LONDON BRIDGE

Waipa Post, Volume 36, Issue 2144, 14 April 1928, Page 7

LONDON BRIDGE

WHY IT IS WHERE IT IS,

(By H. E. Newson)

Of the teeming thousands that cross and re-cross London Bridge day after day, hastily glancing to the right or to the left fascinated by the activities on the waters below, I wonder how many give a thought as to why the bridge happens to be where it is.

Until the modern Tower Bridge was built, London Bridge and its predecessors in antiquity were generally referred to as the lowest crossing point upon the Thames. This statement is, however, such a commonplace that one must study the reasons why from the beginnings of a settled occupation of this? island it was of such paramount importance for man to discover a convenient crossing as low down the Thames as possible.

Those who have stood on the cliffs at Dover on a clear day will realize that the famous Straits were destined from earliest days to become the main connection between this island and the continent of Europe. Similarly, those of us who have toured the Eastern counties north of the Thames and studieed their history will realize that in the Dark Ageb those fertile lands succoured a comparatively large population who were denied communication by road with the principal Kentish centres and the Straits by the great obstacle of the Estuary and tidal river of the Thames.

It is therefore apparent that there existed from the earliest times a necessity to found and maintain a permanent crossing-place at the lowest practicable point in the Thames Valley; as it follows that the farther up-river the crossing was found the longer the detour it involved. Recognising this, let us consider why the crossing-place came just here upon the line of the River, and to consider that we must understand what it was that acted as a barrier to the primitive engineers of those early days.

It cannot be suggested that the obstacle was hills or even the halfmile or so width of river as we now know it. No, the great obstacle was marsh, the difficulties of negotiating which even modern engineering finds one of its chief impediments on the grounds of expense. The first factor in the formation of such marsh as flanked the Thames is the tide and if you have a considerable difference between high water and low water and if that difference is further complicated by great variations between neaps and springs, as in our river, the difficulties of the marsh barrier affected by such a tide are enormously increased} Fuirlher, the alluvium of the clay, brought down through the Thames marshes consists mainly of centuries from the upper reaches, and at no point before reaching London does the, river enjoy a steep on shore of chalk or gravel upon both banks at once.

The problem of early days would appear to have been chiefly one of approach from the South but a study of the geological 'surveys shows that whilst such places as Gravesend, Greenhithe, Erith, Woolwich, Greenwich and Deptford possessed the requisite subsoil there lay upon the bank opposite each of these a belt of marsh which forbade the marking of suitable traffic roads. It must not be imagined that this lack of two opposing hards below the City is due to coincidence. There is a geographical reason for it, as it is obvious that where the stream strikes the gravely and chalk a curve is formed leaving on its inside an increasing wedge of alluvial deposit. The crossing-place was, of course, finally discovered opposite the steep gravel bank upon whoch the oldest pai’t of the city of London stands for although the lands on the opposite bank at Southwark were flat and low-lying it so happened that they contained just that spit of sandy gravel projecting into the alluvial mud which was necessary to establish a crossing. No such conditions existed between this and the sea and far inland as this point was, it naturally became the site selected. Although, as pointed out, the necessity for a crossing was actuated mainly by the demands of the agricultural population of East Anglia, it became equally beneficial to the cattle-farming, mining, and industrial inhabitants of the Midlands and the North who quickly followed with the construction of roads converging upon London from their respective districts.

Thus we can definitely say that the Thames made London; and further, that it has maintained it throughout the ages as the great mai’ket of the world.

In the article Mr Newson has dealt v/ith the question of why London Bridge arose where it did. As to the history of the Bridge itself Mr G. B. Besant (a son of that eminent authority on London’s story, the late Sir Walter Besant) has written a whale book of nearly 200 pages. In this one finds a pleasantly-done narrative, in-

[ informative without being highbrow and detailed without becoming longwinded.'

A summary of the history of the Bridge (and for many centuries it was “the” Bridge) runs something like this:—built by the Romans between A.D. 50 and 100; completely destroyed by the flood tide in 1091 and quickly rebuilt; destroyed by fire in 1135 and renewed; Peter of Colechurch in 1176 began the first stone London Bridge somewhat west of the preceding timber erections; 1831 New London Bridge opened and the old bridge was destroyed the following year.