The Newry Navigation: The Earliest Inland Canal in the British Isles

Abstract

To the south of Lough Neagh the Upper Bann valley and the lowland corridor betwe n the uplands of Down and Armagh lead directly to the head of Ca l ngford Lough and the important port of Newry. Early in the eighteenth century the discovery and exploitation of the coal deposits of east Tyrone precipitated the con? struction of a line of inland navigation, a canal dictated by the desire and determination of Dublin interests to have direct access by water to Lough Neagh and the valuable deposits of coal outcropping on its western shore. The inland section of the Newry Navigation, constructed between 1731 and 1742, ranks as the earliest man-made inland canal in the British Isles and with the completion of the first ship canal, below the town, in 1769, affording entry and exit to large vessels, it was of prime importance in contributing to the emergence of Newry as a major Irish seaport during the second half of the eighteenth century. The inland section of the navigation extended from the town some 18 miles northwestwards to the Upper Bann at Whitecoat Point, just south of Portadown, while the 'ship canal' connects the Newry quays with the navigable channel of the Newry river, above Warrenpoint, whence navigation is possible south-eastwards into Carlingford Lough and the Irish Sea. Thus, there was a continuous navigable waterway between Lough Neagh, the largest inland lake in the British Isles, across which direct communication by water was possible to large areas of mid-Ulster, through the port of Newry to the deep, sheltered waters of Carlingford Lough and the Irish Sea. The canals above and below Newry are of great interest, not only to the economic historian and historical geographer, for whom they afford a rewarding field of inquiry into the influence of an important artery of communication on the cultural landscape throughout a large area of south-east Ulster, but also to the industrial archaeologist for whom the examination of structures associated with these early waterways can throw much light on the earliest period of manufacturing industry and organized commerce in the north of Ireland. Though earlier surveys of the area had been made1 it was not until 1729 that legislation made available to the newly appointed 'Commissioners of Inland Naviga? tion for Ireland' [3 Geo. II (Irish) c.3.] sufficient funds to permit them to take definite steps towards beginning canal construction. By this time public interest inthe coal workings of east Tyrone had been thoroughly aroused and it was confidently predicted that, with the establishing of water communication between the mining area and one of the chief seaports of the day, the small but expanding Irish market in Dublin could well become independent of costly and unreliable cross-channel imports (Haliday Pamphlets). Work on the canal began in 1730 under Richard Castle, a German who had been brought over to Ireland some three years previously as an architect rather than as an engineer (Craig, 1952) but, though it seems highly probable that the stone canal lock chamber was introduced into Ireland under Castle, he was dismissed from his post after only three years' service, having apparently failed to give satisfaction to the Commissioners on several counts (Mullins, 1860). Shortly afterwards an English engineer named Thomas Steers was invited to carry out a survey of the area and in 1737 he accepted a commission to complete the canal, entering into contract to superintend construction work during the following three