Counter's Creek was a minor tributary of the Thames running south from Kensal Green to join the main river west of Battersea Bridge.

Lord Kensington, William Edwardes, seeing the success of the Regent's Canal, asked his surveyor William Cutbush in 1822 to draw up plans to convert the creek into a canal, with the object of bringing goods and minerals from the London docks to the Kensington area, then a rural district isolated from London.

However this was a gross under-estimate, and John Rennie estimated that more than £34,000 would be needed to complete the work properly, including the rebuilding of Stamford Bridge.

The whole party entered the basin amidst the cheers of the multitudes assembled, the band on board playing 'God Save the King'.

"[4] The Annual Register described the canal as well as reporting the opening: Opening of the Kensington Canal.—This ceremony, which had been reserved for the anniversary of his majesty's birth, was performed by Lord Kensington, and a number of friends to the undertaking, embarking in a barge at Battersea-bridge, and proceeding up the canal, accompanied by a number of craft loaded with timber, coals, sand &c., the first fruits of the speculation.

The canal ran more or less straight in a south-south-easterly direction, turning east at the confluence to the River Thames at Chelsea Creek.

The tidal flow brought silt into the canal and the feed from Counter's Creek was inadequate to clear it, so that problems were soon experienced with obstruction to the passage of vessels.

Attention was given to gaining access for goods and minerals to and from the London docks, and proposals were developed for a railway branch to the canal; trans-shipping there to or from river lighters would give the desired connection.

[9] This left a short stub of the original waterway in existence, from the Thames almost to Stamford Bridge: it served flour mills and the Imperial Gas Works, until traffic ceased in 1967.