Deptford to West Silvertown Great British Railway Journeys


Deptford to West Silvertown

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For Victorian Britons, George Bradshaw was a household name.

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At a time when railways were new,

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Bradshaw's guidebook inspired them to take to the tracks.

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I'm using a Bradshaw's Guide

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to understand how trains transformed Britain -

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its landscape, its industries, society and leisure time.

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As I crisscross the country, 150 years later,

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it helps me to discover the Britain of today.

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I'm undertaking a series of journeys in and around London,

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which, at the time of my railway handbook,

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was the epicentre of the biggest empire

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that the world had ever known.

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In the century before my Bradshaw's Guide,

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the foundations of Britain's wealth were laid

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by scientists, inventors and entrepreneurs.

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London's riches depended upon the River Thames -

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narrow enough to provide a highway for the capital,

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deep enough to dispatch ocean-going ships to carry trade

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and project military might around the globe.

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'Today, I start in the east of the capital,

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'where the city's port launched many an imperial adventure.

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'Starting in Deptford, I'll explore Maritime Greenwich

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'before uncovering Britain's military might at Woolwich Arsenal.

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'Finally, I'll delve beneath the Thames, surfacing in the Docklands,

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'which were dramatically expanded around the time of my guide.

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'Along the way, I'll visit the celebrated ship

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'that supplied Victorian Britain with its national drink...'

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Every journey back from China, she was bringing 600 tonnes of tea.

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That was enough tea to make over 200 million cups.

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'..taste a by-product of 19th-century global trade...'

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Mmm!

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Deliciously warm,

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as though it has just come off a hot sticky toffee pudding.

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'..and learn about the nation's top award for gallantry.'

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And this one...

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-is made from the barrel you're leaning on.

-Really?!

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Curiously, the first railway in London was built

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a decade after the first steam-hauled trains

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had run between Stockton and Darlington.

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The pioneering line that brought rail travel to the capital

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was the London And Greenwich Railway,

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and the first stretch to open, in 1836,

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linked Bermondsey with Deptford.

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'We will shortly be arriving at Deptford.'

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Bradshaw's tells me that "the principal object of attraction

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"at Deptford is the Dockyard, which has three building slips

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"and is chiefly used as a victualling yard,

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"the river being crowded with transports."

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This would be the place, then, to meet every class of society,

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from the poorest beggar to the richest ship-owner.

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Built on a remarkable viaduct comprising 60 million bricks,

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the railway transformed the Deptford landscape.

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Meanwhile, beneath its arches, the advent of the Age Of Steam

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heralded extraordinary social upheaval.

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Driven by the Victorian spirit of inquiry,

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one man revealed the starkly contrasting fortunes

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of Deptford's population.

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Historical tour guide Sean Patterson knows his story.

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Sean, I'm here in Deptford to talk about Charles Booth.

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Who was he?

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Charles Booth was a Victorian businessman and philanthropist.

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He heard that, in the Whitechapel area,

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around a quarter of the families were living below the poverty line.

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He thought that was nonsense and he decided to conduct a survey

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to see for himself just how bad it was.

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Suspecting that poverty in Whitechapel had been exaggerated,

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Booth was shocked to discover

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that a third of households lived in penury.

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He determined to map the rest of the capital.

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How did he conduct this survey? What was the method?

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Well, the method was to walk the streets of London -

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ultimately the whole of what we would call zones one and two

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on the travel map now, so a huge area -

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and to make notes as he went

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about the conditions that people were living in.

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In 1899, Booth and his researchers came to Deptford,

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where they discovered an extraordinary range

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of social classes living almost cheek-by-jowl.

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What we've got here is the seven categories.

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As you can see there, the yellow

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and then going down to semi-criminal at the bottom.

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But, interestingly, here you see this line of red.

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That's the High Street which we're on at the moment.

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Well, that's pretty good - that's just one down from the top.

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But, look, we just go off the side

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and you go straight down into dark blue

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with a line of black along it,

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which is almost... Well, it is the opposite end of the scale.

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So Booth produces, really, this very eloquent rainbow of poverty.

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-Shall we move on?

-Certainly.

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'Deptford had long owed its livelihood to the dockyard

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'described in my Bradshaw's.

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'It dated back to Henry VIII's reign

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'and had been the source of great wealth over the years.'

