The collection is due for sale at Christie's in South Kensington on 9 June, in a sale of fine printed books and manuscripts, and the auctioneers estimate it will fetch anything between £3,000 and £5,000.
The drawings, which have been authenticated by archivists at the Institution of Civil Engineers, are duplicate plans which were prepared from drawings sent by some of the chief contractors working on the construction of Tower Bridge, and are dated between 1888 and 1893. They originate from the office of John Wolfe Barry, the chief engineer for the bridge.
They include details relating to the preliminary stages of construction – the positioning shown relative to barge routes on the Thames in one case, as well as a temporary staging from 1889 showing the bridge in its entirety – and illustrate the infrastructure impacts of such a project. The plans were sent to the office of Wolfe Barry, head engineer, from the offices of Baron Armstrong – overseeing hydraulics – and Sir William Arrol, as well as from that of Sir Joseph Bazalgette, an earlier contender for the role of chief architect on the project.
They are being sold with a selection of engineering instruments also from Wolfe Barry's office.
