River Rother (Arun)

Fittleworth Bridge over the Rother

The Rother at Cowdray Ruins

The River Rother is a river which flows for thirty miles from Empshott in Hampshire to Stopham in Sussex, where it joins the River Arun.

The river is partially fed by springs in the scarp slope of the chalk strata of the South Downs which flow at a constant volume and temperature throughout the year. This gives a more stable summer flow than is found in the upper reaches of the River Arun, which drains more clay soils. This steady flow powered several watermills along the river. The flour mill at Coultershaw, south of Petworth continued in operation until the 1960s, still partially water powered and collecting imported bread wheat from nearby Petworth railway station, which was then still open for goods only.

The river's lower section, below Midhurst, was made navigable by the construction of the Western Rother Navigation which was part navigation and part canal, in 1794. The Rother Navigation rose 86 feet from Stopham to Midhurst by a series of eight locks. A branch connected it to Petworth by the short Petworth Canal, 1¼ miles long with two locks before terminating at Haslingbourne to the south of the town. The navigation was closed to trade in 1888, being formally abandoned in 1936.

Name

This River Rother river is believed to take takes its name from Rotherbridge, not the other way round. "Rotherbridge" is derived from the Old English Hreðrebrycge, meaning "Cattle Bridge", which is also the name of the local Hundred. Before being called the Rother, the river was known as the Scir.

There is however another River Rother Sussex; this eastern Rother flows through the east of the county and along the Kentish border before entering the sea at Rye.

References

• Armstrong, J.R. (1971). A History of Sussex. Sussex: Phillimore. ISBN 0850331854. 
• Pamela Bruce (2000). Northchapel A Village History. Northchapel Parish Council. ISBN 0953829103. 
• Peter Jerrome (2002). Petworth. From the beginnings to 1660. Petworth: The Window Press. 
• P.A.L. Vine (1985). West Sussex Waterways. Middleton Press. ISBN 0-906520-24-X. 

• R H Goodsall, The Arun and Western Rother
• P A L Vine, London's Lost Route to Midhurst The Earl of Egremont's Navigation

Outside links

("Wikimedia Commons" has material about River Rother (Arun))

• Sussex Mills Group
• Bridges of the Western Rother (reproduced from Volume 10 of the Sussex County Magazine 1936) on the Rother Valley Project website