There were some well known boatyards in Walsall in years gone by. Ernie Thomas’ at the top of Birchills locks was an extensive yard, much larger than the yard which now occupies part of the site.
The arm from Birchills junction extended right up to Old Birchills and was full of pull out docking facilities and smithy/woodworking shops.
Further around the turn towards the top lock was another dock this time with dry dock facilities and again it extended almost right up to Old Birchills, Ernies house stood between the top lock and this dock with his foremen having the houses the other side of the dock, the remnant of those houses can be seen today in the yard of Dixons the paint people.
The power stations at Walsall, variously known as Reedswood, Birchills and Walsall A and B stations took their coal originally by boat into a specially constructed basin. With the original A station a small tracked crane was used to both unload the boats and to feed the furnaces. As the demand for electricity grew and the B station came on line two large travelling cranes were constructed around 1950 to speed up the unloading.
Ernie had a large fleet of boats and made his fortune supplying Walsall A & B power stations with coal from the surrounding coal fields originally with horse boats but he saw the advantage of motor power and had a series of powerful tugs built which could tow trains of up to 6 loaded boats with a total load of over 200 tonnes.
These tugs came his way from another of his business interests, that of Fellows Morton and Clayton canal carriers, the Eddie Stobart of their day. As a director of that company he managed to get preferential consideration on buying their surplus motors, some of which were converted to tugs as mentioned and others which were stripped of all the long distance boating ephemera and were used to carry coal and tow a couple of the unpowered joeys behind them.
In the final two images you can see one of these motors under the cranes at Walsall power station being unloaded, in order to provide a steady platform for the cranes to empty the boat it can be seen tied up but with the engine still in gear so it is held tightly in place under the crane.
The canal trade to the power stations ended in 1965 and most of the joeys used were either broken up or abandoned wherever they lay. In the late 70’s under pressure from British Waterways the abandoned joeys were gathered together and some were buried in the old dock arm at Birchills or others were taken to Calf Heath where Thomas’ had moved their operations to as they transitioned into hire boats. The boats were taken up on to the abandoned Hatherton branch and again left to nature, some are still there although very little will be left of these once numerous wooden work horses.
Many of the motor boats survived and have found new life as leisure boats, some have been deconverted back to their original configuration and can be seen on the canals as a testament to a once vital part of British industry.
In the late 40s Mr Thomas was approached by the then Chairman of Fordhouses Boys’ Club, Mr W J Bradburn, a well known local businessman, with a view to his donating a narrow boat specifically for the use of boys’ clubs in the Wolverhampton/Walsall area. Using items and equipment supplied by local businessmen, Mr Thomas converted an old former FMC narrow boat, which he then donated to the local boys’ clubs. For the next 18 years the boat, named “Ernest Thomas”, operated successfully in the area, but became uneconomic to operate after a change in Board of Trade regulations and was sold into private hands. The boat reverted to its former name of Vulcan and yours truly spent many a happy family holiday on board. She is now restored to her nearly original condition and looks from the outside to be a steamer in the fleet of Fellows Morton and Clayton.
All aerial photos taken from Britain from Above website although I have zoomed in and cropped the images for clarity.
Thomas’ yard is from https://britainfromabove.org.uk/en/image/EAW029332
Power station aerial shots are from this area https://britainfromabove.org.uk/en/map?country=global&view=map#11,400088,299909
Other images from my own collection as well as Walsall Councils a click in time website
The Canalorak 
Living on Beechdale in the fifties and sixties, I well remember the power station and also the fleets of barges which travelled the Wyrley and Essington, loaded with coal to feed its insatiable appetite. During the Summer holiday my Mom would take a gang of us kids fishing up at Stokes Bridge on Leamore Lane. Though we rarely caught anything, we enjoyed a peaceful, relaxing time until around three o’clock when the distant thumping of a diesel engine would announce the lead boat of a string of barges rounding the curve to the north of the bridge. “Pull in your lines!” Someone would shout. And we stood there, waving to the boatmen as the procession sailed past. We usually went home at that point since the canal became a boiling pit of silt and mud in which fishing was impossible. Occasionally we would take a walk down to Birchills Locks to watch boats going through. I have to admit being slightly scared at the depth of the lock when it emptied. The dripping green walls looked very ominous. Coupled with horror stories of children being drowned there, it was a place I was happy to avoid!
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