Alison Cable, the Archivist with the Rochester Bridge Trust, spoke to us about the charity which dates from 1399, one of the oldest in the country, and about crossing the River Medway; an essential part of the journey between the Kentish ports and London.
The first Bridge was built by the Romans probably very soon after they entered the country in 43AD as part of the Watling Street between London and Dover. Most of what is known about the old Roman bridge comes from the Textus Roffensis, or Book of Rochester, the oldest surviving book of English law written in old English in the tenth century from now lost, documents dating from the fifth century. The Roman bridge was supported by nine stone piers and was probably just an open sided timber surface.
After the Romans left Britain in 410 it fell to the manors and estates within groups of parishes in the surrounding areas to maintain each of the piers. It endured until the very harsh winter of 1381 when the river froze solid and the following spring floods swept much of it away. After that two very wealthy local men, Sir John de Cobham and Sir Robert Knolles, set about commissioning a new bridge and the Wardens and Commonality of Rochester Bridge (now Rochester Bridge Trust) came about in 1391.
The mediaeval bridge was completed in the same year. The mediaeval bridge, which was a little upstream from the old Roman one, had twelve stone piers and a ragstone surface. There was also a wooden drawbridge between two of them to allow boats with higher sails to pass through. The strong tides in the River Medway at Rochester exerted constant wear and tear on the bridge. The Trust holds a number of documents including Pay books which include names of carpenters, masons etc who worked on the bridge.
By the beginning of Queen Victoria’s reign it was clear that the bridge again needed replacing. After much controversy about the costs Sir Richard Cubitt was appointed Rochester Bridge Engineer in 1839 but work on the Victorian bridge didn’t start until 1850, and was completed in 1856. This bridge was once again on the line of the original Watling Street. It is of cast iron structure and had a swing bridge towards the Strood end to allow taller vessels to pass through although that became redundant in the 1880s when the fixed railway bridge was constructed nearby.
The bridge was reconstructed in the early twentieth century. The roadway was raised and suspended from bowstring trusses above instead of supporting arches below. Now known as the old bridge, this was opened to traffic in 1940. It currently takes westbound traffic from Rochester to Strood. By the mid twentieth century the increase in traffic flow meant that the bridge was again inadequate. Work on the new bridge began in 1967 and it was opened in 1970. This carries eastbound traffic from Strood into Rochester. At the same time a smaller services bridge was constructed between the old and new bridges to carry pipes and cables for utility services. During the mediaeval period considerable amounts of property were given to the trust and rental income from these have funded the charity for centuries facilitating substantial donations towards bridges further upstream and today enables free passage for everyone across the bridges between Rochester and Strood.