The stupendous Railway Bridge across the Thames at Battersea from Battersea Park Railway Pier to Grosvenor Road Station is said to be _the Widest Railway Bridge in the World_. It consists of four arches each one hundred and seventy-five feet span in the clear, with a rise of seventeen feet six inches. The immense ribs which support the superstructure are formed throughout of wrought iron, and are firmly attached to massive cast-iron standards which are placed over the piers; the whole of the frame-work is thus made continuous throughout. On each side of the river is a land arch of seventy feet span, making the entire length of the bridge eight hundred and forty feet. The abutments were put in by means of coffer-dams, and the foundations are carried down thirty feet below Trinity high-water mark. The piers are built upon the same principle as that which was first applied by the late Charles Fox to the building of the Bridge at Rochester, Charing Cross, and Cannon Street, Railway Bridges. The bridge was first erected by Mr. J. Fowler. In 1865-6 it was enlarged by the late Sir Charles Fox. Some antiquarians have stated that about fifty yards westward of Chelsea Suspension Bridge, Cæsar and his legions crossed the river Thames by a ford when in pursuit of the Britons who were retreating from the Romans. The ford is described at low water as a shoal of gravel not more than three feet deep, sufficient for ten men to walk abreast, except on the Surrey side where it has been deepened by raising ballast, and the causeway from the South bank may yet be traced at low water. Others think that the place of crossing was higher up the river, either at Chertsey or Kingston; the latter was anciently called Moreford, or the Great Ford. However, landing at Deal, it is natural the Romans would cross the river at some ford nearest that point.[1]