The footbridge over the River Derwent that connects the Hall Leys Park with Dale Road, shown in the photograph on the right, has plaques marking two severe floods that occurred in the twentieth century and within living memory of many residents. On Sunday 4th December, 1960 the flood water reached the lower mark when the river burst its banks and flooded into Crown Square at 9 a.m., engulfing an area five miles long by a mile wide[1]. Some five years later, on Thursday 11th December, 1965, the flood waters reached even an higher point. Many of the shops in the town centre were again flooded and water went up into Firs Parade, where the writer's father had to try to rescue and remove stock before the waters came in. Susy Cytko remembers these floods. "In Matlock Green a lorry decided to rush through the water and made such waves that it broke the window at Aunty Dolly's sweet shop and all the jars of sweets floated out, which was exciting to us as we were children at the time; we did try to catch them but my mum would not let us go down stairs so we tried to catch them with a bucket on a rope but it never worked. Someone came with soup in a boat and we let the bucket down to collect it, and bread. Of course we kids hated the soup as it was onion, but our parents were grateful. ... One person drowned across the road[2]". Though flooding has occurred because of exceptionally heavy rainfall, as in 2000, the town has also flooded because there had been extremely heavy snowfalls which were followed by very sudden rises in air temperature and rapid thaws, sometimes accompanied by heavy rainfall.

Where the floods reached © Ann Andrews

So snow falling in the hills of the Peak melted quickly and formed torrents which drained into the Derwent, causing water levels to rise dramatically and this was the reason why the town flooded in 1965^[3]. The same thing had happened over sixty years before, when the water levels rose very quickly overnight between Sunday 29th December and Monday 30th December 1901. An article in "The Times" described the whole of the Derwent Valley as a "scene of desolation". It was reported that water had entered hundreds of business premises, hotels and private homes at 3 a.m. causing residents to flee^[4]. On that occasion the flood water covered Crown Square by 7 a.m. and was standing four to five feet high in the Railway Hotel^[5]. "Matlock football ground was flooded to a depth of ten feet" and the Derwent above Matlock was about a mile wide^[4]. According to the Matlock historian Benjamin Bryan, there was by then bright sunshine which reflected in the newly formed lake^[5]. Fortunately, "an abatement took place by daylight"^[4] but the flooding had caused considerable damage in the town^[5].

Bryan also described several nineteenth century floods. In the first week of October 1880 there was a storm with very high winds which caused the river to burst its banks. Several months later, just before the 1881 census was taken, snow, high winds and a rapid thaw caused further flooding in February. "So high did the waters rise that the railway was flooded, and no train was permitted to proceed northwards beyond Matlock Bridge. The consequence was that numbers of passengers had their journey arrested, and upwards of 150 persons had to be accommodated at the Queen's Head Hotel and elsewhere^[5]". "The footbridge across the river to Matlock Town was washed down and wrecked ; whilst lower down the bridge leading to the paint works and the High Tor Grotto was also destroyed. There was a strong current of water three to four feet deep running along the roadway, as if it were part of the river, to and through Matlock Bath^[5]".
Also see Matlock: Dale Road, Boat House Hotel & Quarry
There was further flooding in March of the same year, and again during October, so 1881 was not a good year for the town^[6].

A few years afterwards the "Weekly Dispatch" reported, on 16 May 1886, serious flooding and "Great Destruction of Property" in many parts of the country. "At Matlock vehicular and pedestrian traffic was totally stopped along a large portion of the highway, and the houses on The Green were submerged to the second storey". November 1890 saw further flooding: "On the road to Matlock Bath there was a depth of four to five feet of water^[5]".

The postcard above is dated 18th January, 1921 and the area under water is just off Crown Square, at the bottom of Bank Road. One of the entrances to the Crown Hotel is clearly visible on the near left. A gale of unusual severity had affected the U.K. for the previous two days, causing widespread flooding. The Matlock correspondent to "The Times" described "the view from the Peak as one huge lake" as much of the Matlock's town centre was under water. The water rose so rapidly that a temporary bridge had to be erected for traffic^[7]. Ten years later, on the 4th September, 1931, the town flooded again^[8] and photographs exist of the Hall Leys under water once more in 1941.

