For Bristol, 8 December 1864, the day of the Clifton Suspension Bridge’s opening was a city-wide party and a chance for anyone who had any connection with the Bridge, no matter how small, to bring it to everyone’s attention. After all, staking a small claim to the Bridge’s renown was part and parcel of the carnival nature of the occasion. These details did not escape one ‘Cock Robin’ – an observer of the festivities, who chose to hide his or her identity behind a pseudonym – and whose poem ‘Who Opened the Bridge?’ appeared in the Bristol Daily Post of 9 December 1864 – that is, the day after the great event.
Not surprisingly, in its form the piece owes much to the old song ‘Who killed Cock Robin?’ in which bird after bird attests either to the part that he or she has played in the robin’s demise or will play in his obsequies.1 In the 1864 poem, no fewer than fifty-eight individuals or organisations lay claim to a role in ‘opening’ the bridge in the sense of bringing it into use. With some of them – for instance, ‘William Vick … his ghost’ or the engineers Brunel, Hawkshaw and Barlow– the connection is obvious; with others, it is tenuous in the extreme.
As for the bridge itself, the poem makes no attempt to describe it. Instead, drawing on ‘in’ jokes of the time and having much fun at the expense of various eminent nineteenth century Bristolians, it offers a rumbustious portrait of the life of the city of Bristol in the 1860s- its aspirations, its politics and its various internal rivalries. Instead of concluding, as we might expect, on a note of triumph at the spanning of the Avon Gorge, it ends with the Robin’s long lament for the loss of the peace that he once knew and his profound misgivings for the future.
About Cock Robin’s identity we know nothing, except that he is clearly well-informed both about Bristol’s administration and the eventful history of the Bridge’s construction. What his verse lacks in elegance it makes up both in gusto and ingenious rhyming; to come up with a rhyme for ‘consuls,’ for instance, is no mean achievement. At a guess – and my suggestion is entirely speculative – it is possible that this local rhymer may be the Mr H A Palmer who features in stanza 12 and whose steadfast opposition to any development of Leigh Woods is very much in tune with the concerns that surface in the poem’s closing lines (see note 12.).
The note which prefaces the published version of the verses is dated 8 December 1864, which suggests that Cock Robin delivered it to the Bristol Daily Post’s editorial office on the actual day of the bridge’s opening. Its inclusion in following day’s edition of the newspaper seems remarkable and may have called for some extensive overnight work by the compositors and printers. But it raises some question as to when, exactly, Cock Robin composed it. Admittedly Victorian writers could be prodigiously prolific, but to devise fifty-eight stanzas and a substantial coda during the afternoon following the ceremonies and get them to the Bristol Daily Post’s editor in time for publication on the following day seems extraordinary.
It is, of course, possible that Cock Robin gave himself a head-start. Ahead of the opening ceremony, all the Bristol newspapers included information about the participants in the respective military, civilian and bridge processions and the routes that they were to follow on the great day. After all, people taking part needed to know in advance where they were to assemble and which route to the bridge they should follow, while spectators would wish to choose a likely vantage point. If Cock Robin drew on the published plans for the day in preparing his stanzas, who can blame him? The detail that it may have ensured that his poem’s publication when the events of 8 December 1864 were still fresh in collective Bristolian memory was an additional piece of good fortune.
For the day’s celebrations, the broad plan seems to have been that the local Royal Naval Reserve and representatives of Gloucestershire and Somerset regiments – the ‘Military Procession – would initiate the proceedings. Having assembled in Thunderbolt Street, they would march to the Bridge via College Green, Park Street, Queen’s Road, Royal York Crescent, Caledonia Place and The Mall.2 It meant that they were on hand to marshal both the local dignitaries and clergy who made up Bridge Procession and the representatives of the Trades and Friendly Societies of Bristol who made up the Civic Procession.
