Bristol’s has a rich maritime heritage - by the 15th century it was already trading with several countries and was rapidly becoming an important departure point for ships heading to the New World. In 1497 John Cabot famously set sail from Bristol in The Matthew, hoping to find a passage to Eastern Indonesia. Instead, he discovered the Americas, landing in Newfoundland in Canada.
By the 18th century, the route across the Atlantic had established Bristol as Britain’s second biggest city and cargoes of sugar cane, tobacco, rum and cocoa filled the warehouses which lined the Harbourside. This brought both prosperity and an incalculable human cost, as such trade was largely financed through slavery.
As the Harbourside continued to flourish, engineering innovations were developed to control the port’s tides and make navigation easier. Locks were built to divert the tidal River Avon into a man-made stretch of water known as the New Cut, creating a tide-free ‘Floating Harbour’ completed in 1809. The world-famous engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel was also commissioned to tackle the silting problems which plagued the port. He introduced a system of sluices, as well as a steam-powered 'drag boat' and an enlarged entrance lock with a swing bridge.
Shipbuilding also developed as an important industry and Isambard Kingdom Brunel’s famous SS Great Britain - the world’s first iron-hulled ocean-going ship - was launched on 19th July 1843 from the Great Western Dockyard in the Floating Harbour. She now sits in the very dock where she took place, having been salvaged from her final resting place in the Falklands and towed back to Bristol in 1970.
In 1872 the Bristol Harbour Railway was opened on the southern side of the Floating Harbour to transport cargo to Temple Meads station. It was extended to Wapping Wharf in 1876, with a further line and a goods yard opening at Canons Marsh on the northern side of the Floating Harbour 30 years later. The docks were also equipped with a variety of cranes, including a 35-tonne Fairbairn steam crane which remains at Princess Wharf to this day.
The Harbourside continued to trade throughout the first half of the 20th century, with more than 40 cranes moving cargo on to the dockside. Its importance made it a prime target for German bombers during the Second World War and in 1941 a gasometer in Canons Marsh received a direct hit, causing a huge explosion.
However, as ships grew in size, the River Avon and the Floating Harbour became increasingly inaccessible and international shipping began to move to the Avonmouth and Royal Portbury docks on the Bristol Channel. This decline continued throughout the 1960s, when the Harbour Railway closed and the Canons Marsh goods yard was converted into a car park. Finally, in 1968 the docks closed to all commercial traffic.