X. JOHN SMEATON'S REPORT.
When a larye portion of the Passing Tolls was allotted to Dover Harbour in 1756, there were great complaints from the ship owners who navigated the Channel that the harbour bar so frequently made the Port inaccessible. In consequence of those complaints, the Commission invited Mr. John Smeaton, a ? engineer, who had then become famous by the completion of the great Eddystone Light House, to report how Dover Harbour could be improved and its acf'ommodation developed. He presented his report in 1769, wherein he recommended an extension of the South Pier, and an alteration in its form, which, together with other recommendations, was not adoj)ted. But, although the report from this eminent man was disregarded, some passages of it should be embodied here because it gives an exact description of the Harbour as it was in 1 769. He wrote: — '' The mouth of the present Harbour was originally cut through the beach to let off the land waters, pent up inside the Harbour. From that state the present Harbour has been gradually improved, the entry whereof is now defended by two piers, composed chiefly of wooden piles, tJie inside filled in with rough hea\y stones. After passing the entry the vessels arrive in a capacious outward harbour where they may lie defended from all winds; but, having an open communication with the sea, the water flows and ebbs therewith; and at low water spring tides the whole is left dry. Above this the harbour is divided by a dam, called the Crosswall ; in which there is an opening of 38 feet wide at the top and about 36 feet at the bottom; and in this is placed a large pair of gates pointing to the landward, through which at high-water, vessels may pass out of the exterior harbour into the interior basin were occasionally they are kept afloat. The Crosswall besides the great gates, has two other openings of 12 feet wide in each of which is ])lacetl a ])air of drawgates."
"The interior basin is again dixidcd bv a second dam or cross-wall. ha\ing an o]n'ning of more than 20 feet, for the passage of smaller vessels, which is also furnished with a pair of gates pointing to landward ; this dam has likewise another opening furnished with three draw-gates, by which the water can occasionally be let off so as to scour the basin. Into this upper reservoir, which is called the Pent, the freshwater river, which springs from the chalk hills north of Dover, empties itself, and makes its way through both sets of gates through all three harbours and lastly betwixt the pier-heads to the sea."
"This general disposition of the harbour appears to me as judicious as can be contrived, and it is upon the same general idea as the Port of Cherbourg, upon which the French spended an immense sum of money before it was destroyed by the English in the late war."
"When, by hard gales from the South-West a quantity of beach is brought round the Western Pier head and lodges itself between the heads, the basin and Pent are then filled partly by taking in sea water and partly by fresh water afforded by the river, and there retained until it be low water. The drawgates in the sluices in the Cross-wall are then opened with all possible expedition, and the body of water contained in the Basin and Pent, by making its way between the pier-heads cuts down and removes the bar of l)each, which at the time of spring tides is done with so great effect that at one single operation, as I am informed, a good jjassage is opened for vessels ; and at two tides the whole mouth of the harbour can be cleared; and could this be done with equal ease and expedition at all times when wanted, then would the evils that are now complained of not subsist; and this port would then be nearly in the best condition its situation is capable of, and which indeed is very respectable as a tide-harbour, having a good capacity with from i6 to i8 feet of water at common spring tides, but it so happens when there are hard gales from the South-West and at the same time neap tides that such a quantity of beach will be lodged between the pier-heads, and to so great a height that, according to my information, a vessel drawing but four feet of water can hardly get out of or into the Port. At those times the water from the sluices has not sufficient fall to drive out the beach, which is obliged to remain until the spring tides, which at some times may be an interval of a week, producing great obstructions to the Packets between Dover and Calais as well as the Mercantile trade of the place."
Mr. Smeaton very fully discussed the cause of the accumulation and the remedy. His opinion was that the beach which travelled along the shore eastward had originally been flints in the chalk cliffs whicli had fallen and broken up in the sea, and his remedy fo» keeping the beach out of the Harbour was the elongation of the South Pier of the Harbour about 90 feet, and to make the head an angle instead of being round, and not e.xiend the north head, by which means the south head would shoot the shingle into deeper water. By that plan the shingle would be kept out of the Harbour mouth, where it did injury, and carried forward into the Bay, where it would beneficially support the Harbour walls.
It was the Earl of Holderness, the Lord Warden, who invited Mr. Smeaton to make a report, but the Board of Commissioners rejected that simple and economical plan, because it adopted a principle which they and their forefathers had been taught to believe was rank heresy. Because the projection of Henry VHI.'s Pier first caused the shingle to accumulate in Dover Bay, they believed that every j)rojection into the sea, no matter what its form, direction or position, would have the same effect. Captain Perry had aihised the extension of the South Pier in 171S, which the ('ommissioners rejected, and, to be consistent, they rejected Mr. Smeaton 's i)lan too.
The Karl of Holderness, as Lord Waidcn, haA'ing failed to induce his Assistant Commissioners to adopt Mr. Smeatons proposals to prevent the formation ol the Harbour bar, he next called into council the experienced pilots and mariners, judging that their local knowledge would help to solve the problem, but their opinions differed so diametrically from each other that he could found no policy on their diverse proposals. So the Earl abandoned his efforts, and no further works were undertaken before his death, which occurred in 1778.