Ipswich Historic Lettering: Wet Dock map

Wandering around the Ipswich docks over the years, as so many residents must do, we've often been puzzled about the names of the wharves and quays and quite where one begins and another ends. The map here is an initial attempt to insert the names used at various times and attach them to various parts of the dock and River Orwell. We hope it is of some interest and we welcome comments and additions, stories and anecdotes: see bottom of this page for a link. Talking of which...

"To find the old names you need the little maps that used to be issued by the Ipswich Dock Commission with their annual reports; they show many of the old names - of which Tovell's Wharf is not one. Tovell's Wharf was constructed in the 1920s when the old 'branch dock' was filled in - it had originally been a timber pond for the storage of imported timber. The new wharf was named after George Tovell, a member of the Ipswich Dock Commission in the early days; he had a cement works in the area on which the wharf was built. By the way, you have misplaced it on your map, putting it at South West Quay; Tovell's Wharf is where you have the word 'Quay', opposite the Custom House. There are also large-scale OS plans at 50 inches to a mile in the Suffolk Record Office; the first edition, 1882 or thereabouts, and the second of the early 1900s will give you all the names." We're grateful for the assistance in (May 2011) of Bob Malster, a proper local historian, and his interest in the website.

Stuart and Des of the Ipswich Maritime Trust have contributed two maps:
"You will see from Stuart's plan that St Peters Wharf is actually in the New Cut right by Stoke Bridge; at one time the water was wider there But the area at the head of the dock was widened to take another railway line." We naively assumed that St Peter's Quay was the part of the Wet Dock which ends in the 'nip' at the west end, i.e. adjacent to St Peter's Church. We also note that 'Common Quay' shown on some maps as stretching along the northern section of the dock became a shorter quay around the Old Customs House, part of it replaced by 'Neptune Quay', perhaps.

Those in the know will spot that the adjacent map is a summary or compromise which attempts to show the names and positions used over time since the Ipswich Wet Dock lock gates were first opened on 17 January 1842. This date is taken from the invaluable book 'A Victorian vision: the building of Ipswich Wet Dock' by Bob Malster and Bob Jones (see Reading List).

SEPTEMBER 2011: The Ipswich Maritime Trust (partially as a result of an enquiry about wharf names from this website) has produced an excellent 'IMT Occasional Paper No. 1: Quays and wharves of Ipswich' which attempts a 'definitive' map of the names: very difficult as they changed and moved over time with custom and developments in the industrial activity around the Wet Dock. We have updated the map here from that document and thank the IMT for its research (also the excellent illustrations in the occasional paper). One controversial inclusion is the placing of 'Orwell Quay' on the east bank of New Cut, whereas people currently believe the stretch of quay which was 'Ransome's Wharf' at the time of their engineering works on the east side of the Wet Dock to be 'Orwell Quay'. Bob Malster's research has uncovered other names, too. It all highlights the rich history of maritime activity in Ipswich.

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