The Norman tower-keep of Rochester Castle was built in around 1127 with Kentish ragstone. It is 113 feet high and has three floors above the basement level.

Every time I visit Stokesay Castle it takes me by surprise. One look at the gatehouse which was built in 1640-41 makes me feel that I have stepped back in time. The gatehouse as it stands now, probably replaces an original stone structure of which little is known.

The detailing on the gatehouse is quite elaborate with stars, moons, angels, dragons, Adam, Eve and more incorporated into the design:

The biblical story of the fall of man is carved along the lintel above the entrance, with the trees of life and of the knowledge of good and evil at each end, and Adam, the serpent and Eve between them. Adam and Eve appear again on the brackets flanking the entrance, while the brackets to the south are carved as acanthus leaves and those to the north as a pair of dragons. Angels top the wooden pilasters set on either side of the window above.

The inner side of the gatehouse repeats the exterior design, with the addition of two doors, but the carving is even more flamboyant. Dragons grasp a shield over the doorway and on the brackets on either side are a man and woman in Jacobean dress, accompanied respectively by a nude woman, half-hidden, and a nude man. More human figures support the low arches beneath the window above.*

*From the Stokesay Castle guidebook.

As mentioned in my previous post this was the first major bridge of its kind to be designed for vehicles.

Project 2020 which is community group local to the bridge have produced a leaflet full of interesting facts about the bridge:

The remarkable bridge was built by Captain Samuel Brown RN in 1819-20 to demonstrate patents.  Brown had pioneered the development of wrought iron anchor chains and rigging whilst still in the navy.  On his retirement in 1812, he set up an iron works at Millwall,, London.  In 1816 he registered a patent for the manufacture of chain links.  The following year he filed another patent for ‘improvements in suspension bridges’ which included his flexible chain link design which had been developed from ships’ rigging blocks.

The opportunity to put his theories into practice came in 1819 when the Berwick and North Durham Turnpike Trustees commissioned Captain Brown to build the Union Chain Bridge.  The bridge took less than a year to build and, with a record-breaking span of 137m/449ft, cost just £7,700, significantly cheaper and quicker than constructing a traditional stone bridge.

The bridge was opened with much ceremony on  26th July 1820.  Captain Brown demonstrated its strength by driving across a curricle, followed by 12 loaded carts, estimated to weigh 20 tons!  These were followed by 600 spectators eager to cross to the other side.  The event was witnessed by leading Scottish engineer Robert Stevenson and soon the bridge attracted visitors from all over Europe.  Leading French engineer Charles Navier, accompanied by eighteen year old Isambard Brunel travelled here in April 1823 to study this remarkable structure.  Isambard’s father Marc, the famous engineer, visited two weeks later.

Maintenance was paid for by the revenue from tolls.  The Toll Keeper’s Cottage was originally built into the red sandstone cliffs on the English side.  Around the 1900s a family of five lived in the two rooms.  The cottage was demolished in  1955, a commemorative plaque marks where it stood.

It is thought to be part of a medieval mechanism that raised a font cover that has long since disappeared.

This is almost certainly the remains of an elaborate lifting mechanism for raising, by way of a chain through the dragon’s mouth, the 50ft (15.2m) high cover known to have adorned the medieval font, but lost at the Reformation. *

*From the York Minster guide book.

PS: I have amended my typo as per the first comment