Print by an unknown artist entitled 'West India Docks as they appeared in March 1802', from the 'Gentleman's Magazine', Oct. 1802. It shows the docks as they appeared on completion but before being flooded. Built to put an end to loses suffered from pilfering on the open Thames riverside wharves, the West India Docks stretched for half a mile across the Isle of Dogs. These were the first of the walled docks of the 19th-century age of trade.