The Thames from Hampton Court to Sunbury Lock

Molesey Lock

second-To-last lock on the non-tidal thames

Until Romney Lock was built at Windsor in 1797, the lowest lock on the Thames was Boulter’s Lock at Maidenhead. Teddington Lock was then built in 1811.

 

Molesey Lock was completed in August 1815. Fish ladders were added to the weir in 1864 and boat rollers added to the lock in 1871.

flood and freeze

There are two plaques showing the flood levels of 1821 and 1894,  and another commemorating the 1947 flood.

 

During the great flood of November 1894, the water level rose eight feet six inches above the normal summer water level, and Peter Chaplin’s father canoed over the lock without seeing any of the structure above the water.

 

The following year, in 1895 he skated on the ice all the way from Molesey Lock to Sunbury Lock in the middle of the river.

second longest lock on the river

The lock was rebuilt and enlarged in 1906, probably to cope with the increased coal barge traffic heading up to Hampton Water Works, and to accommodate larger boats built at Thornycrofts on Platt’s Eyot.

 

At 268 feet/82 metres it is the second longest lock on the river – the longest being the barge lock at Teddington.

 

At Molesey Lock there is one of the nine recharging points built by the Environment Agency for recharging batteries on electric boats – a modern version of the idea pioneered by Immisch over a century earlier.

Molesey Lock and Weir