GAUNTLESS RR BRIDGE 1825 George Stephenson HEW 190 SE593 520 (not visited)
This bridge has had quite a history. It was originally built by the Burrell’s foundry in Newcastle to Stephenson’s design for the Stockton and Darlington Railway near Darlington and Shildon. Since then it has been ‘recycled’ five times and is now in the National Railway Museum as of 1975.
It has four 12 foot spans of trusses on cast iron trestles. The interlocking pieces are not bolted (which may account for why it was so easily moved so often). The curved pieces are of wrought iron cast into molded vertical legs which continue up to support the deck. The two walkways are supported by cantilever brackets which also help to make the structure rigid. M.F.Barbey likens it to “a Victorian bedstead end” (Civil Engineering Heritage, Northern England, M.F. Barbey p. 55)