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Cuckoo Boats. The Chesterfield Canal is not linked to any other canals. Its only access is via the tidal River Trent at West Stockwith. It was one of the very first canals to be opened in this country in 1777. Thus the first working boats to use the canal were different from those used elsewhere. Rod Auton, Publicity Officer, tells us more. Evelyn at Morse (Mossy) Lock, Jonathan Whaite collection.
O
ver the centuries, the designs of boats using other, interconnected canals evolved and becoming fairly standard. However, the Chesterfield boats changed very little. They were usually used for fairly short trips. They often had a crew of two who did not live permanently on the boats. Therefore they did not have large cabins and were not highly decorated. Remarkably, they were never powered by engines. Commercial cargo carrying finished in 1955 and right up to the end the boats were towed by horses. Sometimes they ventured out onto the River Trent, even going down the Fossdyke and River Witham to Boston. Obviously they could not be horse drawn on such a large river, so they were equipped with sails, oars and heavy chains to provide some control and steering, which again set them apart from the vast majority of other canal boats. When these long thin boats (70′ x 7′) first started to appear on the river, the Trent boatmen thought the canal boatmen were mad (cuckoo) for venturing onto the wild river in such craft. The boats were regarded as cuckoos in the nest for stealing cargoes from the Trent boats. There are many old boaters who insist that the term Cuckoo refers to the boatmen, not the boats. There are historians who point to the use of the term Cuckoo referring to the boats dating back to the early 19th Century. What is not in doubt is that the term Cuckoo boats is now widely used to refer to these craft that are unique to the Chesterfield Canal.
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Wesleyan Sunday School treat Retford 1906, barge Norah (Bassetlaw Museum)