Participants in what became known as the ‘Bridge Procession’ appear largely to have been civic dignitaries. They were instructed to gather on the road outside the Clifton Hotel at 22 The Mall. Besides William Naish, Mayor of Bristol, and the Aldermen, Councillors and Magistrates, they included the contractors – Messrs Cochrane and Grove; engineers John Hawkshaw and William Henry Barlow; their resident engineer – in today’s terms, the ‘project manager’ Thomas Airey – and representatives of his workforce. The Established Church featured in the persons of Rt Rev Charles Ellicott, the Lord Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol; Rev Gilbert Eliott, Dean of Bristol Cathedral, together with his young wife and the incumbents both of Christ Church, Clifton, and of St. Andrew’s which was Clifton’s Parish Church of the time.3 Local MPs joined them, together with the directors of the Clifton Suspension Bridge Company, headed by their Chairman, Captain Mark Huish – he was also General Manager of the LNWR – and his deputy Douglas Galton. The Bridge Company’s solicitors Messrs Ward and Pattrick were also on hand, with the auditors Messrs Bush and Pike; accountants, Curtis and W.W. Webb, and members of the Society of Merchant Venturers.4
The third and largest procession featured the Trade and Friendly Societies of Bristol and assembled itself initially in Corn Street. The trades of the city, which were numerous, included the city’s Iron Bedstead Manufacturers; the carvers. gilders and picture frame makers; stonemasons; cabinet makers; hatters; shipwrights; boot and shoe manufacturers who brought with them ‘a monster boot, four feet in length’ as an emblem of their calling, and the agricultural implement makers and wheelwrights, to name but a few. Among the Friendly Societies were the Ancient Order of Druids; the Ancient Order of Foresters and Shepherds; the Independent Order of Oddfellows; the Bristol Hibernian Benefit Society and both the Free Gardeners and the Practical Gardeners. Remarkably, the whole event had been only about two months in the planning and appears to have owed its inspiration to John Mills Kempster, Bristol councillor and undertaker who in October 1864, had chanced to write to Huish for advice concerning a fitting celebration of the bridge’s opening. 5
Here, then, is the text of the poem together with my identification of some of the individuals and organisations whom Cock Robin names. For ease of digestion, I have split it into sections which correspond broadly to the arrangement of the separate processions. The printed version makes frequent use of quotation marks, not only for actual quotations, but also for proper names such as ‘Lord Lieutenant of Cork’ or the ‘Royal Naval Reserve.’ Since it quickly becomes irritating for a reader, I have omitted them.
*
Who open’d the Bridge?
Who opened the Bridge?
I, said ‘Beau Naish,’ the Mayor And am quite ready to affirm or swear,
I open’d the Bridge. 6
[Military Procession]
We, said the Royal Naval Reserve,
We first crossed the bridge, so please observe,
We open’d the Bridge
I, said the Lord Lieutenant Earl of Ducie,
And deuce is in it, if but to amuse ye.
I open’d the Bridge. 7
I, said the Lord Lieutenant Earl of Cork,
A belted Earl, and yet they made me walk,
I open’d the Bridge. 8
I, said the Sheriff of Bristol, Cruger Miles,
With twenty stalwart Gloucester yeomen – ‘Files’,
I open’d the Bridge. 9
We, said the Bristol Artillery Volunteers,
When our salutes were drowned with thundering cheers,
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the Bristol Rifles, we are the men,
And we are ready, aye, ready to do it again;
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the Bristol Engineers,
And by the papers it appears
We open’d the Bridge.
I, said Sergeant-Major Kendall, N.S.Y.,
No, no, said Colonel Bruncker; no, ’twas I;
I open’d the Bridge.
I, said brave Captain Havilland,
I and Colonel Saville, and
We open’d the Bridge. 10
[Bridge Procession]
I, said [illeg] Way, MP.,
For I had my say, d’ye see?
I open’d the Bridge.11
I, said [illeg] Palmer,
Did you e’er see me calmer?
I open’d the Bridge. 12
Not I, said our Member,
Catarrh in December
Kept me from the Bridge. 13
I, said the Chief Constable Val Goold ,
By all the Irish boys girls I’m toold
I open’d the Bridge. 14
I, said Sir Arthur Elton, Bart.,
I miss’d the train, so in my Malvern cart,
I open’d the Bridge. 15
I, said the very Reverend, the Dean,
With my fair lady, tripping o’er the green,
I open’d the Bridge. 16
I, said the Major and the Canons Minor,
When we expressed a wish the day were finer,
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the Reverend Incumbent Brock,
With a short prayer (just one hour by the clock)
We open’d the Bridge. 17
We, said the Clergy and the vegetarians;
We said the Romanists and the Unitarians,
We open’d the Bridge.
I, said [William] Vick, Alderman and Mayor, his ghost,
When more than a century ago with ale and toast,
I open’d the Bridge.
