Shallow Foreshore. 23 



history, changes and actual state of facts bearing on the 

 Fisheries Stations of our District. (Antea, Sect. 7.) 



Drawbacks and wherefore. As a Fisheries Station, Leisrb 

 has a most serious drawback to prosperity, to wit, a shallow 

 creek, whose depth of water, unfortunately, steadily decreases. 

 According to tradition, the " Slade," near the Southend Pier, 

 was the only entrance to the Swatchway and the Raj^. After 

 a time a tendency was noticed by the fishers of the steady 

 shallowing of the Swatch, the Leigh Creek and the Bay. The 

 current notion has been that the mussel culture in Hadleigh 

 Ray has partly been the cause of its silting. During 1883-4 (?) 

 a narrow deep channel with bar entrance opened up rather 

 suddenly across the marsh-end sand the so called " Low-way " 

 about 100 yards below a previous Low- way gut. The " Low- 

 way " is now the only entrance to Leigh and Benfleet, for 

 during low tide the Swatch is nearly dry, yet 20 years ago the 

 fishing smacks used regularly to beat up the Swatchway at three- 

 quarter ebb, where now they cannot sail except at high water. 



The fishers further say that the elder Mr. Alston, oyster 

 merchant, blocked up an original cross gut viz^ one in a line 

 with the Pottery, and that he cut another new cross gut almost 

 facing the " Crow Stone." This latter is that which at present 

 is used by row-boat to get into the Leigh Creek during low tide. 



In an Admiralty chart, " From Gravesend to Sheerness," 

 containing data between 1856-70, we find the fishermen's state- 

 ments borne out, all excepting the "Low-way" entrance, which 

 had not then existence. 



Accompanying the " Lower Thames Navigation Commission 

 Report " * is an excellent series of charts and text of the 

 navigable channel opposite Leigh, though the shallower inshore 

 waters are less specifically marked out. However, in that of 

 Mackenzie's Survey, 1775, what is an entrance to the Leigh 

 Swatch and one to that of Benfleet Creek are outlined quite 

 apart, and with shallow bars but fairly deep channels within. 



* Thames Conservancy's Ueport to the Board of Trade, March, 1896. 



