OLD DEVONPORT . UK
www.olddevonport.uk
 

SALTASH FERRY (FLOATING BRIDGE)

FLOATING BRIDGE NUMBER 4

Saltash Ferry Bridge number 4 at Saltash, with a Tamar barge passing up river.
From a postcard.

Saltash Ferry Bridge number 4 being loaded at Saltash Passage, Devonport.

Saltash Floating Bridge Number 4 was a steel one built by Messrs Willoughby Brothers Limited, of Plymouth, and she entered service during the afternoon of Wednesday December 30th 1891 amid great rejoicing.

She cost £2,200 and was two feet wider in the carriageway and about eleven feet longer from gate to gate than the previous vessel.  Engines and boilers were on one side; the other was a passenger cabin with stairs to a promenade deck above.  Designed by Mr A M Brumage CE RN, she was powered by two surface condensing engines of 12 nominal horse power with a similar power vertical cross-tube boiler of Siemen's mild steel, having a heating surface of 120 superficial feet to suit a working pressure of 70lbs and a water test of 140lbs to the square inch.

After only a few weeks she broke down and the old ferry, which had already been sold for scrap, was brought back.  

In 1895 she was temporarily withdrawn again to have a new boiler fitted by Messrs Biddles of Millbay Docks, Plymouth, the service being maintained by a barge lashed to a Reynold’s of Torpoint tug.

She was held in reserve when the next new Ferry arrived in 1911 and was finally disposed of in 1927 to Messrs Vick Brothers, of Plymouth..