Cornelius Vermuyden

Who was Cornelius Vermuyden?

Sir Cornelius Vermuyden was a Dutch engineer who introduced Dutch land reclamation methods to England. Commissioned by the Crown to drain Hatfield Chase in the Isle of Axholme, Lincolnshire, Vermuyden was knighted in 1629 for his work and became an English citizen in 1633.

In the 1650s, he directed major projects to drain The Fens of East Anglia, introducing the innovation of constructing washes, to allow periodic flooding of the area by excess waters. An unintended consequence was the shrinking of peat as it dried, resulting in a drop of land levels below the rivers and drains, and renewed seasonal flooding. This could not be controlled until the development of steam-powered pumps in the 19th century used to pump out water, and construction of additional water control projects in the 1960s. At Ramsey Forty Foot on the Forty Foot Drain there is a very good example of a wind-powered, steam-powered and diesel-powered pump sitting side by side. At Prickwillow a museum has a very large pumping engine in working order, but not actively used. The Norfolk Broads were mostly created by the extraction of peat because of this drainage.