Cam.misc posting by Robert MacMillan

Subject:      Re: Hobson's conduit and the Trumpington Street gutters
From:         rmacmillan@cix.compulink.co.uk ("Robert Macmillan")
Date:         1996/02/28
Message-Id:   <DnHp1B.40K@cix.compulink.co.uk>
References:   <Dn38vJ.714@net-Tel.co.uk>
Organization: Compulink Information eXchange 
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Newsgroups:   cam.misc

> Owen Smith wrote (talking about Trinity Conduit - not to be confused with Hobson's Conduit):
>
> I was once told the feed to the fountain continues on to feed the duck
> pond at Emmanuel. Trevelyan says nothing about this and I have no other
> evidence.  Bearing in mind recent statements about Hobson's Conduit and
> the Trinity fountain, I am inclined to take the duck pond with a large
> pinch of salt.

A few of us might try to stop you taking it at all.
But I can confirm your suggestion. Emmanuel College magazine 1994-95 says
on pages 52-53:

"Before 1960 the supply [to the swimming pool] was from Hobson's Brook,
which since 1610 has channelled the water from springs at Nine Wells, on
the slope of the White Hill about one kilometre SSW of Addenbrooke's
(new) Hospital, into Cambridge. It flows in an open ditch past the
Botanic Garden and Brookside to the corner of Trumpington Road and
Lensfield Road, and thence, mainly underground, to Market Hill, where it
fed the fountain building known as Hobson's Conduit. That structure was
moved to its present site at Lensfield Road in 1855.

A branch channel, along the line of Lensfield Road and Regent St, was
added only in 1631. ...

The new supply entered Emmanuel under the street wall of Chapman's
Garden, flowed eastward to the Great Pond in the Paddock, and thence into
the Fellows' Garden where the swimming pool now is. ..."

> By the way, the water in the Trinity fountain tastes excellent.

Not after it's had a bucket of fairy liquid chucked in it.

Robert