An old grandfather clock is responsible for the birth of a north Norfolk charity commemorating the centenary of one of the county's most catastrophic natural disasters.

The clock stood in the Brampton home of the late Ethel Howard, who was in her 90s when she told surprised fellow villager Stuart Wilson that the timepiece had been transported there by wherry.

That remark sparked civil servant Mr Wilson's interest and he began researching the navigation of the River Bure, which runs through Brampton, near Aylsham, where he has lived since 1996.

He learned that from 1779 until a devastating flood in 1912, the Bure between Coltishall and Aylsham had been a watery M1 for rural communities along its 9.5 mile route.

Cargoes were ferried both ways, carrying agricultural produce, timber, coal, bricks – and even grandfather clocks – under bridges and through a series of five locks with access beyond Coltishall to the Broads, Great Yarmouth and the sea.

Crews, usually two men and a boy, would sail the boats along the canalised stretch, or 'quant' them with poles, and sometimes manually bow-haul them from the banks.

At Aylsham staithe and in Coltishall there were boat-building yards. The Bure navigation brought commerce and prosperity.

But at about 4am on Monday August 26 1912, it began to rain across north and east Norfolk, and Norwich.

It didn't stop for some 29 hours by which time seven-and-a-half inches had been recorded at Norwich Cemetery.

More than three months' average rainfall had poured out of the heavens in a little over a day, sweeping away 133 years of tradition and many livelihoods along the Bure.

The damage done by raging waters to those bridges and locks was such that the navigation was ruined forever.

A generation earlier, in the 1880s, the railway had arrived in Aylsham and by 1912 motor cars were gaining popularity.

The days of transporting cargo by water were already numbered.

'The flood was really a catalyst for the inevitable,' said Mr Wilson.

Then, as now, no one had either the money or motivation to restore the navigation but, as this month's centenary of the flood drew nearer, Mr Wilson decided that such a pivotal date in the area's history should not go unmarked.

A letter to Aylsham Town Council prompted an approach from the Aylsham Local History Society which embraced the project.

Enthusiasm snowballed and earlier this year the Bure Navigation Conservation Trust came into being, with Mr Wilson, 59, as its first chairman. Sunday's anniversary of the disaster saw the trust, backed by Broadland District Council, organise a day of commemorative and fun events on Coltishall Common.

It included a piece of dramatised history when Buxton and Lamas Sea Scouts recreated pre-flood days, ferrying a token cargo of potatoes by canoe from Aylsham to Coltishall where the wherry Albion was waiting to take it on its way.