Hello. For those of you with a keen interest in local history this will certainly be of interest. Moving on from the successful renovation of the canal over the last few years, we are now looking for volunteers to help unblock and restore Beckworths’ Victorian sewer system to it’s former glory. It’s bound to be very dirty and smelly work but invaluable historical research (the water board are refusing to fund it, even though they were still using it twenty years ago. They have taken a defeatist stance saying it’s beyond repair). It’s a once in a lifetime chance for strong-swimmers, preferably with their own boiler-suits and breathing gear, to glimpse 19th and 20th century life through discarded toilet detritus and faeces. It is worth remembering that in their heyday the sewers (designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel‘s adopted daughter Islington Kingston Brunel) were described as one of the seventy wonders of the world and were opened to the public by Prince Albert and his incontinent brother Prince Leopald Von Pitsburg, both keen sewer fanatics. Please email the secretary of the society Sarah Beeny for more details about volunteering. Many thanks, Bill Christchurch. Beckworth Historical Society.

(Above) Princes Albert and Leopald stand with Miss Brunel and guest stand on top of the nearly completed Beckworth’s sewers at their grand opening