Ferries of the Upper Thames

Joan Tucker presents a profusely illustrated history of the Thames ferries.

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'In Sweet Thames Run Softly Robert Gibbings describes how in 1939 he saw a window of Blackwell's Bookshop in Broad Street, Oxford full of books on the Thames. He was daunted by this as he was just engaged in writing and illustrating his own lovely book. There were histories of the river, and of the villages beside it. Bridges spanning the river were the subject of several books, also the natural history of it, besides how to fish and row. But there were no books on crossing the Thames by ford and ferry before the advent of bridges. Gibbings himself does not mention them, nor have any been written since.'Joan Tucker's first history of the Thames ferries covered the London reaches, from Staines to the sea. This second book starts at the source in Gloucestershire and follows the river down past Oxford and Windsor to complete the journey. The richness of the documentary history from old deeds and Acts is paralled by the stories and accounts of earlier travels. All the sites have been visited and are described as they survive. The author's earlier Ferries of Gloucestershire was the Railway & Canal Historical Society's 'Road Transport Book of the Year' in 2010.