Between 1884 and 1914 several attempts were made to get a train ferry service between Britain and France. Among these was the rejected 1930 Channel Tunnel Project. As a result Sir Herbert Walker, General Manager of the Southern Railway, was authorised by his Directors to plan a cross-channel train ferry service.

Sir Herbert spent a good deal of time formulating his plans, and Dunkirk was chosen as the French terminal. In England the choice fell, after some deliberation, on Dover rather than Richborough, where constant dredging would have been necessary to keep the waterways navigable.

Roy Thornton Collection

In 1933 Southern Railway undertook to order three new ferryboats and to construct a ferry dock at Dover. It was agreed that a site, lying between the South Pier and the base of the Admiralty Pier, would be suitable. Tenders for the engineering works were invited in the summer and orders for the ferries were place in June with Messrs. Swan, Hunter and Wigham Richardson Ltd., Walker-on-Tyne.

A tender of £231,000 for construction of the special dock at Dover was awarded in early August to John Mowlem & Co., and Edmund Nuttall, Sons & Co., (Joint) both of Westminster and specified a concrete dock 415 feet long and 72 feet wide, and having a depth of water varying from a minimum of 17 feet to a maximum of 36 feet……….

………….These dimensions would give a maximum 30 minutes delay for berthing. Gates of the “box” type permitted the entry of ships, and to assist berthing a 362-foot long pile and concrete jetty was built outside the dock. An electrically operated lifting bridge or 60 feet long link span long and wide enough to hold two lines of track was also to be built.……

Roy Thornton Collection

……..Provision was made for locking the vessels to the bridge with a steel pin and for pumping water into the dock bringing the vessel up to a level where the train could be shipped.

Roy Thornton Collection

The pump house was to have three sets of vertical spindle centrifugal pumps of 230 hp, together able to move 720,000 gallons per hour.

Roy Thornton Collection

The permanent lock gates presented a problem, nothing like them having been attempted before. Divers laid more foundations, and the twin 30-ton lock gates built and installed in a pontoon. They were hinged at the bottom to fall to a horizontal when opened, to rest on the dock floor. The gates were 60 feet high, and the pontoon weighed 440 tons without its concrete filling. It was, however, successfully sunk, only one-tenth of an inch out of true.

Roy Thornton Collection

Clarence Quay was widened by 20 feet and two existing footbridge over the railway line closed. A new overhead walkway for passengers was constructed from Marine Station to the dock.

Roy Thornton Collection

Work began in 1933 with the building of a sheet metal cofferdam to be backed with an earth embankment, but during storms of the following winter, this was washed away. An alternative scheme was tried using 10-ton concrete blocks to form a permanent wall on foundations laid on the seabed.

Roy Thornton Collection

The summer of 1936 saw the work completed. Sill and dock gates for the entrance were completed locally on the quayside…….

Roy Thornton Collection

……of the tidal harbour, the former ready and ‘launched’ on January 22^nd, and the latter on June 18^th and July 7^th. At about the same time the machinery and pumping apparatus were completed and the link span bridge erected.

On September 28^th the HAMPTON FERRY was first of the trio to pass through into the new dock.

Roy Thornton Collection

The HAMPTON FERRY made the first sailing from the dock on October 3^rd 1936. This was followed by TWICKENHAM FERRY on October 6^th and later, on November 14^th, by SHEPPERTON FERRY.

Together with sleeping car and goods wagons……..

Roy Thornton Collection

………. each ferry had an upper garage deck which could accommodate 25 cars, although cars could not be driven on or off the vessels until a concrete side ramp was finished in June 1937.

Roy Thornton Collection

Although the “Night Ferry” service finally ended on 31st October 1980 the dock continued to be used until its closure on May 16^th 1988. After a “hiccup” with the new Admiralty Pier, December 28^th - 30^th 1988, it was finally closed and the tracks were lifted, the overhead link from the Marine Station was dismantled and the link-span removed.

The site is now occupied by Brett Hall Aggregates who maintain a marine terminal where they process marine dredged aggregate.

© John Mavin and © Doverpast (Dover Past Flickr Photostream)