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A very attractive terrace of houses. From what period?

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These houses are from the early-to-mid 18th century.

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From the Georgian heyday of Deptford, if you like.

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These were built for sea captains.

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But by the time of Booth's survey in the 1890s,

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the river had silted up,

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making it difficult for Deptford to compete with newer docks

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more suited to modern steam vessels.

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Dockers struggling to find work were soon also suffering

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the consequences of railway expansion.

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Where are we now on your map?

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Well, we're in this area here which, as you can see, is dark blue,

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with even some black lines along it.

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Very close to the High Street, where we were earlier,

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just a few yards away.

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But, gosh, it's an awful lot worse just here.

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The policeman that Booth is with

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describes this as the worst part of Deptford.

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Where this 1930s estate is

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used to be a street called Addey Street

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and the policeman notes that that morning, at 5am,

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he went into a house to arrest a man

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and found father, mother and five children living in one room.

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And this is what was happening in this area that's been squeezed by...

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what we're standing under, which is Britain's largest listed structure,

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the 800 or so railway arches from London Bridge to Greenwich.

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By Booth's time, the London to Greenwich railway

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had been joined by others crisscrossing Deptford.

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Seeking land for their lines,

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the railway companies had gobbled up cheap housing,

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adding to the overcrowding depicted so vividly by Booth.

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As well as producing his maps,

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which helped to change the way Victorians thought about poverty,

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Booth campaigned for an old age pension,

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which was eventually introduced in 1909.

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This is really a very Victorian story, isn't it?

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It is the scientific approach.

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The collection of evidence, the presentation of a case,

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the drawing of conclusions and the call for action.

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Absolutely, and it's Booth's skill

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that allows him to take that meticulous, forensic approach.

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I'm now continuing my journey on the driverless Docklands Light Railway

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from Deptford Bridge into the heart of Maritime Greenwich,

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which Bradshaw's tells me "presents a striking appearance from the River."

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Soon after the London And Greenwich Railway was built,

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day trippers from the city were coming here

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to admire the glorious historic architecture.

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Greenwich has long been associated with the Royal Navy.

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Bradshaw's mentions the Royal Observatory.

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Warships would anchor within sight

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to set their chronometers to Greenwich Mean Time

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and their sailors might retire to the Royal Naval Hospital

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designed by Sir Christopher Wren.

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But I'm drawn today to the town by a merchant vessel,

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a tall ship whose motto characterised the spirit

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of the British Empire at its peak -

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"Where there's a will, there's a way."

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Morning. Um, which way to the Cutty Sark, please?

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Come with me, please.

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If you will keep straight, and then left,

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you will see the boat on your right-hand side.

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It's quite big, isn't it? I can't miss it!

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-Yeah, it is quite big. Have a nice day, take care.

-Thank you.

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Greenwich remains a popular tourist destination -

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the sights pull in 2.5 million visitors per year.

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And Victorian Britain's most familiar trading ship

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is an essential stop on their itineraries.

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Curator Jessica Lewis is showing me the ropes.

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It's a fantastic view from here, isn't it?

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Looking up at the mast and the spars - is that right?

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Yes, yes. That's right.

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The ship had 11 miles of rigging and 3,000 square metres of canvas.

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Launched in 1869, Cutty Sark was built for speed,

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to a bold design that combined a sleek, streamlined hull

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with one of the biggest sail areas of any ship of her day.

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The ship's crew spent half its time maintaining her, even in high seas,

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but Jessica is letting me off with some light duties!

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So what exactly am I doing with this?

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So it's just a little bit of modern marine oil.

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And you just need to work it into the block.

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So a little bit... That's it. And it goes quite far.

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And this is to moisten the wood,

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to keep it flexible so it can carry on doing its job.

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Because, what, the sun is blasting away at this...?

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Yes, particularly over here on the port side.

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What kind of puzzles me is why, in 1869,

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you would build a sailing ship,

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which is way into the Age Of Steam, isn't it?

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Well, Cutty Sark's owner, John Willis, was thinking,

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"Why would I pay for coal when I can get wind power for free?

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"Why would I want to give up some of that valuable cargo space

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"with engines and the storage of fuel

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"when I could just do it all by the power of the wind?"

