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Middle Pleistocene drainage in the Thames valley

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 May 2009

P. L. Gibbard
Affiliation:
Sub-department of Quaternary Research, Botany SchoolDowning Street, Cambridge CB2 3EA, England

Summary

Stratigraphical investigations in the Finchley depression (Middlesex depression) are summarized and show that a gravel, laminated deposits and till sequence is present. Compositional study of the gravels indicates that they were derived from S of the present Thames valley. Gravel patches in North Surrey can be subdivided into two terrace fragments formed by a Mole-Wey south bank Thames tributary. The upper unit is correlated with the gravel at Finchley. The lower unit terrace can be shown to grade into the Thames Black Park Terrace Gravel, and the latter is extended through London to Dartford and Chatham. The events leading to the diversion of the Mole-Wey tributary by the Anglian chalky till ice parallel those of the Thames in the Vale of St Albans and suggest that similar events may also have occurred in other S bank tributary valleys to the E.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1979

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