I, said the spirit of Isambard Brunel,
And for all time Historians will tell
I open’d the Bridge.
We, said those civil engineers, Hawkshaw and Airey,
And Billy Barlow! Deny it Bristol, dare ye?
We open’d the Bridge.
I, said Captain Galton; What? Beware man!
Said Huish, of the Company the Chairman,
I open’d the Bridge.
We – Knapp, J.Miles, Bidder, L.Cooke, J.Ford,
And Captain Nicholson, being on the Board,
We open’d the Bridge. 18
We, said Grove and Cochrane, the contractors,
No, no, said Chute and all the comic actors,
We open’d the Bridge. 19
We, said Charles Ward and Pattrick the solicitors:
We have been told so by a thousand visitors,
We open’d the Bridge.
I, said the accountant, Corporal Curtis,
To doubt, on my memory a slur ’tis,
I open’d the Bridge.
I, said Lord Combermere.
In my three and ninetieth year,
I open’d the Bridge. 20
I, said J.Funshen,
Just after luncheon
I open’d the Bridge. 21
No, said Sir Greville:
Go to the — Himalayas!
I open’d the Bridge. 22
I, said ‘Sir Peto’,
(Wanting a seat) oh!
I open’d the Bridge. 23
We, said the Consuls,
Though the cold chilled our tonsils,
We open’d the Bridge.
I, said the brandisher of the City Sword,
I verily believe, upon my word,
I open’d the Bridge.
I, said the bearer of the Civic Mace,
An envious grin upon his handsome face,
I open’d the Bridge.
I, said Dan Burgess, the Town Clerk,
Now, all you people, by these presents mark,
I open’d the Bridge.
We, shouted the Colston Boys,
We made a jolly noise.
We open’d the Bridge.
We, whispered the Red Maid girls.
What trouble we took to arrange our curls!
We open’d the Bridge.
I, said Cos. Handel, though my coat was tore,
And everyone voted me a bore,
I open’d the Bridge. 24
I, said the cock’s-hatted Town Crier,
Bell in hand, an in my coat sweet-briar,
I open’d the Bridge.
I, said Sam Harley! All may understand,
White-waistcoated, and almanack in hand,
I open’d the Bridge. 25
I, said Kempster the Counsell man.
I say what none in the Council can.
I open’d the Bridge. 26
We, said the Fairest of the Fair,
Who, in the ‘Stand’ sat shivering there.
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the Auditors, James Bush and Pike,
We, said the bricklayers, who were out on strike.
We open’d the Bridge.
I, said Captain Claxton, Sec. RN,
You know I am the truthfullest of men.
I open’d the Bridge. 27
I, said Sergeant Kinglake, the Recorder,
In my court suit, brand new and made to order,
I open’d the Bridge.
We, said the Guardians of the Poor,
Who never don’t turn no-one from the door,
We open’d the Bridge.
[Procession of the Trades and Friendly Societies of Bristol]
We, said the Ancient Company of Guilders,
’Tis lies to say ‘’twas them nasty Builders.
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the Oddfellows. Yes ’twas us,
As always likes a little bit of fuss.
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the Druids (and the Bristol beer
Was summat strong and made us downright queer.)
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the ancient Foresters, yes, we
In Lincoln Green and bravest finery,
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the hardy, red-breech’d Navigators,
(No time, that day, to eat our biled pertaters.)
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the Shepherds, with our brazen crooks,
We, said the Printers, with our press and books.
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the Builders of boilers and carts,
The sawyers and braziers and makers of tarts.
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the builders of bedsteads and whips,
We said the hatters and builders of ships.
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the Tinkers and Tipplers and Tailors.
We, said the Soldiers and Flymen and Sailors.
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the Gold-beaters, Sweeps and Cork-cutters;
We, said the Dames who sell fruit in the gutters.
We open’d the Bridge.
We, said the Worshipful Company of Undertakers.
We, said the Organ-grinders and Quakers.
We open’d the Bridge.
Who opened the Bridge?
I, said Cock Robin, Sighing and sobbin’,
Sighing to leave this beautiful glen,
Sobbing to think of poor Jenny Wren,
Who has gone far away,
And left me for aye – .
No wonder she’s gone: barbarous, barbarous,
No shelter left here to harbour us, harbour us.
Even the fox
Has deserted the rocks;
And the owls and the bats
Give place to the rats
And the old ladies’ cats!
