Waterloo Bridge Annunity - 1820

Beautiful annunity certificate #22 from the Waterloo Bridge Company issued in 1820. This item has the signatures of the Company's Officer's and is over 187 years old. Some reinforcement on folds.

Waterloo Bridge is a road and foot traffic bridge crossing the River Thames in London, England between Blackfriars Bridge and Hungerford Bridge. The name of the bridge is in memory of the British victory at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. Thanks to its location at a strategic bend in the river, the views of London (Westminster, the South Bank and London Eye to the west, the City of London and Canary Wharf to the east) from the bridge are widely held to be the finest from any spot at ground level.

Waterloo Bridge. The first bridge on the site was designed by John Rennie and opened in 1817 as a toll bridge. The granite bridge had nine arches, each of 120' span, and was 2,456' long, including approaches. Before its opening it was known as 'Strand Bridge'. It was nationalised in 1878 and given to the Metropolitan Board of Works, who removed the toll from it. Serious problems were found in its construction and the new owners reinforced it. Paintings of the bridge were created by the French Impressionist Claude Monet and English Impressionist, John Constable.

By the 1920s the problems had increased. London County Council decided to demolish it and replace it with a new structure designed by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott. The new span was partially opened in 1942 and completed in 1945. The new bridge was the only Thames bridge to have been damaged by German bombers during World War II. The building contractor was Peter Lind & Company Limited. It is frequently asserted that the work force was largely female and it is sometimes referred to as "the ladies' bridge". It is constructed in Portland stone from the South West of England; the stone cleans itself whenever it rains in London.

Granite stones from the original bridge were subsequently "presented to various parts of the British world to further historic links in the British Commonwealth of Nations". Two of these stones are in Canberra, the capital city of Australia, sited between the parallel spans of the Commonwealth Avenue Bridge, one of two major crossings of Lake Burley Griffin in the heart of the city. Stones from the bridge were used to build a monument in Wellington, New Zealand, to Paddy the Wanderer, a dog that roamed the wharves from 1928 to 1939 and was befriended by seamen, watersiders, Harbour Board workers and taxi drivers. The monument includes a bronze likeness of Paddy and drinking bowls for dogs.

The south end of the bridge is the area known as The South Bank and includes the Royal Festival Hall, Waterloo station, Queen Elizabeth Hall, the Royal National Theatre, and the National Film Theatre (directly beneath the bridge). The north end passes above the Victoria Embankment where the road joins the Strand and Aldwych alongside Somerset House.

History from Wikipedia and OldCompanyResearch.com (old stock certificate research service).