The Deben - The Rocks - why the name

I don't have a copy to hand but Jack Cootes in East Coast Rivers suggested it's because of the rocks exposed at low water, perhaps the current edition still says so.
The rocks are still there, my dinghy bottom can vouch for that, so watch out if you go back in the Slug!
 
I understood that it is called The Rocks as there are some large stones within the sand of the beach and under water on the beach side of the channel.
These can be upto 1 foot in size.
That is a serious rock as far as an east coaster is concerned.
Fossil sharks teeth have been found on the beach.
 
Well,yes there are some rocks there and a little cliff. The story I heard was that the Victorians gave the name as it was a favourite spot go fossil hunting. Of course, they are "rocks" only in a geologically recent East Anglian way and represent a very small outcrop amongst mostly glacial terminal morain and meltwater run-off. The only other "rock" outcrops I can think of in East Anglia are the chalk at near Newmarket and sandstone(o think) near Hunstanton. The surface geology of East Anglia is mostly clay, sand, and gravel.
 
Habebty said:
Well,yes there are some rocks there and a little cliff. The story I heard was that the Victorians gave the name as it was a favourite spot go fossil hunting. Of course, they are "rocks" only in a geologically recent East Anglian way and represent a very small outcrop amongst mostly glacial terminal morain and meltwater run-off. The only other "rock" outcrops I can think of in East Anglia are the chalk at near Newmarket and sandstone(o think) near Hunstanton. The surface geology of East Anglia is mostly clay, sand, and gravel.
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Stone Banks off Harwich. In the "old days" the smackmen used to pick up the stones from the seabed there using a grab on the end of a line, then they'd sell them for building. Another sideline they had was picking up coal from the seabed and selling it ashore.
 
The rocks -script

So - on the assumption that you blokes are local sailors and that at least one of you has an o level in history I will describe you in the script as

local sailing historians trell me that ......

Dylan
 
Have patience, have patience. Some of us have Grandkids hogging the megabites (yes I mean megabites!)

From Suffolk Estuary - The story of the River Deben, W G Arnott, 1950

"Above Hemley is the reach of the river called The Rocks because the channel has a hard rocky bottom where many of us get our anchors caught from time to time. The rocks are formed of septaria which you can see lying on the sandy beach and this is the stone of which Orford Castle is built."

Elsewhere in the book it says that there is/was a hard there and a ferry from Kirton Creek used to come to the beach there. The field about the cliff was known as the Ferry Hempland (whioch of course you will know originates from the time of QE1 when anyone who farmed more than 60 acres was obliged by law to grow a crop of flax or hemp (nothing like a bit of cannabis sativa to make the Tudor Nights go with a bit of a bang). The Rocks is also the place where the Upper Deben Beacons started being the old limit of sea pilotage where river pilots took over. Up to the end of the last century a pilot boat was stationed there, having as many as half a dozen pilots on board while othes used the top of Waldringfield cliff as their lookout, spotting through their telescopes the vessels coming up the River.

Jack Coote in edition 1 of East Coast Rivers talks of the 'pleasant landing on a sany beach known locallly as 'The Rocks' but gives no explanation.

Enough?
 
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Thank you. That is amazing, I can find out stuff that I never even knew I didn't know. Now I've just got to remember where I put the car keys.
 
The nodules (and the sharks teeth) come out of the London Clay which is exposed on the foreshore, same stuff (approximately) as the lower part of the cliffs at Walton on the Naze and the cliffs on the north side of Sheppey
 
In subsequent editions of East Coast Rivers Jack did mention that the remains of a hard might be why The Rocks reach is so named. Since I took over editing the recent editions, we have included a reference from Arnott's Suffolk Estuary concerning the sandstone/septaria 'rocks' being used to build Orford Castle (as quoted by Tillergirl) .

In the River Deben An Enchanted Waterway, Robert Simper mentions that Rocks Reach is where cattle were swum across the river to go to Ipswich Market, possibly from the aforementioned hard? Otherwise they would have had to be driven via Wilford Bridge.

That's enough anorak stuff for now...
 
excellent stuff

love the stuff about the cattle

as for being called the rocks

may I suggest renaming it as the - "the stones"

or

"the reasonably big boulders"

perhaps

but the rocks - not what a scotsman would call rocks

but given that I managed to hit the rocks at cromer

a dangerous place for the slug to go

splendid place to anchor though

D
 
No sorry Dylan, can't call it 'Stones' - back to our anoraks and Arnott

"The approach to the ferries was by way of hards over the mud. They were called hards because they were made of 'stone' which in Suffolk means gravel or flints. In very early days the hards were known as 'gates' from a Norse word meaning a way over the shore to the water, hence Methersgate, Wadgate, Havergate and Shotley Gate.

Later on, landing places were called 'stones' referring to the spurs of shingle built up by tidal eddies and forming the hards leading to the water. Although the word 'stone' for a hard was in common use along the Deben banks until the 16th century, it is never heard today. Guston Stone was the place in Kirton Creek where the ferries started [to cross to The Rocks!] and along the Essex Coast we still have survivals in Mersea Stone [still a ferry there], St Osyth's Stone etc."

PS: my latest edition of ECR is on board where it ought to be so perhaps Janet will forgive my omission.
 
okay - very good

tillergirl said:
No sorry Dylan, can't call it 'Stones' - back to our anoraks and Arnott

"The approach to the ferries was by way of hards over the mud. They were called hards because they were made of 'stone' which in Suffolk means gravel or flints. In very early days the hards were known as 'gates' from a Norse word meaning a way over the shore to the water, hence Methersgate, Wadgate, Havergate and Shotley Gate.

Later on, landing places were called 'stones' referring to the spurs of shingle built up by tidal eddies and forming the hards leading to the water. Although the word 'stone' for a hard was in common use along the Deben banks until the 16th century, it is never heard today. Guston Stone was the place in Kirton Creek where the ferries started [to cross to The Rocks!] and along the Essex Coast we still have survivals in Mersea Stone [still a ferry there], St Osyth's Stone etc."

PS: my latest edition of ECR is on board where it ought to be so perhaps Janet will forgive my omission.
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excellent stuff

I shall rename it the "largish boulders" then.

I seem to remember being told that the hard at brightlibngsea was made by the oystermen - the stones were those thrown out as they sorted the catch

very good info - it will get into the next film

d
 
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Morgana said:
Gosh, we just need Cantata to turn up now and we'll have one thread graced by all the great and good of East Coast sailing bibles! :)
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All right then:
In 'East Coast Pilot' it says that the river bed there is strewn with rocks. That chapter was written by Garth who was brought up in Woodbridge.
 
There are Rock there at LWS you can see them, not b....great big ones but the sort you wouldnt want to dry out on.

My number 2 son has a couple of fossilized sharks teeth from there.
 
potenitally yes.. the sharks teeth are very hard phosphate and therefore are not easily destroyed / washed away.. hence they are found in the sands & gravel on the foreshore. Other, rarer fossils include lobster, crabs, seeds. Have a look at:
http://www.sheppeyfossils.com/
this is the same material as found in Kent (ok there is a bit more of it too!)
You might also be interested in:
http://www.geosuffolk.co.uk/geosuffolk.home.html
They did do a leaflet on the Deben area but I cannot find it on their web site - there might be hard copy in Woodbridge
 
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