My walk around Victorian Holbeck.

[frisbee]

There used to be a second beck called the Banyon beck that run amost parrarell to the Hol beck, but flowed in the opposite direction. I believe (although I could be wrong on this) that it flowed into the Holbeck joining the Hol beck at the western end of Water Lane. The Banyon beck flowed near to where The Grove pub stands and in between the foundries on or near Marshall Street. This beck has long disappeared underground, I doubt that any trace of it still exists but maybe Phil D could find evidence somewhere or other.    

[Phill_dvsn]

Hi Parksider.Good point about the beck powering the mills/foundries I have to say i can't see any other reason why the beck was channelled if it wasn't to 'manage' the water supply in some way. There was groves in the stone sets where leat gates were fixed (you can see one on my story) they damned the flow and diverted the supply elsewhere. Also there were side rooms with bowls in them. It's pretty hard to see throught the mists of time how it all worked. I think you'd have to study old maps of 1840/50 to see what stood nearby, and which would have needed water power. Good question though, I'd like to find out some answers myself.    

[jim]

On considering this watercourse, the comment about the minimal flow along Water Lane is very apt, as the beck would appear to be the only conduit for surface drainage from a wide area of the south and west of Leeds. From memory the Mill Shaw Beck and its tributaries, and Farnley/Wortley Beck and all its various connections all end up in the one channel and I have the feeling that the flows I remember from my youth from those watercourses should end up being of far greater quantity than what is to be seen alongside Water Lane.Is there a diverging take-off for some reason somewhere that I have overlooked?    

[railnut]

jim wrote: On considering this watercourse, the comment about the minimal flow along Water Lane is very apt, as the beck would appear to be the only conduit for surface drainage from a wide area of the south and west of Leeds. From memory the Millshaw Beck and its tributaries, and Farnley/Wortley Beck and all its various connections all end up in the one channel and I have the feeling that the flows I remember from my youth from those watercourses should end up being of far greater quantity than what is to be seen alongside Water Lane.Is there a diverging take-off for some reason somewhere that I have overlooked? The 'flood relief' for Water lane is the lake at Farnley alongside the Ring Road, is it not?    

[jim]

It is Railnut. If the flow of the western part of the system ( which does not include any more easterly flows from such as the Mill Shaw Beck, for instance ) rises far beyond normal it will help to "balance" that excess out. I don't think it has any effect on the regular flow, unless there is some mechanism of which I am not aware that diverts some of it. My enquiry was to seek information on any such diversion that might account for the apparent low outfall into the River Aire at Victoria Road Bridge.Of course, it might just be that I have become a victim of the present day fashion for conspiracy theories! ( Perhaps there is a tunnel to Kirkstall Abbey........... )    

[The Parksider]

frisbee wrote: There used to be a second beck called the Banyon beck that run amost parrarell to the Hol beck, but flowed in the opposite direction. I believe (although I could be wrong on this) that it flowed into the Holbeck joining the Hol beck at the western end of Water Lane. The Banyon beck flowed near to where The Grove pub stands and in between the foundries on or near Marshall Street. This beck has long disappeared underground, I doubt that any trace of it still exists but maybe Phil D could find evidence somewhere or other.     Nice one Frisbee, the Benyon Beck passes Benyon Flax mill and does flow opposite to the Holbeck south of it. It's on the 1854 OS map but I can't work out where it may come from? I think we had this on the Leeds lost becks thread as a late entry!Any thoughts where the Benyon Beck emanated from??

[The Parksider]

Phill_dvsn wrote: Hi Parksider.Good point about the beck powering the mills/foundries I have to say i can't see any other reason why the beck was channelled if it wasn't to 'manage' the water supply in some way. There was groves in the stone sets where leat gates were fixed (you can see one on my story) they damned the flow and diverted the supply elsewhere. 1854 OS map shows some flax mills in Holbeck one on the benyon beck and two on the hol beck. There's an oil and mustard mill on water lane, and a woolen mill at Holbeck moor and two corn mills, the latter a "Holbeck corn mill - steam".There are resevoirs - a big one at Silver street - so maybe what you saw could be gates for filling the resevoirs on the other side of Water Lane to the beck.Not sure if it would be certain that "engineering" the beck meant they used it for waterwheel power. Across the south of the Aire Hol, Benyon and Dow Becks were channelled and covered (in the case of the latter two)For any great power you want the water to hit the wheel from above or at least from the middle, hitting it at low level would not provide a lot of power, but I suppose that the emergence of a "steam mill" and the presence of the round foundry making steam engines on the 1854 map and then the dissapearance of the Flax mills by the 1906 map maybe shows that there was some water power, in the early 19thC, but by the late 19thC all the power was steam engines.Just a big fat guess and it may be worth a wander around the hol to see if there are any signs of anything that could be connected with water power - weirs and goits, and of course the resevoirs could be connected with water power - I just await better informed opinion than I have on all this......PS Benyon beck ran alongside Marshall Mills. Didn't Marshall move from the water powered Scotland mill (where the water power set up remains) to Holbeck for the steam power????

