Stephenson, born in Wylam near Newcastle in 1781, stimulates as much controversy today among railway historians as he did among his peers. While some laud him as the father of the railways, others are ready to pour scorn, suggesting that he merely copied a few good ideas and exploited the skills of others. Even if that were the case, there is no doubt that his role in developing the technology was vital. It is not so much that without Stephenson the railways would not have happened, but rather that they were built earlier and faster as a result of his drive. Given that this self-educated and barely literate man was an obstreperous character who did not suffer fools gladly, it is not surprising that he lives on in history as such a controversial figure. But it is unarguable that he played a vital role in the construction of both the Stockton & Darlington and the Liverpool & Manchester.
Stephenson’s meeting with Pease had a rather longer agenda than just the choice of traction. His principal skill may have been as a locomotive engineer but that did not stop him from involving himself in all aspects of railway construction. Pease had been worried about the route selected by the original surveyor, George Overton, and quickly gave Stephenson the task of drawing up an alternative. He produced a far more direct route, knocking three miles off the original scheme which had been designed with meandering bends as tight as those on a country lane, completely unsuitable for a railway. In designing the new route, Stephenson set the standard for future railways, with their long sweeping curves linked by as much plain straight line as possible. But in other aspects, Stephenson was not always right or forward-looking. His choice of wrought iron rather than the more brittle cast iron for the rails was definitely correct (though, for reasons of economy, some cast-iron rails were used, too), but he used very short lengths which made the ride bumpier.19 Worse, he placed them on heavy stone blocks, whereas the far more stable timber sleepers at right angles to the rails had been used for nearly forty years on some wagon ways. On the question of mechanical versus horsepower, however, Stephenson was unequivocal. He knew locomotives represented the future, but even his ambitions were relatively modest. In 1821 he had written: ‘On a long and favourable railway, I would start my engines to run 60 miles a day with from 40 to 60 tons of goods.’20 It was not long before locomotives would be running several hundred miles in a day.
Trevithick had continued to develop the idea of a steam locomotive on rails for several years after his early failures, most notably with his demonstration of a steam engine with the humorous name of Catch Me Who Can on a circular track near the present site of Euston station. The contemporary pictures of the scene show precious few spectators, which may suggest that it was lack of interest that sent Trevithick off to seek his fortune in Peru.
Others, however, were quick to follow in his steps. The north-east was the Silicon Valley of its day, a ferment of ideas with various locomotive engineers devising more effective forms of steam locomotive to suit the growing needs of the colliery owners. There were all sorts of developments, and while some were universally adopted, others were technological dead-ends. One of the latter, using cogged drive wheels, was developed because of concerns about metal wheels having little adhesion on iron rails, the wrong solution for a genuine problem that has continued to dog railways (just like ‘leaves on the line’). John Blenkinsop subsequently designed an engine whose cogs meshed with a toothed rail for the Middleton Colliery in 1812, the first steam locomotives to run on a commercial basis. However, while rack and pinion later became a feature of mountain railways, they were not really suitable for running on the flat. Then there were what we now with hindsight perceive as completely crazy ideas, including the Steam Horse, which was driven by a series of legs sticking out from the rear like a huge grasshopper which ‘walked’ the locomotive along. Initially it did not have enough power but, disastrously, when it was rebuilt the new larger boiler exploded on its inaugural run at Nesham’s Colliery, killing or maiming fifty-seven people. At the same time, progress was being made on the kind of steam locomotives that, within a couple of decades, would be running up and down railways across Britain. With the help of Timothy Hackworth, whom Stephenson later appointed as resident engineer to the Stockton & Darlington, William Hedley built Puffing Billy without using cogs, proving that metal-on-metal contact could offer sufficient adhesion. He later modified his early engines into eight wheelers to enable them to pull 50-ton loads.
