page_title: Sunderland
section_title: Bridges
hierarchical_section_title: Sunderland / History / 19th century / Bridges
caption_attribution_description: Wearmouth Bridge, across the River Wear in Sunderland, England. Photographed by John-Paul Stephenson on 8 September 2005.
context_page_description: Sunderland is in North East England. It was a county borough, and is now part of the City of Sunderland in Tyne and Wear. It sits at the mouth of the River Wear.
  Sunderland started as three small villages:
  Monkwearmouth was created in 674 when Saint Benedict Biscop started a monastery. Monkwearmouth is on the north side of the river.
  Bishopwearmouth was founded in 930. It is on the south side of the river.
  Sunderland, at the mouth of the river was a small fishing village. It was given a charter in 1179. The charter gave the people of the small town some rights which people outside the town did not have.
  Sunderland grew as a port, mostly selling coal and salt. In the 1300s people began to build ships along the river bank. By 1835, the port of Sunderland was so important that its name was used when the three old villages became the a borough. Sunderland became a city in 1992.
  A person born in Sunderland is sometimes called a Mackem.
context_section_description: The river at Sunderland is in a narrow valley, and the town grew up on plateaus high above the river. This meant it never had the problem of allowing people to cross the river without stopping high masted vessels. Rowland Burdon MP pushed for the Wearmouth Bridge, which was built in 1796. It was the second iron bridge ever built. Only the famous Iron Bridge itself is older, but Wearmouth bridge was over twice as long and only three-quarters the weight of the Iron Bridge. Wearmouth Bridge was the biggest single span bridge in the world. Farther up the river, another bridge, the Queen Alexandra Bridge, was built in 1910, linking the areas of Pallion and Southwick. It was designed for trains to run across, too, but the railway section was never completed.
caption: The Wearmouth Bridge
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