Back and Forth

Published on Saturday 30 December 2006 15:38

Q I believe one of my ancestors worked on the Forth Rail Bridge. Are there any records of the building of the bridge that I could look at for evidence of him?

S Bruce (by e-mail)

A The Forth Rail Bridge is one of Scotland's most iconic monuments. It was the world's first major steel bridge and is Scotland's largest listed building. Before the bridge was constructed, it was necessary to take a ferry across the Forth to get to Fife from South Queensferry and this service continued until the opening of the Forth Road Bridge in the 1960s.

The building of the rail bridge was begun in 1883 and a company was formed to oversee its design, construction and the maintenance of the line: The Forth Bridge Railway Company, incorporated under an Act of 5 August 1873. Work on the bridge was formally completed on 4 March 1890 when HRH Edward Prince of Wales tapped into place a "golden" rivet. The bridge was designed by Sir John Fowler and Benjamin Baker and in its construction 4,000 men were employed at times, 54,000 tonnes of steel were used and 6,500,000 rivets driven in. Its total cost was 3.2 million.

A number of men died while constructing the bridge and for years their identities went unknown as there is no official record of their deaths with the Forth Bridge Railway Company. During 2004 and 2005, however, a lot of work was undertaken by a local historian to find out who died, and the names of the 63 workers she identified can be viewed on the website of the Forth Bridges Visitors Centre Trust (www.forthbridges.org.uk). This includes the name, occupation, date of death, age and cause of death.

The records of the Forth Bridge Railway Company are held by the National Archives of Scotland. These records mostly consist of minutes of meetings of shareholders, directors and the board, registers of shareholders, notes and agreements, and engineers' notes and calculations. There are also a lot of photographs of the construction of the bridge and a large number of drawings and plans. These records unfortunately do not include the names of employees.

If, in fact, you believe that your ancestor may have been a shareholder in the bridge, then his name may be included in the shareholder's registers.

The contractor for the construction of the bridge was Sir William Arrol and Co Ltd. The records of this company are held by Glasgow City Archives at the Mitchell Library. It is unlikely that they would have lists of the workers they employed, but you might contact Glasgow City Archives to find out. Contact details for the archive can be found at www.scan.org.uk