And I am alone,
On this cold, cold stone,
Waiting for day,
Then far, far away –
I know not where,
And I don’t much care.
No place for the Dickey Birds here, I see:
No shrubs, no plantations and only one tree,
And a railway leading where nobody knows:
And another on which, of course, nobody goes:
And an Iron Bridge to bring over the scamps,
Lighted, most likely, with horrid gas lamps,
On purpose to scare the nightingales
From the haunts where they waggle their dear little tails.
Every day the noise is louder
Of the blasting powder,
In the tunnels:
Every day our haws and hips
Are blackened by the smoke of ships
From fiery funnels.
Every day I hear men talking
Of building lots where they are walking.
Oh! My poor heart!
Of building streets, hotels and squares,
Where now are feeding peacefully the hares –
Oh greedy Bart.
The Bridge will be open’d today,
The gas is put out, and the streets are dark,
And yet what a noise on the Downs, only hark –
A minute and I am away.
The wind is howling through the woods of Leigh,
And if the day be wet as wet can be,
Let it weep on. I’ll bear it company.
Cock Robin, 8th December 1864.
Notes
1 The Wikipedia entry for ‘Cock Robin’ gives a full version of the traditional song. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cock_Robin. There are many parodies in circulation.
2 According to www.bristolinformation.co.uk/streets/lost-streets, Thunderbolt Street which was ‘very short’ ran off Prince Street. Broad Quay House now stands on its former site.
3 An air-raid of November 1940 left St Andrew’s Church ruined, but it was not demolished until 1956 Information from https://archives.bristol.gov.uk/records/17563/1/420 which includes photographs of the former building. The churchyard survives, known as ‘Birdcage Walk’ which is also the title of the late Helen Dunmore’s novel about eighteenth-century Bristol.
4 W.W. Webb’s book, A Complete Account of the Origin and Progress of the Clifton Suspension Bridge over the River Avon. The 1865 edition includes a very full account of the bridge’s opening and is available online via Google Books.
5 Western Daily Press, 27 October 1864.
6 Elected Mayor of Bristol in November 1864, Alderman Naish was nominated for the post by the Conservative Party; he was also Chairman of Trustees of the Bristol Royal Infirmary and Chief Magistrate (Western Daily Press, 25 August 1864; Bristol Daily Post, 10 November 1864). Relatively new to the post when the Bridge was opened, he was not, in fact, a full-going Tory. A pen portrait of the time describes him as ‘a mild Liberal…a Dissenter’ and ‘a clever man, of good business habits, without strong sectarian bias.’ (Bristol Times and Mirror, 12 November 1864.)
7 Henry Reynolds-Morton (1827-1921), 3 rd Earl of Ducie, was Lord Lieutenant of Gloucestershire from 1857 until 1911. Following an 1859 invasion scare, he organised a cohort of artillery company volunteers in Bristol, (Wikipedia.)
8 Richard Boyle, 3 rd Earl of Cork (1829-1904) was Lord-Lieutenant of Somerset from 1864 until his death; he was also Queen Victoria’s Master of the Horse and Master of the Royal Buckhounds.
9 Henry W Cruger Miles was elected High Sheriff of the City and Country of Bristol at the same time as Naish was elected Mayor. (Bristol Times and Mirror, 12 November 1864.)
10 Major (not Colonel) Henry Bouchier Osborne Savile and Captain Francis Haviland commanded, respectively, the Gloucestershire Artillery Volunteers (within Bristol) and the North Somerset Yeomanry. (Information from the Wikipedia entry for the Gloucestershire Volunteer Artillery and Wells Journal, 19 November 1864.)
11 Arthur Edwin Way, MP (1813-1870), sometime steward of the Ashton Court Estate, https://ahousehistory.com/the-way-era-1880-1936/ He succeeded Sir Arthur Hallam Elton as Member of Parliament for Bath, holding the seat from 1859-65.
12 Probably H.A. Palmer. Seeking to prevent any development of the Nightingale Valley area, when the landowner Sir Greville Smyth of Ashton Court sold it to a speculator, Palmer tried to raise funds for a rival bid. To cut an involved narrative short, his efforts had little result, but the speculator seems to have quit the scene at an early stage. The newly formed Leigh Woods Development Company, which was made up of wealthy Bristolians, purchased a substantial acreage from Smyth, on which – to Palmer’s chagrin – they built the elegant church and sizeable houses which make up the kernel of the present Leigh Woods.
