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An etching of the bridge over the Lutterworth Road at Rugby as depicted by John Cooke Bourne in June 1839 in a collection of 'wash drawings' of the construction of the London & Birmingham Railway. An initial thought that this drawing is of the opposite side of the bridge as depicted in image 'lnwrrm3326' (a drawing from Osborne's London & Birmingham Railway Guide) is soon dismissed because the shadows in both indicate they are of the same view. It is thought the artist is looking towards Lutterworth with the site of the first 'temporary station' on his left. One reason for this opinion is because the shadows slant away beneath the arches. The railway at this point is running nearly East to West so for the shadows to be as shown the sun would need to be behind the artist. This imposing bridge would be demolished within a few years as the amount of traffic to Stafford, Birmingham and Leamington required additional lines to be built thereby increasing the width of the railway to accommodate seven sets of tracks as can be seen in image 'lnwrrm852'. Stephen Weston of the LNWR Society and co-owner of Parliamentary Trains writes, 'The supporting walls (piers) of this bridge are still there (in 2016)!! As part of the WCML upgrade a few years ago, I supervised the drilling of the bridge piers to find out what brickwork was there. Also if you drive underneath it, you can see the distinct sections of this structure in the piers; the original part (with retaining plates and tie bars) the new Leamington line part and then the Trent Valley Line pier. Also, if you walk along the footpath and look up, you can see the arches which I think are the originals. The specification called for ‘Rugby Best White Brick’ which are actually a very pale yellow.'
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