Several of the innovators of this period have some claim to be the ‘father of the steam locomotive’, an appellation often attributed to Stephenson. In fact, as mentioned above, his real skill was in exploiting other people’s ideas; as the Oxford Companion to British Railway History puts it, ‘the peculiar genius of George Stephenson was that he made it happen’.21 In 1812 Stephenson became the ‘enginewright’ at Killingworth Colliery, just north of Newcastle, with the task of building a series of stationary steam engines. But he quickly transferred his energies to locomotives and produced the Blucher that could pull 30 tons up a slight gradient at 5 mph in 1814. He built a further three engines for Killingworth and then five for the Hetton colliery line near Sunderland, which were a great improvement. An eight-mile railway was completed by Stephenson in November 1822 which connected the colliery with the river Wear and on the flat sections these ‘iron horses’, as they were known, could haul seventeen wagons weighing a total of sixty-four tons, more than double the performance of the Blucher. Nevertheless, as the pictures show, all these engines were still primitive beasts that frequently broke down, lost steam through every join and battered the tracks which could barely withstand their weight.
Stephenson was appointed as surveyor of the Stockton & Darlington in January 1822 but the directors still needed some persuasion before they would commit themselves wholeheartedly to mechanical horsepower rather than the hay-eating kind. They made visits to Killingworth colliery – since Hetton was not quite complete – and were sufficiently impressed to choose the new technology. However, since this was to be a public railway, open to all comers using whatever form of traction suited them, many of the trains would in fact be horse-drawn.
Building the line was a laborious process. The big railway contractors of the Victorian era had yet to emerge and the work was undertaken by a host of small companies which required close supervision. The main obstacles were the Myers Flat swamp and the Skerne river at Darlington. Stephenson eventually managed to create a firm base on the swamp by filling it with tons of hand-hewn rock but required the help of a local architect who designed a bridge over the river that was eventually built of stone.22 Despite the length of the railway and ambitious nature of the scheme, the construction proceeded relatively smoothly, and the line was formally opened on 27 September 1825, which was declared a local holiday. It is a mistake to think that because these events took place in obscure northern towns that now boast little more than under performing football teams, they passed unnoticed. In fact, there was worldwide interest in the development of the Stockton & Darlington Railway with newspapers and technical journals covering every detail. Its fame was born of the recognition that this was the world’s first railway to operate steam engines, although most of the haulage in the early years was provided by horses. The crowds clustered around the line on the opening day were also testimony to the fact that people realized this was a ‘Big Story’ that would have a far wider impact than merely reducing local coal prices, the primary intent of the promoters. The spectators were chary of approaching the steaming locomotive too closely, since they were worried, quite rightly, that the boiler could blow up, a relatively frequent experience in the early days of the railways. Stephenson, ever the self-publicist, put on a show for the opening ride. Driving Locomotion, he brushed aside the horseman who had been deputed to lead the procession along the line and raised the steam pressure to reach 12 mph, even 15 mph on a few stretches. He soon outpaced the local riders who had taken to the fields to try to keep up with the train and, after various stops, covered the twelve miles between Darlington and Stockto
n in three hours.
The railway made a great impression on local onlookers. One recalled: ‘The welkin [sky] rang with loud huzzas [applause], while the happy faces of some, the vacant stares of others and the alarm depicted on the countenances of not a few, gave variety to the picture.’23 That description fairly sums up the mixed reaction to the railway from the public. While overall it was supportive, there were, as ever, detractors. Shortly before the opening, the editor of the local Tyne Mercury24 had thundered: ‘what person would ever think of paying anything to be conveyed . . . in something like a coal wagon, upon a dreary wagon-way, and to be dragged, for the greater part of the distance, by a roaring steam engine’. Others expressed fears that the cows in fields next to the railway would be so terrified by horseless carriages hurtling past them that their udders would dry up. Needless to say, these critics were proved wrong. The railway quickly filled up while the cows remained sanguine.