For a full account of the story, see https://www.leighwoods.org/history/andrewswift
13 Henry Gore Langton, MP. had gone to the South of France ‘for his health’ at the time of the Bridge’s opening, but donated £10 ‘unasked […] towards the expenses.’ (Bristol Mercury, 3 December 1864.)
14 Valentine Goold was Chief Constable of the Somerset Constabulary. Apparently Superintendent Box (whom the poem dies not mention) was his opposite number in Gloucestershire.
15 Sir Arthur Hallam Elton, 7th Baronet, (1818-1883.) He was MP for Bath from 1857-1859. In suggesting that he missed the proceedings, Cock Robin appears to have been mistaken. The Bristol Daily Post of 9 Dec 1864 reports that he attended the bridge’s opening, in command of ‘about forty members of the Clevedon Artillery Corps.’
16 In December 1863, Rev. Gilbert Elliot (1800-91), Dean of Bristol, married romantic novelist Frances Vickris Dickinson, aka Frances Minto Elliot (1820-98). For information about her, see https://theidlewoman.net/projects/the-original-idle-woman/
17 Rev Mourant Brock was the vicar of Christ Church, Clifton (Western Daily Press, 1 January 1864.) Bristol newspapers seem to prefer not to mention his unusual first name, possibly because their staff were uncertain about how to spell it.
18 Captain Mark Huish chaired the Bridge Company; Captain Douglas Galton was Deputy Chairman; their co-Directors were George Parker Bidder; I.A.Cooke; J.Ford; J.W.Miles; Captain W S Nicholson and A.J Knapp. (W.W.Webb, A Complete Account of the Clifton Suspension Bridge, issued under the sanction of the Directors. Published by the Author, Bristol, 1865. p.70) Available via Google Books.
19 James Chute was manager of the Bristol Old Vic Theatre, from 1858 until at least 1867. https://bristololdvic.org.uk/archive/james-chute
20 Lord Combermere’s only connection with the bridge appears to have been his residing in Clifton, at Colchester House in the Avenue in his declining years. (Wikipedia, entry for Field Marshal Sir Stapleton Stapleton-Cotton, 1st Viscount Combermere, 1773-1865.)
21 J.Funshen, sad to say, has proved impossible to identify.
22 Sir John Henry Greville Upton Smyth (1836-1901) of Ashton Court, landowner and naturalist. To judge from his Wikipedia entry, he was himself a great traveller.
23 Sir Samuel Morton Peto, Bart (1809-1889), railway contractor, was MP for Norwich from 1847-53; for Finsbury from 1859-63 and for Bristol from 1865-68. (ICE Obituary)
24 Handel Cossham of Pucklechurch – colliery owner, lay preacher, Liberal politician and lifelong teetotaller – would be elected MP for the newly created constituency of Bristol East in 1885.
25 Samuel Harley Bushell – to give his full name – of Bath was interested in meteorology and given to offering ad hoc weather forecasts of variable accuracy. For the bridge’s opening on 8 December 1864, he anticipated ‘Strong winds from the south and south by east’ with heavy rain (Western Daily Press, 3 December 1864). At one time, he brought out annual weather almanacks.
26 John Mills Kempster, Bristol Town Councillor, was instrumental in promoting a public ceremony to mark the completion of the Clifton Suspension Bridge and Chairman of the Procession Committee (Bristol Mercury, 22 October and 3 December 1864.)
27 Christopher Claxton, 1789-1868, naval officer and later Bristol’s Quay Warden (harbour master.) He was a friend of Brunel’s and his unofficial marine adviser.
Article by Victoria Owens
Victoria Owens is one of the Clifton Suspension Bridge’s volunteer tour guides. An independent scholar and writer, she is a member of the Railway & Canal Historical Society’s panel of book reviewers and serves on the Newcomen Society’s Council. In the days before Covid-19, she used to sing with Bristol Chamber Choir.
Her books James Brindley and the Duke of Bridgewater – Canal Visionaries (2015) and Aqueducts and Viaducts of Britain (Amberley Publishing 2019) are both available from Amberley Publishing. Her most recent publication Lady Charlotte Guest – the exceptional life of a female industrialist came out in September 2020 and is available from Pen and Sword Books.
