river
A river is a natural flowing watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, sea, lake or another river. In some cases, a river flows into the ground and becomes dry at the end of its course without reaching another body of w ...
located in southeastern
New Hampshire
New Hampshire is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec to the nor ...
in the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...
. It is a
tributary
A tributary, or affluent, is a stream or river that flows into a larger stream or main stem (or parent) river or a lake. A tributary does not flow directly into a sea or ocean. Tributaries and the main stem river drain the surrounding drai ...
of the
Lamprey River
The Lamprey River is a river in southeastern New Hampshire, the United States. It rises in Meadow Lake in Northwood, and flows south, then generally east through Raymond, Epping, Lee, Durham and finally Newmarket. Here, it meets Great Bay ...
Piscataqua River
The Piscataqua River (Abenaki: ''Pskehtekwis'') is a tidal river forming the boundary of the U.S. states of New Hampshire and Maine from its origin at the confluence of the Salmon Falls River and Cochecho River. The drainage basin of the river ...
Atlantic Ocean
The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...
Epping Epping may refer to:
Places
Australia
* Epping, New South Wales, a suburb of Sydney
** Epping railway station, Sydney
* Electoral district of Epping, the corresponding seat in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly
* Epping Forest, Kearns, a he ...
. Upon reaching the town of Newfields, where it is joined by the Fresh River, the river turns northeast and winds through rolling terrain to Newmarket, where it reaches the Lamprey River. The Fresh River joins the Piscassic just upstream from the Piscassic Ice Pond in a marshy area of beaver ponds.
History
The lower part of the Piscassic River was once used as a canal between Neal's Mills in Newfields and the mouth of the Piscassic at the Lamprey River. A small pond which was used to unload and turn barges is located at the base of a rapids just downstream from the ruins of Neal's Mills, between Piscassic Road bridge and the B&M railroad bridge in Newfields. A mule track runs along the northwest bank of the Piscassic downstream from the turning pond.
A small dam just upstream from the Piscassic Road Bridge forms the Piscassic Ice Pond. A wooden icehouse once stood adjacent to the ice pond, just east of the dam. It had a wooden and iron conveyor leading from the pond to a point a door about 15 feet above the ground. In the early 1900s the ice on the pond was often 18 inches thick. Harvesting crews used large saws to cut ice into 3–4-foot swaths. Teams of horses shod with ice shoes were used to extract and haul the ice to the conveyor. The icehouse had about 2–3 feet inner walls filled with insulating sawdust. The icehouse rotted and fell down in the 1950s and little if anything remains of it today.
See also
*
List of rivers of New Hampshire
This is a list of rivers and significant streams in the U.S. state of New Hampshire.
All watercourses named "River" (freshwater or tidal) are listed here, as well as other streams which are either subject to thNew Hampshire Comprehensive Shorelan ...