The Fens - Introduction

Introduction

The Fens are very low-lying compared with the chalk and limestone uplands that surround them – in most places no more than 10 m above sea level. Indeed, as a result of drainage and the subsequent shrinkage of the peat fens, many parts of the Fens now lie below mean sea level. Although one writer in the seventeenth century described the Fenland as all lying above sea level (in contrast to the Netherlands), the area is now home to the lowest land point in the United Kingdom, Holme Fen in Cambridgeshire, at around 2.75 metres below sea level. Within the Fens there are a few hills, which have historically been called "islands" as they remained dry when the low-lying fens around them were flooded. The largest of the fen-islands is the Isle of Ely, on which the cathedral city of Ely was built; its highest point is 39 m above mean sea-level.

Without artificial drainage and flood protection, the Fens would be liable to periodic flooding, particularly in winter due to the heavy load of water flowing down from the uplands and overflowing the rivers. Some areas of the Fens were once permanently flooded, creating small lakes or meres, while others were only flooded during periods of high water. In the pre-modern period arable farming was limited to the higher areas of the surrounding uplands, the fen islands and the so-called "Townlands", an arch of silt ground around the Wash where the towns had their arable fields. Though these lands were lower than the peat fens before the peat shrinkage began, the more stable silt soils were reclaimed by medieval farmers and embanked against any floods coming down from the peat areas or from the sea. The rest of the Fenland was dedicated to pastoral farming, fishing, fowling and the harvesting of reeds or sedge, for example for thatch. In this way, the medieval and early modern Fens stood in contrast to the rest of southern England, which was primarily an arable agricultural region.

Since the advent of modern drainage in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the Fens have been radically transformed, so that today arable farming has almost entirely replaced pastoral and the economy of the Fens is heavily invested in the production of crops such as grains, vegetables and some cash crops such as rapeseed or canola.

Drainage in the Fenland consists of both river drainage and internal drainage of the land between the rivers. The internal drainage was organized by levels or districts, each of which includes the fen parts of one or several parishes. The details of the organization vary with the history of their development, but the areas include:

• The Great Level of the Fens is the largest region of fen in eastern England: including the lower drainage basins of the River Nene and the Great Ouse, it covers approximately 500 sq mi (1,300 km2). It is also known as the Bedford Level, after Francis Russell, 4th Earl of Bedford, who headed the so-called adventurers (investors) in the seventeenth century drainage in this area; his son became the first governor of the Bedford Level Corporation. In the seventeenth century, the Great Level was divided into the North, Middle and South Levels for the purposes of administration and maintenance. In the twentieth century, these levels have gained new boundaries, and include some fens which were never part of the jurisdiction of the Bedford Level Corporation.
  • The South Level lies to the southeast of the Ouse Washes and surrounds Ely, as it did in the seventeenth century.
  • The Middle Level currently lies between the Ouse Washes and the Nene, but historically lay between the Ouse Washes and Morton's Leam, a fifteenth century canal which runs north of the town of Whittlesey.
  • The North Level now includes all of the fens in Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire between the Nene and the River Welland, but originally included only a small part of these lands, including those of the ancient parishes of Thorney and Crowland, but excluding most of Wisbech Hundred and Lincolnshire, which were under their own local jurisdictions.
• Deeping Fen, in the southern part of Lincolnshire, lies between the River Welland and the River Glen with its tributary the Bourne Eau.
• The Black Sluice District, much of which was known as the Lindsey Level when it was first drained in 1639, extends from the Glen and Bourne Eau to Swineshead. Its water is carried through to the Haven at Boston.

The above were all re-drained at one time or another after the Civil War(1642-1649).

• The Witham Commission Fens:
  • First District: from Washingborough to Billinghay Dales;
  • Second District: Blacksluice – Holland Fen;
  • Third District: north of the River Witham above Bardney;
  • Fourth District: East, West and Wildmore Fens and the Townland from Boston to Wainfleet;
  • Fifth District: Kyme Eau to Billinghay Skirth;
  • Sixth District: Blacksluice – Helpringham Eau to Kyme Eau.

These were drained in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.