Unfortunate News – Village stream dries up.

Millstream Lane brook (traditionally know as Two-Mile Brook) was the main path (via the Hay Mill, demolished 1961) by which the water that wells up in Lammas Meadow in Britwell reached the Thames. This fresh-water spring was known via passed-on wisdom spanning back perhaps hundreds of years to have never run dry even in the severest of droughts. It gives bright clear water which probably gave rise to the archaic name of Britewell.

The run from Haymill down through Brook Path was put underground in the 1970s (for no good reason). The stream surfaces in Lower Cippenham Lane where it runs down Millstream Lane. From there it flows through the new estate and on to Chalvey joining with other sources such as Queen Anne’s Spring and the Montem Brook. It eventually reaches the Thames at Eton. The brook occurs in records dating to the 13th Century.

The photograph shows the state of the water as it was on Friday 27 May in Millstream Lane. Parts of the bed are now completely exposed and in the parts where there is still water cover it is no deeper than a puddle. There is no discernable flow.

The brook has alway been a haven for wildlife, supporting many species of small fish, water-borne insects and amphibians. Kingfishers are still occasionally glimpsed along the banks. We observed minute fish stranded in the remaining puddles and lying dead on exposed parts of the bed.

Local residents we spoke to said that there is in-fact more pooled water now than there had been before the rain of the last few days. We agree with the residents’ view that the cause needs to be found and water flow restored as a matter of urgency.

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4 Responses to Unfortunate News – Village stream dries up.

  1. Robert says:

    Shame global warming has an effect the stream or an act of God and
    should fill up again with a thunderstorm later i if it ain’t filled now? July 19th July 2022

  2. Robert says:

    There used too be a stream lower Cippenham lane with lot of frogs there, none now!,!! Like most streams they filled them in! Weird I had a dream there was a stream at the bottom of the garden, I told the nice old lady neighbor next door. She said there was there was a stream along Mercian way it must have been 90 years ago..Reincarnation is rubbish too me..sure I weren’t there when about 90 years ago, was born there in cippenham house there.. Rob.

  3. Robert says:

    Probably along the line the streams are blocked as the run their course, a lot filled in these days, people have often complained their roads are flooded especially when driving around areas, simply they filled the ditches! Rob.

  4. Dreadnaught says:

    There was stream along Mercian way. It may have been dug in the 13th Century on the orders of Richard, Earl of Cornwall to divert the Cippenham Villagers’ water supply to the Abbey in Dorney that he had bestowed.

    This man may had quite a nasty attitude towards the people that lived in Cippenham. He had a deer park centered about Wood Lane in which he had an old Saxon Wooden Hall as a retreat. He had a number of other places (such as Cornwall) and he probably tired of Cippenham well before his life was run.

    Today they name Pubs and roads after him.

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