Gas Street Basin, Birmingham, ca 1900.
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Gas Street Basin, Birmingham, ca 1900. |
| I’m a hard working boater
and sharp as a knife I’ve worked on the Junction for most of me life, Wi’ a pair of steel boats, seven kids and a wife, I fancy I’ll carry on boating. |
Junction: The Grand Junction or Grand Union Canal, from London to Birmingham. |
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I’ve fought with me windlass and taken some knocks |
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| From the Brummagem wharves to the Weston Point Docks, And I’ve fought for me turn on the Camden Town Locks When I’m wanted in Limehouse for loading. |
Brummagem:
a dialect term for Birmingham. Weston Point Docks: at Runcorn in Cheshire, on the Trent & Mersey Canal. Camden Town and Limehouse (basin): at the London end of the GUC. |
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Meself and me missis have nearly been drowned |
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| When working by night on the fifteen mile pound, Wi’ a big load of spelter for Birmingham bound, And the weather has been pretty bloody. |
Fifteen mile pound: a pound is a stretch of water between locks. The 15-mile pound is that between Tardebigge Top Lock on the Worcester and Birmingham Canal and the stop-lock at Gas Street Basin, Birmingham. |
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I’ve been down to Oxford with a load of D.S., |
D.S.: double-screened nuts - a type of coal. |
| Fifty-five tons out of Griff Arm, no less, And I’ve boated to Wellingbro’, two boats abreast, When the water’s been coming down floody. |
Griff Arm: the Griff Colliery Co. canal, off the Coventry Canal 2½ miles south of Nuneaton. |
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You can talk of your rail and your old Highway Code, |
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| Right over the Cowroast to Leighton. | Cowroast: Cowroast lock is lock 46 on the Grand Union Canal, part of the long
flight leading to Tring summit some 3 miles north of Berkhamstead. Leighton: Leighton Buzzard |
| So wind up your motor and let your blades churn, Keep a sharp eye on the oil that you burn, And feel for the snatch from the butty astern, And don’t keep the company waiting. |
Birmingham Canals Songs index Home page
Rod Beavon 17 Deans Yard London SW1P 3PB
e-mail: rod.beavon@westminster.org.uk