All History Now

          Having previously dipped into Plymouth History Month by way of a thinly-attended talk on the recently-established LGBT+ archive, my latest historical foray was on the subject of Plymouth’s civil engineering exploits – a subject far more extensively documented than the population’s sexual traits, despite its relative novelty: it goes back merely to the 16^th century, when fortifications were built against the threat of French invasions. But this talk was focused on a particular project – bridging the Tamar estuary – first by rail in 1859, then by road, an astonishingly-delayed 102 years later.

          The talk attracted an audience of ten and was delivered by a volunteer at the visitor centre attached to the control room on the Devonshire side of the bridges (which are separated by a few hundred metres). The first thing she told us was that she was not an expert on the subject (though she knew people who were) but an ex-teacher more used to engaging the attention of parties of school children with a view to encouraging them to become civil engineers. So, having established the fundamental mis-match between speaker and audience and disappointed us with her meagre credentials, she then struggled to give us anything beyond some basic facts and a couple of anecdotes. Fortunately, her offering was supplemented by material offered up by one of the attendees, an old bloke who had worked in the dockyard since the age of fifteen. When our teacher told us that the rail bridge had survived the impact of HMS Roberts colliding with it years ago, our docker told us all about the circumstances of the incident (stormy weather was to blame, it seems) and the warship itself – its history in battle, its refits with guns salvaged from other vessels and its decommissioning at the end of its useful life. “You should record all that info with the local history society,” said our teacher, but he seemed not to hear.

          All this took place outdoors on a sunny day in a mini amphitheatre overlooking the portals to the bridges and across to the Cornish side. Whether or not civil engineering is your bag, the spectacle alone is impressive. But even as a child growing up nearby (before the road bridge was built) I was intrigued, not so much by the bridge as by the six-foot high lettering emblazoned on the main pier – I.K. Brunel, 1859. At that time, the only means of crossing for vehicles and pedestrians was an old chain-ferry operating in the shadow of Brunel’s bridge and we would sometimes ride that ferry on Saturday mornings, with paper bags of winkles soaked in vinegar for a treat and with no other purpose than to entertain ourselves. I don’t recall any adult telling me what the initials I.K. stood for (I don’t recall any adults being present – unless you count my cousin, who was a few years older than me), but I was delighted to learn later in life that the great engineer had a suitably impressive name – Isambard Kingdom Brunel! No PR guru could have come up with a name as mysteriously impressive. The road bridge, by contrast, lacks any aura of romance, dedicated as it is to an engineering consortium called Tamar Crossings, 1961 and, try as she might, our teacher was on a loser trying to make it otherwise.

          As the talk approached its conclusion (Brunel’s bridge originally carried seven trains per day: now it carries 70 and there are 18 million crossings annually on the road bridge) something set our docker off reminiscing about HMS Roberts again. He seemed lost in his own memories – as was I. Looking nostalgically down to the slipway far below, I could make out the chain-anchoring points for the old ferry. It ceased to operate in 1961 and, along with it, the shellfish stall that served the queueing passengers. All history now.