[Phill_dvsn]

It seems the purpose of setting water courses down these stone channels was to manage the flow really. Not to have waterwheels along it's run. It's all about culvert hydraulics and how they work. They had to maximise the flow of water even in dry periods. A good culvert design has a deep pool of water at the head of the channel, the water collects there and maintains a constant fast flow down the channel. The culvert feeder stream may be very slow, but once it's forced down the narrow channel it becomes very fast. The leat gates were lowered into the channel to divert the flow elsewhere. Obviously the faster they diverted the water, the quicker it was available further down stream again.            

[jim]

I've finally got down to comparing a variety of old maps, and have been surprised what I have found. Certainly much of it is to be found on these threads elsewhere, but I don't think put together.Firstly, in 1770 ( T. Jeffreys' map ) the only waterway shown south of the river in Holbeck is the one identified later as Benyon Beck. It enters the Aire just west of Leeds Bridge more or less due north of the site of The Red Lion, having passed midway between Water Lane ( east ) and Meadow Road from the vicinity of Meadow Road. There is no sign of any waterway near the present outlet alongside Water Lane ( west ) at Victoria Road Bridge, but near the site of the L&L lock are to be found Buckrum House and - Water House!Giles' map of 1815 shows the "missing" Hol Beck now running alongside Water Lane (west ) in its present position, with obvious connection to the Benyon Beck in the Bridge Road area, but as the map ends at that point it cannot be determined if there are one or two connections.Proceeding to the 1834 map of Baines and Newsome, it can be seen that the Wortley Beck splits in two just north of where it was later bridged by Brown Lane. A smaller stream travelling somewhat north of the main waterway passes just south of the later Danube an Oswald side streets to Gelderd Road, crosses the junction of Spence Lane and Domestic Street immediately to the south of Holbeck Lane, and appears to rejoin the main flow by the site of Phill D's "mystery bridge - whereupon it bifurcates again to become respectively Benyon Beck and Holbeck.The smaller stream from the Brown Lane junction is variously labelled as Mill Green Goit or Little Hol Beck. The larger stream is labelled Low Beck.There is a clear connection shown as a particularly wide waterway running alongside Bridge Road between Water Lane and Sweet Street, but there is the implication of another in the area between the old Holbeck Public Baths and Water Lane, but I can find no unassailable evidence.On Rapkins' 1850 map two large mill ponds are depicted on the site of the later L&NWR viaduct line and Bath Road, but of course have gone by the time of the next map I have of the area which postdates that line's construction. By 1901 nothing remains to be seen of Benyon Beck beyond where it passes beneath the Midland Railway route just north of the Sweet Street bridge, and shortly afterwards it is no longer visible east of Bridge Road. The stretch of Mill Green Goit/Little Holbeck alongside Wortley Lane and Holbeck Lane seems to have disappeared piecemeal over a similar time, but most of the rest of these watercourses is still in evidence in my mid-1950s "Geographia".The Ingram Road Distributor works will have covered much else, but a major question remains. Is the course of Benyon Beck, or a straightened out underground replacement still awaiting discovery by one of Secret Leeds' researchers, and does a large part of the Wortley/Mill Shaw Beck use that course, leaving the Hol Beck as an overflow or balancing route? I have known the more easily accessible parts of the system since 1949, when I came to live within a hundred yards of the Wortley section, and spent many hours then and since in the Holbeck area as a young trainspotter in the early 1950s and later as a railway worker, and I am sure the present day flows alongside Water Lane are but a trickle compared with the flows I was accustomed to seeing there in any but drought conditions in the past.

[The Parksider]

jim wrote: I've finally got down to comparing a variety of old maps, and have been surprised what I have found. Firstly, in 1770 ( T. Jeffreys' map ) Giles' map of 1815 Proceeding to the 1834 map of Baines and NewsomeOn Rapkins' 1850 map Fascinating jim, thanks....Where/how can I access these maps????