Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for THAMES (The)

THAMES (The), a river of Gloucester, Wilts, Oxford, Berks, Bucks, Middlesex, Surrey, Essex, and Kent. It was known in the time of Cæsar as Tamesis; was known very anciently also as Tamesa, Tamissa, and Thamesis; was known to the Saxons as Temese and Taemese; bears poetically the name of Isis down to the influx of the Thame, particularly in the vicinity of Oxford; and has been supposed by some writers, but erroneously, to have got its name of Thames by contraction of Thame-Isis. It rises in four springs 376 feet above sea-level, at Ullen farm, 3 miles WSW of Cirencester. It runs 6 miles south-eastward into Wilts, at Leigh; and there receives the Swill. It proceeds 3 miles, east-by-northward, to the vicinity of Cricklade; and there receives the Churn, coming 16 miles south-south-eastward to it from among the Cotswolds, and entitled geographically to be pronounced the parent stream. It goes thence, partly within Wilts, partly on the boundary of Gloucestershire, about 9 miles east-north-eastward, to Lechlade; is joined there by the Thames and Severn canal, from the W; and receives, in that vicinity, the Cole, the Colne, and the Leach. It proceeds, in many windings, sinuous or serpentine, along all the N boundary of Berks, dividing that county from Oxfordshire and Bucks; it receives the Windrush at Newbridge, the Evenlode near Ensham, the Cherwell at Oxford, the Ock at Abingdon, the Thame at Dorchester, the Kennet at Reading, the Loddon at Shiplake; and it is joined by the Berks and Wilts canal at Abingdon, and by the Kennet and Avon canal at Reading. It next goes windingly along all the N boundary of Surrey, dividing that county from Bucks and Middlesex; it receives the Colne at Staines, the Bourn and the Wey at Weybridge, the Mole at Moulsey, the Hogsmill at Kingston, the Cran at Isleworth, the Brent at Brentford, the Wandle at Wandsworth; and it is joined by the Grand Junction canal at Brentford, and by the Paddington and Surrey canals at London. It then proceeds, in 18 bends or reaches, along all the N boundary of Kent to the sea, dividing Kent from the SE nook of Middlesex and from all Essex; it is joined by the Regent's canal at Limehouse reach; and it receives the Lea at the boundary between Middlesex and Essex, the Ravensbourn at Deptford, the Roding below East Ham, the Darent opposite Purfleet, the Medway at Sheerness, the Swale at Whitstable, and the Crouch at Foulness Point.

The river has a total course of about 216 miles, from its source to the North Foreland; it drains a basin of about 6,000 square miles; it has a height of 243 feet above sea-level at the influx of the Upper Colne, 190 feet at the influx of the Cherwell, 106 feet at Henley, 41 feet at Weybridge, and 4¼ feet at London bridge; it is navigated by barges to Lechlade, by steamers to Moulsey; and it is stemmed by the tide to Teddington, and has there its first lock for inland navigation. Its width at London is about 692 feet; and its depth there is averagely 12 feet at low water, and 29 or 30 at full tide. Its principal reaches thence to its mouth are the Limehouse, the Greenwich, the Blackwall, Bugsby's, the Woolwich, Gallion's, the Barking, the Halfway, the Erith, the Rands, the Long, the Fiddlers, the Gravesend, the Hope, and the Sea. The width, all down to the Hope, below Gravesend, nowhere exceeds a mile; increases to 5½ miles at the Nore, between Shoeburyness and Sheerness; and expands rapidly thence to the sea at the North Foreland. The estuary abounds with sands and shoals, as the Margate, the Girdler, the Long, the Kentish Knock, the Sunk, the Barrows, the Cant, the Maplin, the Heaps, the Glenfleet, and others; and it has channels between the shoals, as the South, Queen's, Prince's, Thomas', the Black, the Barrow, the Swin, King's, the Walfleet, and others.-The depth at low-water varies from 2 to 5 fathoms, between London and Gravesend; and from 5 to 14 fathoms, from Gravesend to the sea. Enormous pollution of the waters, by sewage, went on increasing with the growth of population on the banks, and eventually became an intolerable nuisance at and below the metropolis; but stupendous measures for abating this were recently carried into execution, and have been noticed in our account of London. The freshwater fisheries above London are sufficiently extensive both to afford much sport to anglers, and to yield considerable marketable value; and the salt-water fisheries below London, particularly below Gravesend, are productive in many kinds, particularly in white-bait, gudgeon, shrimps, and oysters. But the grand value of the Thames consists in its being a great highway of commerce; and it takes aid, in this character, from the Medway, from some other affluents, and from the canals. Denham says respecting it,-

"Thames, the most loved of all the Ocean's sons

By his old sire, to his embraces runs;

Visits the world, and in his flying towers,

Brings home to us and makes both Indies ours;

Finds wealth where 'tis, bestows it where it wants;

Cities in deserts, woods in cities plants.

So that to us no thing, no place is strange,

While his fair bosom is the world's Exchange."


(John Marius Wilson, Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales (1870-72))

Linked entities:
Feature Description: "a river"   (ADL Feature Type: "rivers")
Administrative units: Berkshire AncC       Buckinghamshire AncC       Essex AncC       Gloucestershire AncC       Kent AncC       Middlesex AncC
Place names: TAEMESE     |     TEMESE     |     THAMES     |     THAMES THE     |     THE THAMES

Pages for linked administrative units may contain historical statistics and information on boundaries.