Frampton Pill July 31 2008
Maritime Volunteer Service delivering Coal.
History:
Boats on the Severn, before the opening of the Gloucester and Berkeley Canal in 1827, put in at Frampton Pill, the mouth of the River Cam with an inlet on the Frampton side that appears to have been enlarged as a basin. In 1668 a storehouse for the reception and sale of coal was built or proposed to be built on the Slimbridge side of Frampton Pill, which was crossed as early as 1584 by a bridge called Warth Bridge. The pill was being used for landing coal in 1770, and in 1781 the bridge needed repair after a large coal-carrying vessel had broken it. In 1806 further repairs were needed after damage by a break-away barge, and that may have encouraged the inhabitants of Frampton to build a bridge at the upper end of the landing-place, where it would be less vulnerable to boats, but where in 1806 it was alleged to infringe the rights of the inhabitants of Slimbridge. In 1815 the inclosure commissioners awarded the parishioners of Frampton a free landing-place on Frampton Pill, which was replaced by one on the canal bank when the canal was built.
