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THE BRIDGES of
THE TYNE
Its final
destruction in 1771 was due to a flood which exceeded any that
had previously occurred.
" At
midnight between Saturday and Sunday, the 16th and 17th
November, the river had risen to a height of about nine feet
above high water spring tides, and filled most of the arches of
the bridge. The Close, Sandhill, and Quayside were deep under
water, and vessels floated over the surface of Newcastle Quay
and remained upon it when the flood subsided.
Early on Sunday
morning the middle arch of the bridge fell, and in the afternoon
a second and third were so much shattered that two more fell a
few days afterwards."
After the
disastrous flood of 1771, which destroyed all the bridges of the
Tyne except that at Corbridge, an arched stone bridge was built
on the same site as the Roman and the 'Mediaeval bridge. It was
completed in 1781 and a toll was charged to pay for its upkeep.
The Suspension
Bridge at Scotswood was opened in 1531. It excels all the other
bridges in the beauty of its design and the slender grace of its
span. At the time of its construction the district round gave it
a fairer setting than it now enjoys.
Perhaps no
invention in the history of the world has so altered the face of
countries and continents, and brought about changes in the lives
of their populations so great and so rapid, as the invention of
the locomotive engine by George Stephenson,
Only a hundred
years have passed since the first train to carry passengers ran
from Stockton to Darlington, and the engine then used may still
be seen in Darlington station. But during that century the rate
of progress, in man's command over nature, has been ten times as
fast as in the period (1700 years) from Hadrian to Stephenson.
In 1838 steamships were already beginning to conquer the ocean,
but Stephenson's engine began the conquest of the land. The
steam locomotive displaced the stage coach, and the carrying of
goods by road, just as the petrol engine in our own day has
" given a new life to the old roads, and opened out the
pathways of the air."
The progress of
towns now came to depend chiefly upon the railway, and, as
trains could not cross the Tyne at water level, engineers were
faced by a new and serious problem.
By the year 1839
Newcastle was linked up by rail to Carlisle, and the first
railway bridge at Scotswood was built. In 1844, Gateshead at
Redheugh, was connected by rail with Darlington. Another line
joined Newcastle with Berwick. But connection between these
lines had to be made in an awkward roundabout journey by
Scotswood.
Between
Gateshead and Newcastle yawned the deep cleft of the Tyne. No
such space had ever before been spanned. Was engineering skill
and science able to make a crossing at the high level needed for
a railway ? Had the answer been " No," much of the
importance now enjoyed by Newcastle and Gateshead would have
passed to the place at which a bridge was found possible.
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