West Hill Covered Bridge, Montgomery Vermont
The West Hill Covered Bridge crosses West Hill Brook in the West Hill district of Montgomery township. Five other covered wood bridges remain in the town, giving Montgomery the highest concentration of covered bridges by town in Vermont. Two brothers, Sheldon and Savannah Jewett of Montgomery, built all six of the bridges; the year of construction of the West Hill Bridge is estimated to be 1883. The Jewetts used Town lattice trusses in and similar dimensions (except for length).
Together with another bridge constructed by the Jewett brothers in the adjoining town of Enosburg, the Montgomery bridges constitute the most extensive surviving record of the work of any individual covered bridge builders who practiced their trade in Vermont. The complete inventory of bridges built by the Jewetts is unknown; Richard Sanders Allen writes that they built bridges "for more than thirty years." The brothers prepared the timber for their bridges at their own mill, which stood near the West Hill Bridge.
The covered bridges of Vermont are among its most cherished and symbolic historic resources. About one hundred of the bridges still stand in the state, the highest concentration by area of covered bridges in the United States.
Bridge Description
The West Hill Covered Bridge consists of a single span supported by two flanking timber Town lattice trusses. The structure has not been reinforced by any of the various devices added to many other covered bridges in Vermont. The bridge rests on abutments built of irregular stone blocks laid dry; the north abutment has been faced with concrete.
The West Hill Bridge is 59 feet long overall and 19.5 feet wide; it has a 16-foot roadway. The wood floor, which consists of planks laid flat and perpendicular to the trusses, begins four feet inside each portal; the approaches are gravel.
On the exterior, the heavy planks pegged together diagonally to form the trusses (and side walls) of the bridge are sheathed with unpainted flush boards hung vertically. Similar siding protects the ends of the trusses immediately inside the portals. The siding stops short of the eaves to leave strip openings along the tops of the walls.
The gable ends are also sheathed with unpainted flush boards hung vertically. The portal openings have diagonal upper corners, which correspond to the line of the interior struts. The shallow-pitch gable roof is covered with standing seam metal sheeting painted red.
East elevation (1974)
