Berkeley, Gloucestershire
Berkeley (
pronounced ) is a
town between the south bank of the
River Severn and the
M5 motorway in
Gloucestershire,
UK, at . The town is located mid-way between Bristol and Gloucester and is built on a small hill in the Vale of Berkeley. The town is noted for
Berkeley Castle where the imprisoned
Edward II was murdered.
Berkeley was the birthplace of
Edward Jenner, the originator of
vaccination. After studying medicine in
London he returned home to work as the local doctor, and in
1796 performed a pioneering experiment by innoculating his gardener's son with cowpox, thus preventing infection from
smallpox. The Chantry, Jenner's home in Berkeley for 38 years, is now The Edward Jenner Museum.
Berkeley was also the site[
1] of a
Magnox nuclear power station. This power station, one of the first commercial British reactors to come to power, has since been decommissioned and all that remains are the two reactors encased in concrete. The administrative centre adjacent to the station is still active however - the centre was founded as
Berkeley Nuclear Laboratories in the early
1960s and was one of the three principal research laboratories of the
CEGB.
Just north of Berkeley lies the port of
Sharpness, one of the most inland in Britain. The
Gloucester & Sharpness Canal starts here, and the river used to be crossed by the
Severn Railway Bridge. However, this was damaged beyond repair by a ship collision in
1960.
Berkeley itself stands adjacent to the
Little Avon River, which flows into the Severn at Berkeley Pill. The Little Avon was tidal, and so navigable, for some distance inland (as far as Berkeley itself and the Sea Mills at Ham) until a 'tidal reservoir' was implemented at Berkeley Pill in the late
1960s.
The
Royal Mail postcode begins GL13.
*
The Edward Jenner Museum
