SIR - Mike Pryce was perfectly correct in saying Worcester Bridge was closed by the great flood of 1947, if only for a few days, and M Simpkins (Letters, November 19) is wrong to doubt this. I very well remember this event, as I was working in a menswear shop in Broad Street at the time.

The methods to keep the bridge open as described by M Simpkins were used, as also was the use of farm tractors, but in the end the water in New Road became too deep for even the biggest vehicle and the bridge became unusable.

The only direct way from St John's to the city centre was by catching a truck from Henwick Station to Foregate Street.

All the biggest floods of the past 300 years are shown by marks on the wall of the Cathedral Watergate - 1947 was the biggest since 1780 and has never been surpassed since.

JOHN WRIGHT,

Worcester.