This is the site of the Old Putney Bridge built in 1729.
"Putney Bridge, Christmas 1879" published in The Art Journal, 1881. Wood engraving with recent hand colour.
The legal framework for construction of a bridge was approved by an Act of Parliament (the Fulham and Putney Bridge Act) in 1726. Built by local master carpenter Thomas Phillips to a design by architect Sir Jacob Acworth, the first bridge was opened on 29 November 1729. In its first guise, from 1729 to 1886 it was slightly down river to the north, and in many official records was also known as Fulham Bridge. It was the only bridge between London Bridge and Kingston Bridge at the time. A toll bridge, it had tollbooths at either end of the timber-built structure.[3]
In October 1795, Mary Wollstonecraft, philosopher and early women's equality advocate, allegedly planned to commit suicide by jumping from the bridge, because she had returned from a trip to Sweden to discover that her lover was involved with an actress from London.[4]
The bridge has been the starting point for The Boat Race since 1845 when the course was revised. The competitors are currently 32 men of Oxford and University of Cambridge with two crews of first and second eights. Women's eights competed this for the first time in 2015, having since 1927 competed a shorter varsity race in Henley also in the early spring.[5]
The bridge was badly damaged by the collision of a river barge in 1870. Although part of the bridge was subsequently replaced, soon the entire bridge would be demolished.
The NEW Putney Bridge stands west from this site, linking Putney on the south side with Fulham to the north. The bridge has medieval parish churches beside its abutments: St Mary's Church, Putney is built on the south and All Saints Church, Fulham on the north bank. This close proximity of two churches by a major river is rare, another example being at Goring-on-Thames and Streatley, villages hemmed in by the Chiltern Hills (the Goring Gap). Before the first bridge was built in 1729, a ferry had shuttled between the two banks.
* PLEASE REFER TO THIS LINK:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Putney_Bridge
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