Mostly, though, the benefits were widely understood. The Newcastle Courant applauded the venture and correctly stressed its importance by predicting the railway ‘will open the London market to the collieries of Durham as well as facilitate the obtaining of fuel to the country along its line’.25
At the opening, the line was not entirely complete as some of the branches had not been built and there were few facilities such as sidings and engine sheds. There was, too, a shortage of rolling stock: the company merely owned ‘a single locomotive (Locomotion No. 1), one passenger carriage and 150 coal wagons’.26 More were delivered over the next couple of years by Stephenson’s company but horses remained the mainstay of the railway. Nevertheless, traffic built up quickly. In the first three months, 10,000 tons of coal were carried on the railway, much of it horse-hauled. The coal was of better quality, as bigger lumps could be carried than on the panniers of pack-horses, and the price had gone down by more than a half: ‘At Stockton, [coal] could be profitably sold for 8s 6d (42.5p) per ton, rather than the pre-railway price of 18s (90p) a ton.’27
Passengers, too, used the railway. The only coach provided on the first day, aptly called the Experiment, was a primitive affair with seats along the side of the interior and was said to resemble a showman’s caravan. It went into service being horse-drawn between Stockton and Darlington, a distance of twelve miles, which it covered in two hours, an hour less than Stephenson had done on that opening day, and was soon replaced by more comfortable carriages. But even these, in reality, were little more than old stagecoaches adapted for rail use with flanged wheels, each carrying sixteen passengers. The railway leased out the rights to run the passenger service to various independent operators including, interestingly, two female innkeepers, Jane Scott of the King’s Head, Darlington, and Martha Howson, who ran the Black Lion in Stockton. A year after the opening of the line, seven coaches were covering the distance and were being charged 3d per mile by the railway. The horses cantered at 12 mph, sometimes reaching 14 mph, though obviously they were far slower when climbing the inclines or when they tired. Locomotives often fared less well. Although notionally they were faster than horses, as Stephenson had demonstrated on the opening day, they were confined to 5 mph when the track passed through woods because of fears that running them too fast would throw sparks far into the countryside, causing fires. Moreover, the company was fearful of excessive speed, as the directors rightly perceived it meant greater wear on the track, and consequently drivers were fined, even sacked, for this offence. The strict Quaker management encouraged the public to report any speeding or other misdemeanours by the drivers, and directors were known to patrol the line themselves, seeking out miscreants who had to appear before a disciplinary committee to explain their actions.
Although traffic built up well, the first days of the Stockton & Darlington were not profitable, due to the high costs of maintenance and the relatively low charges (which, however, were of great value in stimulating the local economy). The economics of the railway were not helped by the fact that Stephenson was frequently away working on the Liverpool & Manchester and his six locomotives were unreliable, often running out of steam and in need of frequent repairs. Indeed, despite Timothy Hackworth’s skill in keeping them working, the railway’s directors came close to reverting to an entirely horse-run railway by the second half of 1827. Hackworth then designed a much improved locomotive, the Royal George, with six wheels each 4ft in diameter and coupled together and with a more powerful and bigger boiler, that was a great improvement. Robert, Stephenson’s son who, it seems, had fallen out with his father and left in 1824 to seek his fortune in South America, returned, and his engineering skills became vital in keeping steam running on the track.
It was not just the unreliability of the locomotives and the slowness of often exhausted horses which made operations on the line chaotic. Running a train along the Stockton & Darlington was a hazardous and difficult business. A great mistake had been to make it single line, with just four passing loops28 every mile to allow trains to pass each other. The points were operated by the driver or his assistants, and, with so much, traffic disputes were inevitable when trains met each other far from a loop, rather like cars meeting head-on on small country roads. There was no signalling and there were frequent altercations between drivers over who should be allowed to proceed first, an area of conflict exacerbated by the fact that these men worked for various private companies, rather than all being employed by the railway. The rule was supposed to be that passenger trains would reverse to the nearest loop since the coal trains were far heavier, but passengers did not like these delays and were known to join in fisticuff fights on the side of their driver. This highlights one aspect of the railway that was to prove a mistake and that consequently other railways did not follow – the idea that it should be run like a turnpike road, open to all comers prepared to pay the toll for their carriage wagons or trains, rather than being operated by the owners.