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Known as clippers, super-fast sailing ships like Cutty Sark

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carried one of Victorian Britain's most prized commodities.

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Cutty Sark's cargo of tea was worth over £272,000 then

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and that's about £18.5 million in today's money.

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So, every journey back from China, she was bringing 600 tonnes of tea.

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That was enough tea to make over 200 million cups.

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1869, the year of Cutty Sark's launch,

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was also the year that the Suez Canal was opened.

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It provided steamships with a short cut to Asia -

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but it was impossible to sail through the canal,

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so clippers like Cutty Sark had to slog around Africa.

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Steamships are coming back from China in 60 days

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and Cutty Sark is only coming back in about 100 days, 109 days.

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Cutty Sark's maiden voyage, in 1870,

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there were 59 sailing ships loading tea in China that year.

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Her last voyage, in 1877, there were just nine.

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With Cutty Sark's tea trade with China scuppered,

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in the 1880s, her owner diverted her to the Australian wool trade.

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Her daring captain made the gruelling long-distance voyage

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work in her favour, charting a course around Cape Horn,

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where Cutty Sark harnessed the strongest -

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and most dangerous - winds in the world.

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Her fastest passage was 73 days from Sydney to London

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but she was regularly making the fastest passage of the season

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by about three or four weeks.

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And she became known as the fastest ship of her day.

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Well, I declare this vessel shipshape. Let's go below.

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In 1922, her days as a trading vessel were over

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and Cutty Sark was eventually put to rest here in Greenwich in 1954.

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But that wasn't the end of her troubles.

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In November 2007, an electrical fire broke out

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at the start of a six-year project to conserve her.

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Luckily, a lot of original structure -

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half of the hull planks, all of the masts, the deck houses -

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had already been removed to storage at the time of the fire.

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And so they were saved?

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Absolutely, and we were very lucky

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and the quality of the original construction

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withstood the heat of the blaze.

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'Today, this glorious blade of a clipper that once cut through

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'the world's oceans with its zinc-and-copper-bottomed hull

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'is on view for us all to enjoy.'

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And so, in the 21st century, we're still able to appreciate

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-this extraordinary piece of Victorian engineering.

-Absolutely.

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This project was about ensuring Cutty Sark had a future,

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a sustainable future, so that future generations can enjoy the ship.

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From a restored relic of the Victorian docks,

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I'm moving on to a more modern vessel - the Thames Clipper,

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part of Transport For London's network along the River Thames.

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Following a special London edition of Bradshaw's, I'm heading east,

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towards an institution that provided firepower

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for the mighty British Empire.

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According to Bradshaw's London guide,

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"the government establishments of Woolwich

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"are acknowledged to be the finest in the world.

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"At the Royal Arsenal, the manufacture of implements of warfare

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"is carried on upon the most extensive scale,

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"casting the largest pieces of ordnance,

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"for which steam power has lately been applied.

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"The Arsenal contains no less than 24,000 pieces of ordnance

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"and three million cannon balls piled up in huge pyramids."

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During the largely peaceful 19th century,

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the Victorian attitude to war was summed up in an 1878 song -

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We don't want to fight

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But, by jingo, if we do

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We've got the ships, the men

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And the money, too!

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In Bradshaw's day, this important military installation

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was situated just a few steps from the jetty.

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Today it's the home of the Royal Artillery Museum

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and Paul Evans is my guide.

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Paul, why did the government establish its arsenal at Woolwich?

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It's established here because of an accident.

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An accident took place in 1716 in a gun foundry over in London.

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Gun founding is a really impressive thing, molten metal,

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pouring over, it looks fantastic, but it's got to be done right.

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They went down one day,

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took a party of MPs with them to show it off and their sand was damp.

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And there was an explosion. It killed 17 of them.

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And the powers that be said,

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"You can't do this in the centre of London.

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"This is the centre of the world.

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"You need to go somewhere where you've got space to do this.

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"We want you close enough to London to come and talk to us

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"but far enough away to be safe."

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Woolwich.

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By the time of my guidebook,

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this was the primary site for ordnance manufacture in the country.

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Railways were at its heart.

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We are walking down the trackway

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where the Royal Arsenal had its own railway.

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It was attached to the main line and it's making thousands and thousands

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of tonnes of material, so it needs that railway to be able to move it.

