Steam Locomotive Water Point

798-1/84/587 CAMLEY STREET 11-JUN-03 Steam Locomotive Water Point (Formerly listed as: GOODS WAY LOCOMOTIVE WATER POINT NORTH OF ST PAN ST PANCRAS STATION) (Formerly listed as: EUSTON ROAD WATER POINT NORTH OF ST PANCRAS)

II Steam Locomotive Water Point. C.1870, probably by the office of Sir George Gilbert Scott, for the Midland Railway. EXTERIOR: red brick with yellow stone dressings, iron water tank within. Rectangular structure in three tiers. Lower tier with arched doors to sides, with radiating voussoirs above; moulded stone plinth bands and string course. Middle tier with seven bay arcades to long sides, with stone capitals to pilasters and alternate brick and stone voussoirs. Corbel table above. Upper tier entirely of brick, with blind arcade with round-headed arches. HISTORY: this formerly served Midland Railway steam locomotives departing from St Pancras Station. The structure was in place by 1872, when the 'Quarterly Review' criticised the inappropriate use of Gothic for a functional structure of this sort. It was one of a pair of structures, the other (long demolished) housing hydraulic lifting gear used to raise beer barrels from the station undercroft. Redundant following the disappearance of steam from main line use in the early 1960s, it was first listed in 1974. The construction of the Channel Tunnel Rail Link necessitated the relocation of the structure to its present location on Camley Street. This was undertaken in November 2001, with funding assistance from the Heritage Lottery Fund, when the structure was removed in three parts and re-erected 700 m. north of its old location. The Morton Partnership Ltd were the consulting engineers responsible. It is an exceptionally architectural example of a water point, and related historically and stylistically with the great terminus of St Pancras. SOURCE: report by Pre-Construct Archaeology, 'A Survey of Historic Pipe-work at the Waterpoint, St Pancras (2001). Listing NGR: TQ2989983551