racing, although its first bicycle race was held just one day before Warner’s!

5. Crowds at Warner's Kingsbury race course in the 1870s.

6. A swimming gala in progress at the Welsh Harp, c.1870.

(Both of these images, from Geoffrey Hewlett’s collection, are probably from “The Illustrated London News”)

Warner brought racing on a larger scale to the Welsh Harp in 1870, with the opening of his Kingsbury race course. His Spring steeplechase meeting, with a course that went across the fields of Kingsbury as far as Preston, was famous in its day, but the Racecourses Licencing Act of 1879, banning horse racing within ten miles of the capital, put a stop to this venture. The summer of 1870 also saw the first of the Welsh Harp’s swimming galas in the reservoir.

 7. The Brent Reservoir, as it appears on an 1873 O.S. map of Middlesex. (From an original at Barnet L.S.C.)

This extract from an Ordnance Survey map shows the Brent Reservoir as it was in 1873. You can see that its waters stretched east and north well beyond the Edgware Road. To give you an idea from the area today, part of the Brent Cross Shopping Centre and most of the Sainsbury’s superstore at West Hendon would have been under water. The map also shows the Midland Railway line, which opened in 1869/70, crossing the reservoir on a viaduct.

Warner was quick to see that the railway could bring many more people to events at his pleasure grounds. The trip from Hendon Station might put some people off, so he persuaded the railway company to build a Welsh Harp Station, which opened in 1873, just two minutes walk from the tavern. This was to their mutual benefit, with the Midland Railway running special trains on Bank Holidays to bring thousands of Londoners to the attractions that Warner staged.

 8. Warner's advert and the Midland Railway special timetable for the Welsh Harp, Whit Monday 1884.

A succession of very cold winters from 1879 onwards saw the reservoir freeze over, sometimes for a number of weeks. Warner, never one to miss an opportunity, was soon advertising public skating on the Welsh Harp. He also brought down professional speed-skaters from the Fens, for one-mile races that drew large crowds of spectators. The Warner Cup, in January 1880, was won by the English champion, George “Fish” Smart. With milder winters now, even if the surface freezes, please don’t venture onto the reservoir – you would be “skating on thin ice”!

9. A newspaper advert for skating at the Welsh Harp, and "Fish" Smart winning the Warner Cup race.

 10. W.P. Warner's Old Welsh Harp in the 1880s. (Brent Archives online image 1340)

William Warner died at the Old Welsh Harp in 1889, aged just 56. You can see in the photograph above, taken in the 1880s and used in a later postcard, what the public house he took over thirty years earlier had developed into under his management. His widow carried on their business for another ten years until the lease ran out, assisted by William’s brother, John. As well as the many sporting and entertainment facilities that the tavern and its grounds offered, they continued to put on special attractions, such as a parachute descent from a balloon by the fearless Miss de Voy of London in 1890. 

Her gas-filled (from the mains!) balloon took off from the tavern’s grounds, watched by a large crowd. It disappeared into the clouds, and several minutes later Miss de Voy’s parachute was spotted. Unfortunately, she was blown off-course, and the crowd following her along the bank saw her land in the water, near the Cool Oak Lane bridge. A local newspaper report says that W. Leicester, a youth from Willesden, threw off his hat and coat, and dived into the water to save the brave aeronaut, but she was rescued by boat before he could come to her aid.

11. Cool Oak Lane bridge, from the reservoir bank, c.2010.

Even while the Old Welsh Harp was in its heyday, things were beginning to change around the reservoir. About 200 terraced houses were built in West Hendon in the 1880s, on new streets stretching down from the Edgware Road towards the water’s edge. But other parts of the surrounding land remained as rural countryside, where people could enjoy country walks on a Saturday or Sunday, if they were not making use of the livelier attractions on offer at the tavern.

12. Two photographs taken during a family's Sunday afternoon walk by the Welsh Harp in 1897.
(From the collection of the late Geoffrey Hewlett, copies donated to him from a Kingsbury family’s photo album)

The popularity of the Old Welsh Harp declined after Mrs Warner left, and the Midland Railway closed its station in 1903. There were other attractions that Londoners could enjoy, including the ambitious, but short-lived, pleasure grounds at Wembley Park. For his zeal in putting on sports and entertainment that brought in the crowds, W.P. Warner could be compared with Arthur Elvin, and his efforts to promote Wembley from the late 1920s onwards. More than fifty years before Elvin used greyhound racing as a way to save Wembley Stadium, Warner had staged England’s first greyhound race using a straight track and a mechanical hare, at the Welsh Harp in 1876. Unlike most of his ventures, that one ended in failure.

13. The reservoir and the Welsh Harp, in an 1898 illustration. (From Geoffrey Hewlett’s collection)

William Perkins Warner has been largely forgotten, but he has left a lasting legacy. Although its official name is the Brent Reservoir, because of his efforts most people know this stretch of water as the Welsh Harp. Its story will continue into the twentieth century, next weekend. Don’t miss it!

Philip Grant