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To our left here we've got Crimean War vintage storerooms

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and work sheds that were state of the art in the Crimean War,

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built specifically so you can work in them 24 hours a day.

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To the right we've got the brass foundry building.

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So all of these buildings are making parts of the whole

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and you put them on the railways, move it to the dockyard,

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drop them onto the ships, down the Thames and off to war.

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The Crimean conflict of 1854 changed

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public perceptions of the military in Britain.

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Thanks in part to the new system of telegraph wires that had

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grown up alongside the railways, this was the first ever media war.

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The disastrous Charge of the Light Brigade shocked the nation.

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Equipment and clothing shortages and outbreaks of cholera

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and typhoid fever contributed to the deaths of 20,000 men.

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The officer class was vilified in the press,

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while the ordinary soldier became a national hero,

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but at this time

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only high-ranking officers could be awarded medals for gallantry.

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Queen Victoria herself agreed that this had to change.

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One of the consequences of the Crimean War was people

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started asking the question, what is there

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that we give our soldiers as the ultimate prize for gallantry?

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And you get the Victoria Cross.

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The Victoria Cross. And what actually is that made of, that medal?

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The Victoria Cross is made of gunmetal.

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And this one...is made from the barrel you're leaning on.

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-Really?!

-Absolutely.

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And then it was awarded to men from the Crimean War, was it?

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Yes. Originally you had to have survived the action

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for which you were put in for it.

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If you died, a little line went in under your mention in dispatches

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saying "would have been awarded the Victoria Cross had he lived".

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And then Queen Victoria lined up her heroes, did she,

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and actually presented these VCs?

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Absolutely, and she did more than that, she designed

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the majority of the medal as well.

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It's very much her personal medal.

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I'm continuing my journey from Woolwich station, which was

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first linked to the metropolis by rail as far back as 1849.

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Today this south-eastern corner of London is also

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connected to the capital's heart via the Docklands Light Railway.

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And soon there'll be a third, much faster way to get into town.

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Travelling with my Bradshaw's I've often been nostalgic

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for the Victorian railway age, wondering why

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we can't do things on the same scale and with that imagination.

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Well, now I've been partly answered, because they're building Crossrail,

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an immense railway undertaking beginning at Heathrow

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and in Berkshire in the west, passing under the West End, the City

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and Canary Wharf and popping out into Essex and Kent in the east.

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It is the largest construction project in Europe.

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The recently completed tunnel from Woolwich

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under the river to North Woolwich isn't yet open to the public.

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But there's one locomotive already running here.

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I'm joining construction manager Barrymore Nicholls on board.

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Ah! First class!

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Barrymore, I'm guessing this is not the final design

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for the new Crossrail trains.

0:19:430:19:45

No. This is the railway we use to help construct the tunnel.

0:19:450:19:48

You make pretty good use of tracks in the construction process.

0:19:500:19:54

Very much so.

0:19:540:19:55

It's a logistics exercise to keep the tunnel boring machine going.

0:19:550:19:59

'For a year, this locomotive has been hauling tonnes

0:19:590:20:02

'of reinforced concrete, used to build the tunnel walls.

0:20:020:20:06

'But first the gigantic boring machine, quaintly dubbed Mary,

0:20:060:20:10

'has to do her bit.'

0:20:100:20:12

This is us approaching the back of Mary,

0:20:120:20:15

the tunnelling machine that's come all the way from Plumstead

0:20:150:20:19

through the Woolwich box and under the Thames.

0:20:190:20:21

It's a little strange to me because we've had a year of

0:20:210:20:24

frenetic activity and now it's being carved up to be pulled out.

0:20:240:20:27

Oh, you sound quite emotional about that.

0:20:290:20:31

It is weird.

0:20:310:20:34

'Mary's cutter head is seven metres in diameter,

0:20:340:20:37

'while the whole machine is an impressive 110 metres long.'

0:20:370:20:42

And here we are at the build area,

0:20:420:20:44

it's just behind the cutter head, so the backup starts behind.

0:20:440:20:48

Everything in front is about digging

0:20:480:20:49

and everything behind is about logistics to keep the digging going.

0:20:490:20:52

The way this works is we build a ring, the rings are 1.6 metres long.

0:20:520:20:57

There's eight pieces go together to make a ring.

