6 Wilmington Bridge

Hull City Records Office (TSJ 28) describes Wilmington as:

“a swing railway bridge, now a footbridge, spanning the River Hull. Circa 1870 and 1905, for the North Eastern Railway. Converted and restored in 1991. Arch topped riveted wrought-iron girders form the span, which is carried on a roller bearing central pivot. Remains of a footway on the north side. Above the centre, a riveted post and beam structure with railed platform, carrying a wooden cabin with matchboard cladding and hipped lead roof. On the west side, 4 large glazing bar windows. At the south end, a projecting porch reached by c20 steel steps. At the north end, a canted wooden oriel window to the left, and a 2-light glazing bar window to the right. The bridge is operated by mechanism in the cabin engaging with a ring gear on the pivot. The mechanism is complete and operable.”

The council’s blue plaque on the bridge states that it was built for the North Eastern Railway and opened on Friday 10th May 1907. It replaced a single track bridge built in 1853 for the York and North Midland Railway.

It is perhaps one of the most photogenic of Hull’s river bridges and now being easily accessible as footpath and cycle route, joining Wincolmlee and Sculcoates to the west with Stoneferry and Wilmington to the east. A working visit to the bridge in February 2013 is where the seeds of the Open Bridges project were sown.

Click on each plan and zoom in to see the detail.

“I like bridges! Not as much as I like dams but they are up there. This one is my favourite! I passed it every time we practised in one of those practise rooms for bands on the Bankside industrial estate. I always imagined living in it. I also have memories of the Sutton Road Bridge. I remember being in my pram going over there on shopping trips to the Co Op top of Greenwood Ave. Those shops were a lifeline for the newly built Sutton Park mothers in the early 1970s. Anyway I remember the wooden slats and seeing the water below. The river looks tiny now.” Andy Guitar Newlove

There are a number of photographs in circulation of the first train to go over the new Wilmington Bridge; however the photograph below shows the first barge to sail through on 11th May 1907, watched by a group of children from Wincolmlee and onlookers on the bridge. We’ve included a detail showing the conversation between the barge’s skipper and the bridgemaster.

There is a comprehensive article on the building of Wilmington Bridge on the Forgotten Relics website here http://www.forgottenrelics.org/bridges/wilmington-swing-bridge/

Forgotten Relics “records and celebrates the UK’s disused railway structures, still standing as monuments to the period of ambition, courage and endeavour during which they were built”. It’s a wonderful site.

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