Neatishead Boatyard
Neatishead Boatyard was located off Hall Road in Barton Turf on a site that is now occupied by housing. The business moved to Wayford Bridge around 1968.
Details of the hire fleet of Neatishead Boatyard can be found on the Norfolk Broads Boats web-site.
John Yaxley’s A Jam Round Barton Turf has the following account of Neatishead Boatyard:
Cox Bros. Boatyard
Cox’s Boatyard is located at Barton Staithe. The first reference to boat building in Barton Turf in trade directories is in the 1883 Kelly’s, where Jacob Cox appears. In the 1883 White’s he is shown as G.S.Cox, but this is probably a misprint of J.S.Cox. From 1890 through to 1900 the sole boat builder recorded is Jacob Salmon Cox and during this time he is also shown providing accommodation or apartments. The 1891 and 1901 census returns show two of Jacob’s sons, Herbert and Jacob, working as boat builders. Jacob died in 1903 and in the 1904 and 1908 Kelly’s Mrs Jacob Salmon Cox is recorded as the boat builder.
With the meadow at the rear, leading down to the dyke’s edge, this was all developed in the ’fifties as Neatishead Boatyard, but in Barton Turf, by a resident at Point House. Later acquired by Mr John Lynford, who was tragically killed in a private plane crash. In its later years this was used for the laying up of GRP, i.e. glass reinforced plastic, hulls in the early days of Aqua Fibre, now situated on the old Rackheath aerodrome. The name and business of this boatyard has now been transferred to Wayford and the whole site developed for housing.
By 1911 Pamela, Mrs Jacob Salmon Cox, is recorded in the census return as a farmer and sons Herbert and Jacob as boat builders. From 1912 to 1937 Kelly’s has Cox Brothers – The Staithe listed as the boat builders. From 1927 they are also shown as having a boat hire business. Jacob and Herbert (‘Jeerky and Harbit’) were followed in the business by Herbert’s sons Jacob (‘Sunny’) and Lewis. Later Lewis’s son Tim took over the boatyard and eventually the lease was sold to a consortium in 1995. An EDP newspaper article about the sale can be viewed as a PDF document.
John Yaxley’s A Jam Round Barton Turf has the following account of Cox’s Boatyard:
‘Cox Bros’ could well be one of the oldest family boat building yards on the Norfolk Broads. Two generations of brothers have worked under this name, ‘Jeerky and Harbit’ and ‘Sunny and Lewis’. The father of the first two built his first boat in the shed on the north west corner of the staithe. They next used the northern section of the staithe where wherries were pulled out and repaired. The wherry ‘Ethnie’ was built on this site. Later they acquired a small piece of marsh to the south of the staithe known as the ‘Holdyard’. They also did much work on the ‘Maria’, (pronounced in the old fashioned way ‘Marigher’), the now famous lateener at present in the Broads Museum at Stalham, which was owned and raced by the late Sir Jacob Preston of Barton Hall. Although now leased out, this yard still trades under the original name.