0:20:570:21:00

They fit together, they've got bolts and dowels that fit between them.

0:21:000:21:04

And what happens is we pick them up from the erector,

0:21:040:21:07

there's a vacuum pad on the bottom that can spin through 360 degrees,

0:21:070:21:11

place them anywhere in the circle.

0:21:110:21:13

We finish the ring, all eight pieces,

0:21:130:21:15

and then it's self-supporting, it's like the arch of a bridge.

0:21:150:21:18

And how often have you done that here?

0:21:180:21:20

We've done that 3,409 times now.

0:21:200:21:22

I'm now surfacing on the north side of the Thames

0:21:250:21:28

to see how Mary has fared.

0:21:280:21:30

So here we see the teeth of the cutter head

0:21:320:21:36

that's brought you to the other side of the Thames.

0:21:360:21:39

Yeah, a bit rusty and battered. Mary did very well.

0:21:390:21:41

When Isambard Kingdom Brunel was working on his father's tunnel

0:21:410:21:46

under the Thames he was swept away by a torrent of water

0:21:460:21:49

and nearly lost his life, but you have come safely under the river.

0:21:490:21:52

Until Crossrail is complete,

0:21:550:21:57

I have to continue my journey on the Docklands Light Railway.

0:21:570:22:01

I'm travelling west along the north bank of the Thames,

0:22:010:22:04

where vast new docks had been constructed in the mid-19th century.

0:22:040:22:07

London was at the heart of a global empire and lived by trade.

0:22:110:22:16

The pride that Victorians felt

0:22:160:22:18

is evident in an 1870s version of Bradshaw's.

0:22:180:22:21

"Docks in the East End of London cannot be omitted

0:22:210:22:24

"in a summary of the characteristics of the metropolis.

0:22:240:22:27

"They are the storehouses of widest commerce in the world,

0:22:270:22:32

"and their extent and skilful and economical arrangement

0:22:320:22:35

"will serve as a suggestive index

0:22:350:22:38

"of the merchandise brought from all parts of the world."

0:22:380:22:42

And from the sticky climes of the Caribbean

0:22:420:22:45

came a delicious sticky substance.

0:22:450:22:47

One of the joys of my childhood.

0:22:470:22:49

Imperial expansion changed British eating habits,

0:22:520:22:55

and the Victorians developed

0:22:550:22:57

a seemingly insatiable appetite for hot, sweet tea,

0:22:570:23:00

which saw their consumption of both tea and sugar quadruple

0:23:000:23:04

during the course of Victoria's reign.

0:23:040:23:07

As the sugar industry boomed in the late 19th century

0:23:070:23:10

two rival sugar tycoons, Henry Tate and Abram Lyle,

0:23:100:23:15

set up processing plants here in the Docklands.

0:23:150:23:18

It's said that the two competitors never actually met

0:23:180:23:21

but in 1921, more than two decades after both their deaths,

0:23:210:23:26

their companies merged.

0:23:260:23:29

I'm visiting a legacy of the Victorian sugar industry

0:23:290:23:32

with Gerald Mason.

0:23:320:23:34

Ah!

0:23:340:23:35

An extraordinary sight with all the tins tumbling down here.

0:23:350:23:40

What is the origin of this plant on the River Thames?

0:23:400:23:44

Well, Abram Lyle was a partner in a sugar refinery in Scotland

0:23:440:23:48

but he wanted his own refinery.

0:23:480:23:50

So in 1880 he sent his two sons to London with a bank loan of £150,000

0:23:500:23:58

to find land and build the refinery.

0:23:580:24:00

The factory remains on the site that they chose,

0:24:000:24:03

ideally situated for the docks.

0:24:030:24:05

And soon this refinery was producing more than just

0:24:050:24:08

sugar for the tea table.

0:24:080:24:10

The Lyles were fantastic sugar refiners

0:24:100:24:13

and what they soon realised was there was sugar

0:24:130:24:15

being lost in the process which was costing them money.

0:24:150:24:18

'These canny Victorian businessmen turned what had been a waste product

0:24:180:24:23

'into a cheap sugar substitute dubbed golden syrup.'

0:24:230:24:26

So very, very quickly the product grew from

0:24:270:24:30

a local following around London

0:24:300:24:32

to being a product that's sold all across the UK.

0:24:320:24:35

A golden legacy!

