Index

• The Dark and Middle Ages
  • The Dark Ages
  • The Middle Ages
  • Bridgwater Castle
  • Town's Mediaeval Layout
  • St Mary's Church
  • St John's Hospital
  • Grey Friars
• Bridgwater's Fairs and Markets
  • The Earliest Fairs
  • St Matthew's Fair
  • Markets and Trade
• Bridgwater Carnival
  • Bridgwater Carnival
  • Historical Background
  • Cornhill Bonfire
  • The Final Bonfire
  • Squibbing
  • Early Disasters
  • The Evolution of Carnival
  • Carnival Concerts
• 17th Century
  • English Civil War
  • Admiral Blake
  • The Plague
  • Monmouth Rebellion
• River and Shipping
  • Earliest Records
  • Blossoming Trade
  • Shipbuilding
  • Docks
  • Bertha the Dredger
• 18th Century
  • Stage Coach Travel
  • The Iron Bridge and the Turnpike Trusts
  • The Architectural Legacy
  • Entertainment
• Bridgwater and Slavery
  • Somerset Rebels Sold into Slavery
  • Bridgwater’s Petition
  • A Slave Speaks Out in Bridgwater
• 19th Century
  • Political Corruption
  • Disenfranchised
  • Advent of the Railway
  • Somerset and Dorset Joint Railway
  • Utilities
  • Bridgwater’s Regiment
  • The Borough Constabulary 1834-1940
  • The Bridgwater Workhouses
  • The Brick and Tile Trade
  • The Brickyard Strike of 1896
  • Bath Brick
  • Wicker Products
• Early 20th Century
  • Introduction
  • Introduction of Electricity
  • The New Fire Stations
  • The Launch of the Irene
  • An Unwanted Suffragette
  • First World War
  • Changes in Transport
  • Between the Wars
• Second World War
  • Vernon Bartlett
  • The Day War Broke Out
  • Rationing and Restrictions
  • Prisoners of War
  • Women’s Land Army and the War Effort
  • Air Raids
  • Home Guard and Returning Heroes
  • VE Day
• Late 20th Century
  • Post War Bridgwater
• Around and About the Town
  • Admiral Blake Statue
  • Bridgwater Infirmary
  • Blake Gardens
  • The Cannon
  • Castle Street
  • The Cornhill
  • Friarn Street
  • King Square
  • The Old Vicarage
  • Penel Orlieu
  • Royal Clarence
  • Salmon Parade
  • Town Hall
• Lesser known Bridgwater Worthies
  • Captain George Lewis Browne, William Hubber and the Battle of Trafalgar
  • John Clark, Inventor of the Mackintosh
  • Denis Heron
  • Frances Barkley
  • Brother John Somer
  • Fanny Talbot
• Did You Know?
  • Did You Know?

History

Bertha the Dredger

Road traffic at the dock was facilitated by a bascule bridge, again believed to be of a Brunel design, and this is the bridge over which traffic still goes today.  Completing Brunel’s contribution to the dock’s infrastructure was the dredger, Bertha.  The main problem for the dock operators was heavy silting.  Bertha, the steam-driven dredger, was designed such that she would run up and down a chain from one end of the dock to the other.  At the end of each journey, the chain would be moved a bit further across the end of the dock, so that over a period of several trips, she had covered the entire dock basin.  Imagine if the dock were drained and a bulldozer was used to push the silt deposit to one end of the dock.  The bulldozer blade is down in one direction and up in the other.  That was how Bertha  worked, but under the water. 

Text Copyright © 2008 Roger Evans