The 4-span Waterrow Viaduct was built by the engineer Richard Hassard for the Devon and Somerset Railway (D&SR) 1871-3. It carried the railway over the River Tone to the south of Waterrow.
The 43 mile long Devon and Somerset Railway connected Barnstaple to the Bristol and Exeter Railway (B&ER) at Norton Fitzwarren near Taunton. The line opened in June 1871 from Norton Fitzwarren to Wiveliscombe. The Wiveliscombe to Barnstaple section opened in November 1873. The line had 14 stations, 4 tunnels and another viaduct at Castle Hill near Filleigh. It was built as broad gauge and operated by the B&ER.
The D&SR was converted to standard gauge in May 1881. The Great Western Railway (GWR) acquired the D&SR in 1901. The GWR was nationalised and became part of British Railways in 1948. Good services on the Barnstaple to Norton Fitzwarren line were withdrawn in 1964 and the line closed to passenger trains in October 1966, as part of the Beeching cuts.
The Waterrow Viaduct is also known as the Venn Cross Viaduct or the Tone Viaduct. It had three tapered stone piers and stone abutments at either end. These supported a continuous wrought iron lattice girder, which had a bridge deck above and a maintenance deck below. The viaduct was 148 metres long and 31 metres above the valley floor. The lattice girder was removed in the 1970s, but the 3 piers and the 2 abutments remain. The central and eastern pier and the eastern abutment can be viewed from a public footpath through the Hurstone Local Nature Reserve.
The Castle Hill Viaduct over the River Bray was similar in design to the Waterrow Viaduct, but it had 6 spans. Its pillars are still in use today, as they carry the North Devon Link Road (A361), which opened in 1988.
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