0:24:350:24:37

The secret recipe of the syrup remains the same,

0:24:380:24:41

as does its iconic trademark.

0:24:410:24:44

The famous lion that I remember from my childhood.

0:24:440:24:48

It's been one of the most enduring

0:24:480:24:50

logos and trademarks of all time, hasn't it?

0:24:500:24:52

Yeah, it's actually the oldest

0:24:520:24:54

unchanged brand packaging in the world.

0:24:540:24:57

To ensure that this product tastes

0:24:570:24:59

just the same as it did in Bradshaw's day,

0:24:590:25:01

the secret recipe is carefully monitored.

0:25:010:25:03

-This is Chris, one of our long-serving employees.

-Hello, Chris!

0:25:050:25:08

-Hello.

-Long-serving? How long?

-31 years.

0:25:080:25:11

31 years. And are you in the business of sampling the product?

0:25:110:25:15

Yeah, I'm just doing a brick sample,

0:25:150:25:18

and that measures the amount of sugar syrup

0:25:180:25:21

in the solution as a percentage.

0:25:210:25:23

Do you ever just stick your finger in there and...

0:25:230:25:26

Erm...not often, no. Not any more. A while ago maybe.

0:25:260:25:28

The employees here might not be tempted, but before I leave

0:25:320:25:36

I can't resist a taste hot off the production line.

0:25:360:25:39

There you go, Michael.

0:25:420:25:45

Whoa! The tin is warm.

0:25:450:25:46

Mmm!

0:25:480:25:50

Deliciously warm, as though it had just come off

0:25:500:25:53

a hot sticky toffee pudding.

0:25:530:25:56

This factory is one of the docklands' few

0:25:580:26:01

remaining links with its trading and industrial past.

0:26:010:26:04

The area suffered badly during the Blitz,

0:26:040:26:07

and the post-war years ushered in a long period of decline.

0:26:070:26:12

More recently, it's been a target for regeneration,

0:26:120:26:15

and one of the latest additions to the landscape

0:26:150:26:18

is the striking Emirates Air Line,

0:26:180:26:20

a bird's-eye link between the Royal Victoria Docks and North Greenwich,

0:26:200:26:25

opened in 2012 for the London Olympics.

0:26:250:26:28

In my time, I have crossed the River Thames by boat,

0:26:320:26:35

by bridge, by tunnel, by foot,

0:26:350:26:38

by car, by bus, by train, by Underground,

0:26:380:26:43

by Docklands Light Railway, but today for me I'm attempting a first.

0:26:430:26:47

I'm crossing the river by air line, a bold piece of engineering

0:26:470:26:52

that takes my cabin soaring to 295 feet above Old Father Thames.

0:26:520:26:59

As it grew into the world's first truly global city,

0:27:010:27:04

Victorian London underwent an extraordinary metamorphosis.

0:27:040:27:08

What I love about my home town is that it never stops changing -

0:27:080:27:12

from the waxing and waning fortunes of areas like Deptford

0:27:120:27:17

to the new transport projects that will keep Londoners moving.

0:27:170:27:21

A century ago this was the West India Dock,

0:27:230:27:26

covering more than 50 acres with berths for 600 ships.

0:27:260:27:31

Today it is home to more than 14 million square feet

0:27:310:27:34

of commercial floor space.

0:27:340:27:37

We may lament the passing into history

0:27:370:27:39

of so much of our shipping and manufacturing

0:27:390:27:42

but if we feel sentimental about the Victorian age we should recall

0:27:420:27:46

that it was also an epoch of poverty, squalor and disease.

0:27:460:27:51

George Bradshaw could never have dreamt of Britain's

0:27:510:27:55

21st-century wealth.

0:27:550:27:57

Next time, I'll experience the Olympic legacy hands on.

0:28:000:28:03

My knowledge will be tested by a cabbie.

0:28:070:28:10

How can you get from Bishopsgate to the Old Bailey without

0:28:100:28:13

crossing a road?

0:28:130:28:15

By hiring a cab with a knowledgeable driver!

0:28:150:28:19

And I'll see how London's Victorian infrastructure

0:28:190:28:22

is getting a remarkable 21st-century upgrade.

0:28:220:28:25

I had no idea that this great big box was here.

0:28:250:28:29

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