This open access experiment had its roots in the Zeitgeist of the early 1820s when the idea of a very pure form of free markets and free trade was in vogue. The old traditions of monopoly companies and guilds working as cartels had been discredited in the previous century by Adam Smith and his ideas were being revived. As one historian of the railways puts it, the Stockton & Darlington was created like a free market in transport: ‘Demand would be met by enterprising suppliers; fares would be kept down by competition between carriers; operational costs would be kept down by competition between the aspiring contractors . . . All would be individualism and competition.’29 That is perhaps putting on too much of an ideological gloss, given that, at the time, there was no other way of running a railway, though the very motto of the railway company – ‘At private risk for public service’ – seems to encapsulate Adam Smith’s philosophy.
Even so, railways do not work well under these conditions. As the regular punch-ups between operators showed, there are simply too many interrelated interests where the need is for cooperation, rather than competition, between different users. The open access regime on the Stockton & Darlington lasted only until 1833 when the directors took over the running of services which then became all locomotive-hauled. The Liverpool & Manchester, whose promoters were watching events in the north-east with great interest, would not make the same mistake.
The Stockton & Darlington paid a healthy 5 per cent dividend within two years and, more importantly, demonstrated the impact that railways would have in fostering the development of their hinterland. The line was soon extended to Middlesbrough, five miles from Stockton, then a mere hamlet with a few houses and a population of less than 400 scattered in local farms. The railway quickly turned it into a boom town and the population increased fifteen-fold to 6,000 by 1841. Thanks to investment by Pease and his Quaker colleagues, docks were built and it became a major seaport, later acquiring large shipbuilding yards and iron smelting works. Within half a century, tiny Middlesbrough had been transformed into a thriving industrial town with the largest iron-producing centre in the world, thanks to the adv
ent of the railway. Middlesbrough was, therefore, the first example of the railway as a catalyst for economic growth and urban expansion, although sadly this pioneering railway town is ill-served by the railway as it is not on a main line. As the later chapters show, there were to be countless more.
By the late 1850s the Stockton & Darlington was paying an average dividend of 9.5 per cent, better at the time than any railway company in Britain, although by then it was a rather insignificant little operation ripe for merger with its bigger and newer rivals. It retains a place in railway history but the importance of its role remains at issue. On the one hand it could be dismissed as a mere extension of its predecessors, the dozens of little railways that principally ran from mine to waterway and mostly used horses to pull the wagons. Moreover, the railway’s reliance on sub-contracting to the extent that it did not even operate its own passenger services bore little relation to later nineteenth-century railways. On the other hand it has been argued that the line ‘proved an invaluable testing ground both for the technical development of locomotives and for improvements in track’.30 The way that the promoters of the railway attracted capital was an early example of the raising of finance through personal networks that ‘played a critical role in financing Britain’s early industrialisation’. While the Stockton & Darlington suffered all the disadvantages of being a pioneer, it helped usher in the railway age. That era did not really begin in earnest until five years later with the completion of the Liverpool & Manchester, which has all the appropriate features to back its claim as the world’s first railway.
ONE
THE FIRST RAILWAY
It was not by chance that the world’s first steam-hauled and twin-tracked railway should have run between Liverpool and Manchester. In 1830 when the line opened with much fanfare and, unluckily, a terrible tragedy, they were two ‘world-class cities’ of their age. Manchester and its Lancashire hinterland was the centre of the cotton trade while Liverpool had been built up on a rather more sinister industry – slavery – and despite the decline of that trade remained Britain’s second most important port, thanks to the burgeoning imports of cotton from the USA. The Liverpool & Manchester represented the start of the railway age – just as it marked a significant advance in the technology – and was far grander in scale and conception than any of its predecessors.
Fire and Steam Page 3
