Gloucester Westgate Bridge (The Gatehouse Record)

Also known as, or recorded in historical documents as;
Great Bridge

In the civil parish of Gloucester.
In the historic county of Gloucestershire.
Modern Authority of Gloucestershire.
1974 county of Gloucestershire.
Medieval County of Gloucestershire.

OS Map Grid Reference: SO82411902
Latitude 51.86905° Longitude -2.25541°

Gloucester Westgate Bridge has been described as a certain Fortified Bridge.

There are no visible remains.

Description

Bridge crossing the River Severn in Gloucester. It was rebuilt in 1222 and fortified by brattice and barbican circa 1225. (PastScape)

To the far west there was the medieval West Gate, probably built at the same at the bridge in the reign of Henry II. This gate, rebuilt in the time of Henry VIII, survived into the 19th century as an ornamental approach. (Lobel 1969)

The west gate, a substantial structure with four corner turrets, was removed in 1805 or 1806 in preparation for the rebuilding of Westgate bridge. (VCH)

Sources of information, references and further reading

Historic England (PastScape) Defra or Monument number(s) 115495; 1431092.
County Historic Environment Record (or Sites and Monuments Record) number(s) 10127; 10128.

Websites (Gatehouse is not responsible for the content of external websites.)
- BBC Gloucestershire
  BBC your paintings
  Wikipedia entry
Books
- Herbert, N.M., 1988, 'Bridges, gates, and walls' and 'Gloucester Castle' in Herbert, N.M. (ed), VCH Gloucestershire Vol. 4 (Oxford: OUP for the Institute of Historical Research) p. 242-7 online transcription
  Lobel, M.D., 1969, 'Gloucester' in Lobel, M.D. (ed), Historic Towns: Maps and Plans of Towns and Cities in the British Isles, with Historical Commentaries, from Earliest Times to 1800 Vol. 1 (London: Lovell Johns-Cook, Hammond and Kell Organization) p. 7 online copy
  Colvin, H.M., Brown, R.Allen and Taylor, A.J., 1963, The history of the King's Works Vol. 2: the Middle Ages (London: HMSO) p. 651-6
Periodical Articles
- Harrison, D., McKeague, P. and Watson, B., 2010, 'England's fortified medieval bridges and bridge chapels: a new survey' Medieval Settlement Research Vol. 25 p. 45-51 online copy
  1974, The Antiquaries Journal Vol. 54 p. 49-51
Other sources: Theses; 'grey' literature; in-house reports; unpublished works; etc.
- Bruce Watson, 2013 Sept, Gazetteer of fortified bridges (working list kindly shared with Gatehouse) (records Westgate and Great Bridge as two separate entries - reflecting the PastScape records but this is the same bridge)

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The bibliography owes much to various bibliographies produced by John Kenyon for the Council for British Archaeology, the Castle Studies Group and others.

Suggestions for finding online and/or hard copies of bibliographical sources can be seen at this link.
Minor archaeological investigations, such as watching brief reports, and some other 'grey' literature is most likely to be held by H.E.R.s but is often poorly referenced and is unlikely to be recorded here, or elsewhere, but some suggestions can be found here.

The possible site or monument is represented on maps as a point location. This is a guide only. It should be noted that OS grid references defines an area, not a point location. In practice this means the actual center of the site or monument may often, but not always, be to the North East of the point shown. Locations derived from OS grid references and from latitude longitiude may differ by a small distance.
Further information on mapping and location can be seen at this link.

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