Lost Villages........

We have just spent a few days with friends in Derbyshire. We arrived back tonight and have nearly finished unpacking everything.

Hubby comes from Derbyshire and still has friends and family there. it is a lovely area, with lots to look at and the chance to take lovely pictures.

One of the places which we visited was Ladybower reservoir. The picture above shows part of the dam. There is water flowing over the top into the lake below. This is one of several locations which were used by the RAF to practice for the WW2 Dam busters and was used as the location for part of the original film that was make re-telling the story.

It has been a bit of a funny week for taking pictures but the afternoon that I took these was one of the best ones. I used my new little Canon and it was the first time that I had used it for outside pictures.

This is probably the best picture of the bunch and it is looking back away from the main Dam itself.
What I had forgotten is that to build this Dam two villages had to be flooded. Derwent and Ashopton are both submerged below the water.

This is a picture of Ashopton with the building of the Viaduct going on in the background started around 1940. The viaduct is still in use and the remains of the village is now under the water right by the viaduct. Finished by around 1941.

http://www.flickr.com/

This is another picture of the village.

There is additional reading here and it is really interesting and a bit scary that peoples homes were simply removed from them for a reservoir, but the water supply needed to be increased.

Above is the village of Derwent before the flooding.(1912)

Derwent Hall was also flooded as part Dam building. Quite a stately house at the time and had been built in 16 72.

There is lots of information on this topic and the picture of the half submerged church spire is very thought provoking. It was later demolished fully in the 1940's on health and safety grounds.

Three reservoirs in total were built between 1935 to 1945.

It took Ladybower reservoir two years to fully fill up. At very low water some remains of Derwent have been seen but Ashopton is so close to the viaduct that remains of that village are rarely, if ever seen. There is lots of additional information on the Internet about these two villages but also others around the world, villages that have disappeared for a variety of reasons.

I thought this might be of interest as to look at the water Sophie was astonished that there had been two villages on that site!
xx