River Neckinger

The watercourse drained first the seasonally wet (and occasionally flooded) ground at St George's Fields, where the former building of the Bethlem Royal Hospital, now the Imperial War Museum, stands.

[3] In London Past and Present, published in 1891, Henry B. Wheatley argued that there was 'much good evidence' that 'the 'Devil's Neckinger'... the ancient place of punishment and execution' was at the site of the 'Dead Tree public-house' on Jacob's Island.

[8] In May, 1016,[9] Danish Cnut the Great, who had invaded England, dug a trench through Southwark to allow his boats to avoid the heavily defended London Bridge.

[14] In the 16th century, herbalist and botanist John Gerard wrote of the wild willow herb that 'It is found nigh the place of execution at St. Thomas a Watering; and by a style on a Thames bank near to the Devil's Neckerchief on the way to Redriffe.

[19] Local doctor, William Rendle, writing in Old Southwark And Its People, in 1878, describes a bridge on the Old Kent Road, dated to the time of Bermondsey Abbey, which was still visible as part of the sewer system in the 19th century.

It was described by Charles Dickens in 1838 as "the filthiest, the strangest, the most extraordinary of the many localities that are hidden in London",[21] and by the Morning Chronicle in 1849 as "The very capital of cholera" and "The Venice of drains".

[24] In 1935, Bevingtons moved most of their business to Dartford, keeping the smaller section of their divided site as a warehouse, and selling the larger portion to the Bermondsey Borough Council.

[24] When Bevingtons sold the warehouse in early 1980s it was converted into a residential development,[24] and it has since been joined by new blocks of flats, which coexist, with some friction, with the more bohemian houseboats moored offshore at Reed Wharf.

St Saviour's Dock is a deep-excavated and embanked inlet where the vestiges of the Neckinger meet the River Thames . Here the inlet divides the riverside districts of Shad Thames and Jacob's Island .
19th century map showing the Lock Stream (between the Lock Hospital and Bull Inn) going under the Old Kent Road then reappearing as a channel on the other side.
Route of Canute's Trench south of the River Thames from A History of London (1884) by W. J. Loftie . The early section of the Neckinger, where it crossed the Old Kent Road, was known by this name.
1813 engraving of Chapel of the Hospital for Lepers in Kent Street, Southwark, called Le Lock . The upper section of the Neckinger passed by the hospital site and was known as Lock Stream .
1820 engraving of the bridge and turnpike of Grange Road (now Grange Walk ) over the River Neckinger.