Read here about the history of the Chain Pier

Read here about images of the Chain Pier

 

Read about the history of the Chain Pier

There are details about the Chain Pier in several entries:

The Packet Ships which sailed from the Chain Pier BPC00072

The designer of the Chain Pier, Captain Samuel Brown, BPC00065 and BPC00104.

The construction of the Chain Pier is described on the image in BPC00106

What promenading on the Chain Pier was like BPC00084

The waterwheel beside the Chain Pier BPC00099

The buildings at the end of the Chain Pier BPC00084 and BPC00086

The storms which damaged the Pier BPC00076

Changes to the Chain Pier entrance BPC00069

A description of the eastern pedestrian entrance BPC00481

The plan to build a harbour around the Chain Pier BPC00476

How to date images of the Chain Pier BPC00082

See the Dividend Payment Certificate from the ‘Brighthelmstone Suspension Pier Company’, incorporated by Act of Parliament in 1822  BPC00103

About images of the Chain Pier

The bulk of the Chain Pier publications were in the 1820s and ‘30s. By the 1850s the market was nearly saturated, with very few new prints published in the ‘50s and ‘60s. The exception appears to be the two views produced by J.M.W. Turner, one of which was not published until 1859, with re-prints up to 1880. The other view, with the well-known ‘rainbow’, was first published in 1825 but had re-prints taken from the re-engraved plate up until 1892 (the pier having been closed in 1889 on safety grounds). While there are a lot of prints of the pier, these images do afford a great variety of views along the east and west cliff developments, and of the sea shore.

See all the galleries on the galleries page