Docklands Docklands History Group
 
DHG Life President Chris Ellmers

DHG LIFE PRESIDENT CHRIS ELLMERS

OUR MISSION

Operating largely with volunteer but well-informed efforts, the Group has an unrivalled record of effective liasion with the Museum of London and the Museum in Docklands in particular. For 25 years the Docklands History Group has sought to organise speakers and site visits to:

  • promote understanding of London’s traditional riverside and port communities;
  • understand Londoners’ work and their skills, and the many technological and social changes that have changed and otherwise affected ships and the riverside;
  • produce a gazetteer of traditional port and marine activities before their demise;
  • support the creation of a Museum in Docklands adequate enough for the task;
  • engage museum staff, archivists and archaeologists in sharing their knowledge.

To sustain this, it has entailed:

  • recording nearly-lost skills and the changing forms of industries;
  • presenting the range of skills of Licensed Watermen and Pilots;
  • describing activity within London’s food and drink businesses;
  • explaining the achievements of London’s Shipping interests;
  • illustrating ceremonial on the river and within Livery Companies;
  • grasping the scope of tasks like Canary Wharf and the CTRL;
  • chronicling major changes that have affected riverbanks: on the north from Teddington to Southend, including the City’s riverside, its canals and the Docks from Brentford to Tilbury;
  • and likewise for the south bank, from Richmond and Kew to Southwark, the Surrey Commercial Docks, including the many specialist wharves and the naval presence in Deptford, Greenwich, Woolwich and Erith, activity from Gravesend to the North Foreland;
  • providing a platform for effective liaison over a wide range of cultural heritage;
  • discerning the international importance of some of London’s imports and exports;
  • conveying the full range of the Port of London’s multifarious tasks;
  • elucidating the earlier tasks of the Thames Conservancy, Trinity House and tasks sustained by the Corporation of London, the Crown and HM Customs and Excise;
  • interpreting infrastructural changes within London’s port and telecommunications;
  • understanding the concerns, roles and changes within London’s Trade Unions;
  • revealing the tasks entailed in the river’s Conservancy and in riverside Conservation Areas; and
  • seeing the many achievements of the Port’s Architects, Engineers and Surveyors.