As for Matlock Bath, there was very localised flooding during the summer of 1924 that was caused by a violent thunderstorm in which "rain and hailstones fell as large marbles for two hours. The Parade became a river and the shops were flooded to a great depth". Visitors and day trippers were marooned, or had to wade through deep water to escape^[9].

One of the saddest tales resulting from the Derwent being in flood occurred in the village in January 1852. There was a particularly tragic accident involving two members of the Cumming family, who drowned in the swollen river at Matlock Bath. The disastrous consequences of this, as the head of the family was one of the two who perished, were widely reported and a fund was set up to help the surviving children.
Cumming biographies | Newspaper report | Subscription for the relief of the Cumming children
Sadly, these weren't the only fatalities to occur in the Matlock section of the River Derwent^[10].

Whilst flooding can and did cause misery and damage, Matlock's inhabitants were not without a sense of humour. Colin Goodwyn writes of an escapade in 1866 during what proved to be the worst flood for 25 years and which turned the Hall Leys into a sea of water across to Matlock Green. "Some wags hung a five bar gate on the lamp post at Matlock Bridge as a make believe that the flood had been that height and left it there". A sign board was seen floating down the Derwent; on it had been painted the words "No road this way"^[11].

Below is a photograph of the River Derwent in spate, taken from from Matlock Bath's Jubilee Bridge in the 1950s using a 2 x 2 Agifold camera. The landing stage was completely submerged! The Lovers' Walks on the opposite bank would undoubtedly have been underwater downstream.

There is an interesting, if somewhat obscure, cutting from the High Peak News, dated Saturday, April 22, 1916, about flood prevention.
Read the article
Whatever the various bodies may have either talked about or did, nothing to deal effectively with the problem happened for many years.

During the 1970s the weir that served the Matlock Dale colour works and fed their water turbine was removed. This fundamentally changed the nature of the river between Matlock and Matlock Bath; it is better for the canoeists, though that was not why the weir was removed, and Matlock has not been flooded since^[12].

References:

^[1] "The Times", Monday 5 Nov 1960. These were the worst floods to have hit Matlock since those of late Dec 1931 - early Jan 1932. The flood water covered low lying land between Matlock and Rowsley.
^[2] Thanks to Susy Cytko, whose parents then ran the Horse Shoe in Matlock Green. The drowned man Suzy referred to was Mr. George Ellis, a 58 year old railway worker from Starkholmes. He was swept away by the flood water during the night of 9th December ("The Times", Monday 13 Dec 1965).
^[3] "The Times", 30 Nov 1965 reported blizzards and heavy snowfalls in the U.K. and Matlock police reported that over 400 vehicles were stranded in North Derbyshire.
^[4] "The Times", Wednesday 1 Jan 1902.
^[5] Bryan, Benjamin (1903) "History of Matlock - Matlock, Manor and Parish" London by Bemrose & Sons, Limited.
^[6] "The Derby Mercury", 19 Oct 1881, reported a gale and strong winds, with many trees uprooted. A Mr. Willliam Hadfield of Oker managed to save a hay rick which was in danger of being caried away by the water that flooded the fields. It referred to the damage in February when, according to the same paper, the noise of the water rushing through the gorge beneath High Tor was terrifying. Tree trunks, general debris and some sheep and rabbits were swept downstream and on towards Derby (issue of 16 Feb 1881).
^[7] "The Times", Wednesday 19 Jan 1921.
^[8] The date is from Arkle, M. J. (1983) "Tuppence Up, Penny Down", printed by Geo. Hodgkinson (Printers) Ltd. The flood damage was estimated to be over £30,000. "The Times" of 4 Sept 1931 reported heavy rain across the country and on the 5th that Derbyshire's rivers were in flood, although did not mention events in Matlock.
^[9] "The Times", Wednesday 23 July 1924.
^[10] Further tragedies are described in Boating on the River Derwent
^[11] "The Derby Mercury", 21 Nov 1866, with thanks to Colin
^[12] From Peter Hare. Also see Photographs of Matlock Bath Today (4) | Matlock Bath, High Tor and the Colour Works