Re-Opening of the Britannia Bridge 50th Anniversary

Celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Re-Opening of Britannia Bridge. Our first cover in the new Fourth Rail Series, featuring a stunning painting of the bridge by renowned artist John Wigston, postmarked Anglesey 30th January 2022.

Britannia Bridge is a bridge in Wales that crosses the Menai Strait between the Isle of Anglesey and city of Bangor. It was originally designed and built by railway engineer Robert Stephenson as a tubular bridge of wrought iron rectangular box-section spans for carrying rail traffic. Its importance was to form a critical link of the Chester and Holyhead Railway's route, enabling trains to directly travel between London and the port of Holyhead, facilitating a sea link to Dublin, Ireland.

For its time, the Britannia Bridge was a structure of "magnitude and singular novelty", far surpassing in length both contemporary cast beam or plate girder iron bridges. The noted engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel, a professional rival and personal friend of Stephenson's, was claimed to have remarked to him: "If your bridge succeeds, then mine have all been magnificent failures".