Ice to see you, to see you...
Back in the old days, before refrigeration, ice was a very seasonal product. But then, as now, winter was not the time you wanted an ice-cream or extra lump in your G&T. So how could you still have ice in the summer?
In the early 19th Century ice would be harvested from the frozen canals, but for obvious reasons this wasn’t ideal so enterprising ice-mongers began importing ice from cleaner sources such as New York and Norway. This would arrive in London at Limehouse in ships insulated with straw and be transported by horse-drawn barges along the canal into the city.
Harvesting the ice.
To preserve this precious chilly load, it was then stored in large underground brick-lined ice-wells. The first of which was built at the now defunct Cumberland basin in the 1820s, two more were at King’s Cross - which are still visible at the Canal Museum, and two right here at the busy canal wharf in Camden Town. The ice could last in these wells well into the summer, and was used for ice-cream, keeping meat & fish fresh and even as a basic anesthetic!
The ice-wells at King's Cross
The two wells at Camden Town still exist but alas are out of sight. But here where you find yourself in an entrance way on Jamestown Road you’ll see two circles in bricks on the ground. These show the outline and entrance hole to the larger of two ice-wells here and an information panel on the wall shows a cross section of it - said to be the largest ice-well in London.
The ice-well near this cache...
This ice trade existed into the early 20th Century when industrial processes made cheap ice on-demand possible, but is remembered in this very building - "The Ice Works" and by the Wetherspoons round the corner - "The Ice Wharf".
Please replace carefully and and as you find it, and do let me know if the cache is stuck or becoming loose.