Stoke Bridge in

Ipswich Ipswich () is a port town and borough in Suffolk, England, of which it is the county town. The town is located in East Anglia about away from the mouth of the River Orwell and the North Sea. Ipswich is both on the Great Eastern Main Line r ...

carries Bridge Street ( A137) over the point at which the

River Gipping The River Gipping is the source river for the River Orwell in the county of Suffolk in East Anglia, England, which is named from the village of Gipping, and which gave its name to the former Gipping Rural District. The name is unrelated to ...

becomes the

River Orwell The River Orwell flows through the county of Suffolk in England from Ipswich to Felixstowe. Above Ipswich, the river is known as the River Gipping, but its name changes to the Orwell at Stoke Bridge, where the river becomes tidal. It broadens in ...

. It carries traffic into Ipswich from the suburb of

Over Stoke Stoke is a suburb of Ipswich, in the Ipswich district, in the county of Suffolk, England. Stoke was placed in the hundred of Ipswich in 1086 in the Domesday Book as one of 470 places under the control of the Abbey of Ely St Etheldreda. Ameniti ...

. The bridge consists of two separate structures and is just upstream from

Ipswich dock The Ipswich Docks, Ipswich wet dock and the wet dock,) are a series docks in Port of Ipswich located at a bend of the River Orwell which has been used for trade since at least the 8th Century. A wet dock was constructed in 1842 which was 'the big ...

on a tidal section of the river. In 1789, Robert Ransome moved to Ipswich begin the “Orwell Works company employeeing 1500 men. His fourth patent in 1808 was for improvements on the wheel and spring ploughs. He was then joined in business by his two sons and the firm “Ransome and Sons” was one of the first to build iron bridges. The Stoke Bridge at Ipswich was constructed by them in 1818.

History

There are records of a bridge existing on the site from the late 13th Century. The fact that the

Domesday Book Domesday Book () – the Middle English spelling of "Doomsday Book" – is a manuscript record of the "Great Survey" of much of England and parts of Wales completed in 1086 by order of King William I, known as William the Conqueror. The manusc ...

mentions

Saint Mary at Stoke Saint Mary at Stoke is a Grade I listed Anglican church in the Old Stoke area of Ipswich. on the junction of Stoke Street and Belstead Road in Ipswich, Suffolk. The church stands in a prominent position near the foot of a ridge, just south west ...

implies that a crossing existed much earlier. The bridge is featured in John Speed's map of Ipswich of 1610 and

Joseph Hodskinson Joseph is a common male given name, derived from the Hebrew Yosef (יוֹסֵף). "Joseph" is used, along with "Josef", mostly in English, French and partially German languages. This spelling is also found as a variant in the languages of the mo ...

's map of 1783. The southbound bridge has a plaque celebrating the bridge's erection over 1924 and 1925. The bridge was the southernmost crossing of the river in Ipswich until the construction of

Orwell Bridge The Orwell Bridge is a concrete box girder bridge just south of Ipswich in Suffolk, England. Opened to road traffic in 1982, the bridge carries the A14 road (formerly the A45) over the River Orwell. History Design The main span is 190 metre ...

in the 1980s.

History

References

See also