Three Men in a Boat takes place at the end of the 19th century, mostly on the River Thames.

The Thames rises in Gloucestershire, and flows eastwards in various twists and turns to the Thames Estuary and the North Sea – 215 miles in all, the longest river in England.

 

The source of the Thames is at Kemble, and the river then passes through Oxford, Reading, Maidenhead, Windsor, Staines, Kingston and London. From Teddington Lock (pictured in google map) onwards, the river is tidal.

 

 

The river journey in Three Men in a Boat starts just above Teddington Lock, at Kingston-upon-Thames, and they call at or pass by various towns and landmarks, as well as venturing through several of the locks that control the non-tidal river upstream of Teddington. They continue as far as Oxford, a journey of about 91 miles – almost half the length of the Thames.

Guide to the River Thames

 

 

Although most of the book takes place on the river, the expeditions begins in central London with a train journey from Waterloo station to Kingston-upon-Thames.

 

Waterloo station was opened in 1848. It was intended to be a through station, with a line into the City of London. Over the next few decades, more buildings and platforms were added haphazardly, so that by the time of Three Men in a Boat, it was the butt of jokes and was considered to be the most perplexing railway station in London – so much so that from 1900 the whole lot was pulled down and a new station constructed (which itself was badly damaged in World War 2).

The picturesque streets of Kingston-upon-Thames are long gone, but there are still pockets of history worth visiting today.

The narrator refers to Molesey lock as Moulsey. Close to Hampton Court, it is the second longest out of forty-five locks on the River Thames and was built between 1814 and 1815.

 

Caesar's Camp at Walton-on-Thames was at one time believed to be a fortified encampment belonging to Julius Caesar, but in fact it is much earlier in date.

Ankerwycke Park is on the opposite side of the Thames from Runnymede. It is the site of St Mary's Priory, where Henry VIII occasionally met Anne Boleyn. The Ankerwycke Yew is believed to be 2,000 years old, a tree said to have witnessed the signing of the Magna Carta. Ankerwycke Park was acquired by the National Trust in 1998.

 

Maidenhead has always been important in terms of transport links, with the Brunel railway bridge crossing the Thames here, as well as the road from London to Bath, with many coaching inns in the town.

 

The River Lea (or Lee) is a major tributary of the Thames. It rises at Leagrave near Luton in Bedfordshire and enters the Thames almost opposite the Millennium Dome, via the Limehouse Cut (close to where Jerome lived in Poplar as a child).

In Jerome's day, Reading was known as an industrial town, but it has had a long and eventful history.