SIR FRANCIS DRAKE AS AN ENGINEER.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXII, Issue 129, 1 June 1901, Page 2 (Supplement)

SIR FRANCIS DRAKE AS AN ENGINEER.

The xvater works of Plymouth date from 1590, in which year Sir Francis Drake, under powers conferred by an Act of Parliament of 1585, commenced to build a weir on the River Me we or Meavy, ajid to excavate an open watercourse, or leat, from the weir to Plymouth, a distance of 10J miles in a direct line, but 18| miles along the route taken The drainage area above the weir was 4585 acres. The work was completed and water brought into the town in April 1591. Water taken from the river by this means supplied the town for three hundred years. The open watercourse, however, was liable to be blocked in times of snow and frost; and for this reason, and also because the increased population demanded a larg-er and more certain supply, various schemes were promulgated for the storage of floodwaters and the protection of the leat. In 1891 Mr E. Sandeman was appointed water engineer, and a few months later he presented a report, which was adopted, advocating the building of a storage reservoir, and the substitution of a line of pipes for the open leaf. This work has/since been executed; but Sir F. Drake's water works served for three hundred years.