A Boat Load of Gardiners

It would be surprising not to find a Gardiner or two working for James Smart. After all, it’s a well-known name in these parts but even so, to find five of them, all spelt the same, might be considered more than a coincidence. Were they related? I don’t know, but you’d have to consider it a possibility.

The ones I’ve come across so far are Henry, Thomas, William, Joseph and Frank.

At the time of writing the bulk of letters are from Henry and Thomas with only one each from the others. We find Frank carrying timber from Cirencester, Joseph carrying stone from Cricklade to Lechlade and Kempsford and William carrying sacks of maize out of Sharpness.

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So what about Thomas and Henry?

Henry seems to be mostly working between Gloucester, Cirencester and Stroud except for one occasion when he was in Stourport. All of his letters are dated 1893 but he is not always clear about his location. We see that he and three other boats all got caught in the frost at Gloucester in January and could not unload. On another occasion he writes that he doesn’t have a key to the cabin and can Smart please send Gleed by train with it. He often asks for money, ten shillings, five pound etc. In only one letter does he give a clear indication of his cargo; wheat for Cirencester and barley for Brimscombe in the form of seventy two tons for Mr. Bowley and seventy one tons for Mr. Beckett. He tells us “We have done the best we could as we had a man took against us in both places.”   

Thomas is a different matter. There are a lot of letters concerning his doings.

The first letter we have in the archive from Thomas is dated September 5th 1885. It’s a Saturday and we find Thomas in Swindon where he has arrived with the help of a horse. Initially he tells Smart that he hopes to be in Chippenham the following Monday.

Then in a more serious tone he writes that the Register man has been round and has threatened him with a summons if he can’t produce the relevant document the next time he calls. “So you had better send me as quick as you can,” he urges. In addition he requests the sum of thirty shillings as he has no money.

Of course we only see one half of any communications so we don’t know if the paper was sent or if Thomas was fortunate enough to evade the “Register man” but the next missive is from October the same year and we see that Thomas has come to Upton-upon-Severn where he is expecting to load with timber and then come on down to Gloucester. Once again he is requesting money but only ten shillings this time.

There’s a big gap the before we pick Thomas up again back in the eastern side of the Smart empire. In November of 1886 Thomas writes that he has not yet got to Lechlade but should arrive at Inglesham the following day. Inglesham is where the Thames & Severn Canal meets the River Thames and Thomas writes that there “Is a big flood in the river” and even if they could go on, it’s unlikely that they could return for a couple of weeks. Thomas thinks it would be better to come back along the canal and asks if Smart knows of any cargo going anywhere and if there is, to let him know via Mr. Hicks at Lechlade Wharf.

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An even longer gap then until we pick up Thomas again. Now it’s April 1891 and he is once again in Lechlade where he was expecting to collect a quantity of hurdles from Mr. Hicks but apparently they were all sold before his arrival. Now he has a dilemma because he does not have enough dunnage to secure the cargo of wheat destined for Walsall. In the end he decides to sail on to Basildon in the company of “Whiting”, presumably in search of more hurdles.

Whether he made the journey to Walsall with the wheat we don’t know but days later we find he is still out east at Abingdon. Yet another problem besets him at this point as he is bound for Swindon and thence homeward. But he has to deal with the summit of the Thames & Severn Canal. In spite of the best efforts of its designers the summit could not keep its water level up and this was a constant issue for loaded barges. Thomas writes to ask if there is enough water in the summit as they are drawing two feet seven. He also asks if a lighter can be sent to help get his cargo through the summit.

Moving on, it’s 1893 and Thomas writes from Banbury that he should be in Birmingham on Wednesday morning but he has another problem; this time his “lad” has left the boat last night leaving him without help. He asks if Smart can send Richard Peglar as a replacement and gives detailed instructions as to how this should be done; “Tell him to come to Warwick as we shall get there tomorrow afternoon Tuesday and if he can’t come send me someone else as quick as they can come and let them have some money to come with and tell them to ride to Warwick and enquire if we have gone through there at the Canal Office as we think of getting to the bottom of the Hatton locks on Tuesday night.”

Hatton Locks, colloquially known as the “Stairway to Heaven” is a series of 21 locks on the Grand Union Canal but at the time Thomas was going through them, they were part of the Warwick & Birmingham Canal.

A fortnight later and Thomas is back east at Reading. He has called at Pangbourne to see Mr. Flowers (occasionally referred to as “Old Flowers”) who has told him that he may have no one to help with loading and so Thomas looks to sail empty for Wroughton Wharf where he hopes to find cargo. However, four days later he is still in Pangbourne as Mr. Flowers has asked him to wait but in the end is told that it will be after Easter before anything is hauled. He goes back to his original plan of going to Wroughton for poles.

So there we have it. Just some of the trials and tribulations of five Gardiners working in the James Smart empire.