Links
Historic Narrowboat Owners' Club
Basingstoke Canal houseboat story
This site was last updated on 01/01/03
Hagley - History
Hagley is a "Town Class" butty and was built in 1937 by Walker's of Rickmansworth for the Grand Union Canal Carrying Company.
As part of an ambitious expansion programme, the GUCCC ordered 186 pairs of boats between 1929 and 1938. The first group were the "Royalty Class", named after kings, queens and princes etc. These were deep sided at 4'11" to take advantage of the deeper dredging along the upgraded Grand Union. This was not a complete success as the top end of the Grand Union was never modernised.The second group were the "Star Class", named after planets, constellations and various other heavenly bodies. These had 4'2" sides and were designed for loose cargo. There then followed a small number of v-bottomed steel boats and finally the "Town Class", named by picking names from the railway timetable! These were built with 4'9" sides to work on the Thames, collecting boxed cargo from the London docks. The previous classes had included both wooden and steel motors and butties but the town class had steel motors and a mixture of wooden and steel butties. The order included 62 butties to be built by Walker's of Rickmansworth at the rate of one every two weeks - the most ambitious order ever placed.
Hagley was the last but one of the butties to be built, followed by Halton. She was delivered in 1937 and numbered 387 in the fleet. Originally paired with the motor Hadley she worked through the war in the Grand Union fleet, at some point paired with Bath.
On nationalisation in 1947, the Grand Union fleet passed to the British Waterways Board. With declining trade, many of the boats became redundant and were moored around the Black Country in disused arms where they gradually sank.
In 1963, with rising house prices in the London commuter belt, Floating Homes Ltd was formed with the idea of mooring house-boats along the near derelict Basingstoke Canal. They bought up many of the redundant boats from around the system, floated them and brought them down to the Basingstoke where they were converted to house boats at Scotland Road Wharf. Following planning permission problems the company folded but the existing boats were allowed to stay. Hagley then remained in use as a houseboat until 1998, gradually deteriorating like many of the other boats. She was eventually replaced by a steel shell, deconverted and left waiting to be broken up. At this point we heard of her impending doom and decided to restore her, with one week to spare!
Click on the thumbnails below to view a larger image
