The water system
The water that flows through the garden comes from springs. The highest spring is in Margaret’s Pool at the junction of West Street and Pound Street 60m west of the garden. The water from this flows into a pond immediately west of Honeywood which was once in the grounds of a house called Wandle Lodge. The main flow from this enters the garden over a brick weir, flows through the south end of the rectangular pond and then enters a culvert below the lawn. It re-emerges at the back of the house and then flows under it into Upper Pond.
There are two subsidiary flows. One enters the garden through a small grotto on the west boundary north of the main culvert (section 3.11). The water flows into a rectangular pond and from there into the main culvert. The other passes under the west boundary into the small oval pond (section 3.14). There are two exits from this. One runs north into the side of the main culvert. The other runs southeast, possibly towards the pond that may have been on the site of the present ash tree stump on the south east corner of the lawn. If so the exit channel from this pond is unknown.
There are two subsidiary flows. One enters the garden through a small grotto on the west boundary north of the main culvert (section 3.11). The water flows into a rectangular pond and from there into the main culvert. The other passes under the west boundary into the small oval pond (section 3.14). There are two exits from this. One runs north into the side of the main culvert. The other runs southeast, possibly towards the pond that may have been on the site of the present ash tree stump on the south east corner of the lawn. If so the exit channel from this pond is unknown.
The ponds behind Honeywood and the surrounding buildings in 1913
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Diagram showing the water system in the garden. Dark blue channels are open to the air, light blue are below ground culverts or pipes
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The little oval pool on the west side of the Honeywood garden is fed by an uncontrolled pipe from the Wandle Lodge pond so it would have had the same water level. The lowest point on the edge of the pond is at 35.259 only 14cm above the crown of the grotto weir.
The system is protected by a pipe forming a spillway from the oval pond to the main culvert but this is regulated by a sluice gate which would need to be opened for it to be effective. An uncontrolled pipe runs off to the north.
Miss Hetherington, who lived in Wandle Lodge to the west of Honeywood, said that Ruskin’s work on Margaret’s Pool left the neighbour’s drawing room chairs ‘floating’*. It has been thought that this refers to the original Honeywood demolished about 1884 or Wandle Cottage. If the sluice gate of Margaret’s Pool was opened suddenly it might generate a considerable rush of water but the Wandle Lodge pond would act as a buffer and the culvert below Honeywood is probably large enough to take the flow. However, the flow might be enough to raise the level of Wandle Lodge Pond by several centimetres as the exit sluice was probably narrow. This might be enough to raise the two garden ponds to lawn level and from there the water might find its way across the lawn into Honeywood although not in sufficient quantity to float chairs.
The system is protected by a pipe forming a spillway from the oval pond to the main culvert but this is regulated by a sluice gate which would need to be opened for it to be effective. An uncontrolled pipe runs off to the north.
Miss Hetherington, who lived in Wandle Lodge to the west of Honeywood, said that Ruskin’s work on Margaret’s Pool left the neighbour’s drawing room chairs ‘floating’*. It has been thought that this refers to the original Honeywood demolished about 1884 or Wandle Cottage. If the sluice gate of Margaret’s Pool was opened suddenly it might generate a considerable rush of water but the Wandle Lodge pond would act as a buffer and the culvert below Honeywood is probably large enough to take the flow. However, the flow might be enough to raise the level of Wandle Lodge Pond by several centimetres as the exit sluice was probably narrow. This might be enough to raise the two garden ponds to lawn level and from there the water might find its way across the lawn into Honeywood although not in sufficient quantity to float chairs.
In the next page we look at
*Sutton Archives, Peatling Papers under Margaret’s Pool
