what exactly is the source of a river now that might seem like an obvious question
and if it's a physical answer i'm looking to give you then i'll show you that just up ahead my name
is paul and this part of my journey today starts alongside the abandoned thames and seven canal
now not only is this point here the summit level the highest point on the canal but
just behind me there in the distance is the two mile long sapperton canal tunnel again
long abandoned and collapsed in many many places likely causing the ultimate demise of this canal
it's mid april and we've been blessed with some really rather gorgeous weather just adding to this
absolutely gorgeous abandoned canal and just ahead of me is a wonderful little folly i want to say
a little castle stood here next to the canal what a gorgeous landscape this is now the reason why
i wanted to start this journey on the thames and seven canal is for good reason because when
they when they wanted to build this canal they didn't give any real consideration to how they
would maintain a level of water in that canal so they just assumed that all the rivers around here
would be more than enough to to fill it and maintain that head of water now for context
let's pop the thames and seven canal on a map just so you know exactly where we are
the rivers in question play a key part in today's story as well and when we pop them on a map too
you can see how water from those rivers looks like a viable means to fill this canal
so let's not delay any further i think just up ahead of me is indeed the source of the river
thames now the embankment you see just there is the thames and seven canal it's important that
it's there come back to that shortly but here we are the source of the river thames uh source
to sea 232 miles that's also important we'll come back to that shortly and the most important thing
of the day the conservatives of the river thames 1857 to 1974 the stone was placed here to mark
the source of the river thames but look around us there's a lovely little pile of stones there and
laid in the ground that's quite dry and all around me in fact is extremely dry it's spring we've had
a bit of rain recently there's like a lake there but there's no water in it it's completely dry so
let's head half a mile further south because there's something else we need to show you
so we had no intention of showing you this but we just looked on the old
os maps from national library of scotland 18 80s 1890s that's all there are
here as marked as the source of the river thames at thameshead which is this area
makes sense not half a mile up there where the current stone is lovely little alcove
they've made for it you can't read anything on it i don't know if there is any writing on it
but nevertheless this is the second source of the river thames from today's video something
more important to show you than both of these sources 100 yards through the trees over there
so now walking along the river thames the start of the river thames we've just seen the sources
up there one or two of them now before we turn this all on its head let's consider something else
let's consider again the canal because it's said that somewhere up there on that private household
there is a well lit well we think it's just around there somewhere now lid well was fed by
a lot of feeder tunnels from here now again this is the source of the river thames and it should
be flowing with water but it's not but in order to feed the canal and keep it maintained with water
they had a winding pump and they had then a steam pumper bolton and what famous steam pump
in which they took water from this man-made well and put it into
the canal so around here somewhere there are supposedly some culverts and some
underground water systems that feed a well just over there that in turn fed the canal
a look at an 1860 plan of the canal reveals something else we've yet to consider a leak
now back where we started the journey there was a significant quarry
the canal from birth in 1789 had some stop planks in the side a drainage paddle or a sluice perhaps
now it's even said to this day that whenever this part of the
the thames is actually wet on the rare occasion the sauce is actually correct then the canal is
very wet too it's dry today so that adds up now it turns out that that's because well there's another
source of the river thames and that just so happens to be a spring within the tunnel
everything i've just told you in the last few minutes probably isn't the most riveting story it
just means that perhaps ironically the thames and seven canal for the last 200 years has been the
source of the river thames so in a wet period it comes from the canal and the leak in the canal and
in the dry period well perhaps the source is just a mile or two miles down that way even further
so let's do what we've said we're going to do and turn this video on its head
around about maybe 10 miles to the east of the source of the river thames i'm now walking north
along a completely different river this is the river churn it's just down there in the valley
and it's really rather picturesque today the river churn is 23 miles long and it runs
from the source up at seven springs we'll visit there in a moment all the way down this valley and
it joins the thames back at quickly now the fact that it joins the river thames might give a little
bit of an indication as to why i want to find the source of this river so let's mark that on a map
the start and the finish and next up let's define the source of a river the tributary that started
the furthest distance from the river's end would be considered the source or the headwaters
so that's both national geographic wikipedia and various other
sources so here we are at seven springs the source of the river churn
the first tributary to the river thames and yet if we look at this um as a river in its
own right well it's 23 miles long from its point at quick laid now that's almost twice the distance
from quick laid to the actual source of the river thames
and yet here we are at the source of the river churn not the source of the thames
so by right we should now be stood inside
this wonderful weird looking well that is in fact the source of the thames and here is
the latin inscription which probably reads something along those lines
so what does this mean well if we take a look at the longest river in britain which is currently
the river seven at 290 miles in length well if in fact this was the source of the river thames
the end of ever churn then it would add another 14 miles to the river thames and the river thames 214
currently so adding another 14 miles well it would make it clearly the longest river in britain
if it's wrong why don't we change it why don't we make this the official source of the thames
i guess that could be a thing but i guess it would also take a lot of work from a lot of
authoritative bodies and to what end ever since 1542 john leyand decreed that actually thames head
was the source of the thames where we were earlier and it's not changed since and i guess
to what gain what would we gain from changing it i don't know but it certainly fell into my net
of interest in things so if you've enjoyed this video and you've enjoyed walking with us in uh
random parts of the cotswold today enjoying the landscape and the sunshine then do click on the
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