Historic island-town bathed in glory at opening of the new bridge

“Oh to be able to go back and dander over that bridge just one more time!” a News Letter reader yearned, and more from the

wonderfully evocative e-mail in a moment.

The Johnston Bridge was highlighted on Roamer’s page last week because that’s exactly what Selwyn Johnston hopes will happen!

A regular contributor to Roamer’s page (and not related to the bridge’s namesake) Selwyn has been enthusiastically campaigning for some years to have the bridge’s original lighting restored to its former glory and powered by solar electricity.

He firmly believes that lights and bridges “are symbolically a sign of hope” and that restoring the lampstands “could be a way of sharing this within our community, at a time when it is needed most.”

When it was built, the bridge had eight lampstands and the four that remain today aren’t working.

Selwyn wants the missing four replaced and all eight lit up at night.

He shared a little of the bridge’s history last week, which can be a tad complicated as there are so many bridges around the island-town and some of them have several names!

Also, unless you look carefully beneath the riverside roads, it’s sometimes hard to know where the bridges start and the roads end!

Until the Johnston Bridge was built, the only access to Enniskillen was by two bridges, the present East Bridge built in 1892 and the West Bridge in 1885.

Selwyn was brought up in a family-run riverside guesthouse adjacent to the West Bridge, also called the Erne Bridge, an early encounter with tourism that sparked his interest in lighting up the Johnston Bridge.

Along with a link road to Irvinestown, it was first proposed “as far back as the 1840s” he recounted, though “it took over 100 years for Enniskillen to get The Johnston Bridge and the Cornagrade Road” he added.

The Johnston Bridge was built in 1950 and then the Queen Elizabeth Road was constructed on the shore of the northern part of the island, opened in 1954 and linked by a ramp to the Queen Elizabeth Bridge, also called the East Bridge.

While Roamer probably waxed a little too lyrical last week about Lough Erne’s multiple bridges, a copy of a local newspaper article about the 1954 opening more than confirms the profusion of bridges all across the panoramic Lakeland!

Sent to me by the Fermanagh and Omagh District Council Museum Services, the article is headlined ‘Enniskillen - Venice of the North’.

From the Impartial Reporter of 18 th November 1954, it describes the opening of the Johnston Bridge on the 15th November by the Rt Hon Viscount Brookeborough, Prime Minister of Northern Ireland.

Sadly, the man after whom the bridge was named, Enniskillen’s Mayor Alderman W. E. Johnston, wasn’t present at the opening due to illness but proposing a vote of thanks to the Prime Minister, Alderman George Elliott emphasised the tally of bridges built by the Borough and County councils during the previous three decades.

“They had done a lot of work,” said Alderman Elliott, adding “they constructed the Boa Island Bridge, the Galloon Bridge, the bridges connecting Lisnaskea with South Fermanagh and had placed a contract for a bridge into Cleenish Island.”

While it was the Prime Minister who christened Enniskillen ‘the Venice of the North’ at the civic luncheon in the Town Hall after the bridge was opened, Alderman Elliott’s vote of thanks further promoted Enniskillen to “the cleanest and best kept town in Northern Ireland and the most picturesque county of the six.”

It’s almost impossible to fully appreciate just how little the bridge cost in those pre-inflation days, but the overall cost revealed at the civic luncheon was outlined in the Impartial Reporter; the Johnston Bridge totalled £33,000, the link road cost £25,000 and the Queen Elizabeth Road and ramp together came to £44,000.

After he’d cut the tape to open the whole complex “the Prime Minister was presented with the scissors as a memento” the report ended.

“I greatly enjoyed your article and photos about the building of the Johnston Bridge,” Ian Elliott e-mailed Roamer after reading last Wednesday’s page.

“The island in the middle is called Cherry Island,” Ian explained, describing it as “a perfect setting overlooking the lake.”

Ian attended Portora Royal School in the 1960s and 1970s.

“Many a time I walked to visit my aunt and passed this scene,” his e-mail continued “those wonderful prefab houses in the photo reminded me of their super design and how popular they were after the war. Warm, spacious and so neat.

Further to the left was the area we called ‘The Dardanelles’ named after the rows of soldiers’ houses.”

This long-gone housing was occupied by the families of WWI veterans.

“The area recalled the unique military history of the town in raising two Inniskilling regiments of the British Army,” Ian’s e-mail continued, ending evocatively “Oh to be able to go back and dander over that bridge and through The Dardanelles just one more time! I hope that the lighting gets sorted out for Selwyn and town.”

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