Sandford Lock

 lock (water navigation)  Add category

 Upload a photo

Sandford was one of the first three locks ever built on the Thames (the others were at Iffley and the long gone Swift Ditch near Abingdon) in 1630. Over the years the lock has undergone many modifications and rebuilds, so not much of the original remains, except for three large lumps of granite on the lockside. The current lock - a 1972/3 rebuild - used much of the structure from the early lock. Two versions of the locality's history are well known. One, that monks worked a mill on the river here to make bread around the year 1170. Two, the Knights Templar built the first mill here in the 1200s. Either way, the building was converted to a paper mill in 1826 but this was closed down in the 1970s. These days, private flats grace the site.