We are saddened to report the death on 11^th June 2026 of Hugh McKnight, former IWA trustee, editor of IWA’s then Bulletin (before it became Waterways magazine), waterways author, photographer and journalist.

Hugh McKnight was born and brought up beside the River Wey at Weybridge, and developed an interest in inland waterways from the age of 4 when his father bought a small boat for outings on the Thames.  He joined IWA in 1957 as an enthusiastic 14-year-old supporter and was supplying photographs for IWA’s then members’ journal Bulletin by 1962.  The following year he joined the committee of IWA’s then London & Home Counties Branch as press officer and quickly rose to prominence using his skills as a freelance journalist and photographer.  Between 1961 and 1964, Hugh undertook a 5,000-mile journey of Britain’s inland waterways, initially aboard a 12-foot motorised camping dinghy, and later upgrading to a 20-foot sloop dory.  He also spent several weeks living with working narrow boat families on the Grand Union Canal and joined early work parties on the Southern Stratford and Basingstoke Canals.  In later years he upgraded to a historic boat of his own.

[Photo by Job Hutchings]

On taking early retirement in the 1990s, Hugh moved to France to follow up a passion for continental waterways.  He was a frequent traveller across Europe on the motor yacht Avonbay, which he co-owned with former IWA national chair and London solicitor John Humphries and his wife June.  Already a seasoned boater on Western European waterways, Hugh used his travels as the basis for further books on continental waterways, which became invaluable guides to others following in his footsteps.  Slow Boat Through France was first published in 1991, and was followed by Slow Boat Through Germany in 1993.

Following Brexit, Hugh and his wife Mig sold up in France and returned to England, basing himself in an apartment at the converted Coxes Mill beside the River Wey, and in earlier 2026 had purchased a new narrowboat that, sadly, he never got to use owing to hospitalisation with pelvic cancer.