Hambleden Lock
An old tug boat leaves the lock
Waterway	River Thames
County	Berkshire
Maintained by	Environment Agency
Operation	Hydraulic
First built	1773
Latest built	1994
Length	61.00 m (200 ft 2 in)[1]
Width	7.70 m (25 ft 3 in)[1]
Fall	1.44 m (4 ft 9 in)[1]
Above sea level	101'
Distance to Teddington Lock	43 miles
Power is available out of hours

v t e Hambleden Lock
Legend
River Thames Marsh Lock and weir Site of mill Rod Eyot A4130Henley Bridge Henley Reach Regatta Course Temple Island Hambleden Lock weir Site of mill moorings River Thames

Hambleden Lock is alock with a longweir situated on theRiver Thames in England, about 2 miles downstream ofHenley Bridge. The lock is on theBerkshire bank between Aston andRemenham. Built by theThames Navigation Commission in 1773, the lock is named after the village ofHambleden, a mile (1.5 km) to the north.

The great weir is impressive and there are walkways over it from the lock to the small village ofMill End on theBuckinghamshire bank. Here is situated the picturesqueHambleden Mill, and the site of aRoman villa is nearby.

Themill at Hambleden is mentioned inDomesday Book, which implies there was also a weir here then. There is reference to the weir, with a winch (for pulling boats through theflash lock) in 1338. The pound lock was the fourth downstream in the series of locks built after the 1770 navigation act. The others were built of fir which had to be replaced by oak after a dozen years. In 1777 a small brick house was built and Caleb Gouldbecame keeper. This eccentric, who baked bread for bargemen, ate a dish of onion porridge every night, wore a long coat with many buttons and walked daily to Hambleden marking a cross on the ground where he reached, was in post at the lock for 59 years and was succeeded by his son.

There is reference to continuing use of the flash lock and winch at the weir until the middle of the nineteenth century. The channel downstream of the lock which takes navigation clear of the weir and weir pool was excavated in 1825.^[2]

In June 1829, the lock was the starting point for thefirst boat race between Oxford and Cambridge universities. The course ended 2.25-mile (3.62 km) upstream atHenley Bridge.^[3] An estimated 20,000 spectators watched Oxford win the race.^[4][5]

The lock was completely rebuilt in 1870 after years of complaint about its condition. In 1884 the new weirs were built and after public complaints the walkway was built to reopen the ancient right of way.^[2] The lock was rebuilt in 1994.

The lock can be reached from the village of Aston on the same side, after a short walk; access to the track leading to the lock is immediately to the west of the Flower Pot pub. From the opposite side the walkways across the weirs provide easy access from Mill End.

The river curves round to the south, passing, on the Buckinghamshire bank,Greenlands, a large country house built in the nineteenth century which is now the home of theHenley Management College. After the turn isTemple Island, which is the start of theHenley Royal Regatta course. The regatta is rowed upstream over a wide straight course of 1 mile, 550 yards (2,112 m). On the Berkshire bank are open fields, lawns and Remenham Farm, part of the village ofRemenham. The regatta lawns continue up toHenley Bridge, while the town ofHenley on Thames stretches along the Oxfordshire bank.

The annualHenley Festival is also held on the reach, stretching between just upstream of Hambleden village and just short of the next lock upstream from Hambleden,Marsh Lock.

AfterHenley Bridge is the Henley river front with boat hire and a landing stage for riverboat cruises. After a small wooded island is the largerRod Eyot, andMill Meadows provides public open space on the Henley side of the river. TheRiver and Rowing Museum is situated here. On the Berkshire bank the land rises steeply with a wooded escarpment hanging overMarsh Lock.

• Upper Thames Rowing Club
• Remenham Club
• Leander Club
• Henley Rowing Club

TheThames Path stays on the Berkshire bank to Henley Bridge, and is here in better condition for the benefit of the rowing coaches who cycle along it. It crosses Henley Bridge and continues on the Oxfordshire bank to Marsh Lock.

Since the 1940skayakers andcanoeists have used the weir structure for recreation.

In each of the four sluices a concrete ramp of about 16 deg has been fixed to the weir apron, on top of these a hinged steel plate is fixed. The hinged steel plate is adjustable between the 16 deg of the base concrete ramp and approx 28 deg. The adjustment of the steel plate is currently by pneumatic bellows installed between the plate and the concrete base.

InJerome K. Jerome's 1889 humorous novel,Three Men in a Boat. The narrator and his two friends ask the lock-keeper at Hambleden Lock for some drinking water to replenish their boat's supply, and are nonplussed when he suggests they drink water from the river, as he habitually did.^[6]

In the book, Jerome also mentions the nearby Greenlands, describing it as"the rather uninteresting river residence of my newsagent - a quiet unassuming old gentleman, who may be met with about these regions, during the summer months, sculling himself along in easy vigorous style, or chatting genially to some old lock-keeper, as he passes through". The newsagent in question wasW H Smith.

Caleb Gould's gravestone atRemenham has the elegy

This world’s a jest,
And all things show it;
I thought so once,
And now I know it.

• Locks on the River Thames
• Crossings of the River Thames
• Rowing on the River Thames
• Kayaking and Canoeing on the River Thames

• Photograph of the weir with Hambleden Mill behind

51°33′37″N0°52′24″W / 51.56027°N 0.87333°W /51.56027; -0.87333

• Locks of Berkshire
• Locks on the River Thames
• Weirs on the River Thames
• Remenham

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