Engines and Men/Chapter 1

by John R. Raynes

Chapter I

 

The Early Days of Railways—The First Locomotives—A Link Between Stephenson and the A.S.L.E. & F.—Stephenson's Success.

 

As we look back upon all the wonderful changes presented by the nineteenth century, from the steamship to the telegram, it is probably the steam engine which comes puffing into the centre of the picture as the greatest and most substantial innovation of them all. The locomotive indeed filled a priceless place in the scheme of things, for it linked up in a manner never before comprehended the goods and the market. It diminished distances and raced against time. Small towns in the path of this monster of strength grew into cities, and England began to change in character very markedly. The changes were social as well as industrial, for the era of steam power affected the whole life of the nation. So deeply do railways affect the body politic that I soon found it would be impossible to begin the history of the A.S.L.E. & F, at the year 1880. Circumstances were preparing the way for it fifty years earlier, and all the forces at work in the half century that followed were really forging and shaping the destiny of the Society. It became as essential to enginemen as the engine itself was to this nation and others. The whole service turned completely upon engineers and firemen, who in those early days were the silk-hatted aristocracy of the line.

Not many of our 75,000 members to-day will be aware that one of our earliest members was actually a driver with George Stephenson and his son Robert Stephenson in 1832, but such was the case. This and other important connecting links with railway history make it essential that our history should begin with a survey of the early history of railways, and of the earlier organisations of men which preceded the A.S.L.E. & F., and finally of the conditions prevailing on the service generally in the year 1880, when the Society sprang into life.

Thomas West Smith, of Leicester, the member referred to, was the last survivor of the Stephenson group of pioneer drivers. He was born in the year 1808, and began in the railway service in his twenty-third year. He was first employed as a porter at Westbridge Station, on the Leicester & Swannington Railway, which was opened on July 17th, 1832. He later cleaned and fired "The Comet," built by Stephenson at Newcastle, conveyed by sea to Hull and then by canal to Leicester. This water carriage was made necessary by the absence of any railways, and it was some months after the safe delivery of "The Comet," which made a great sensation at Leicester, that the tender came along in the same way to keep it company. During those months the water was carried in a large cask in a coal waggon. Other engines which joined the same service later were "The Phoenix," "Samson," "Goliath," and "Hercules"; and the drivers had many experiences with George Stephenson and "young Robert," as they called him. The signals on those early lines consisted of a pole with a pulley, and the rule was "go ahead" unless a red flag or a red lamp was showing. The drivers carried bugles to give warning of their approach at level crossings, but after a few carts had been wrecked by the new monsters, the engines were fitted with whistles which were like little steam trumpets.

Even by day the passage of an engine caused wonder and amazement, but when they began to run through the darkness of night they caused consternation. They were pictured as lurid ogres of fire and steel tearing through the peaceful country, stampeding horses and cattle and alarming old folks. The airships of the twentieth century caused less astonishment and interest than did the steam engines of the 1830 period. The old open-topped carriages gave passengers the mixed blessings of scenery and breeze and smuts from the engine. They afforded opportunity for sportsmen ta shoot at rooks and other birds on their rail journeys, until their practice became dangerous to others, and it had to be forbidden. Many of the wayside stations consisted of a single hut, which served duty as stationmaster's office, weighing machine room, passengers' waiting room, and licensed house, the stationmaster having the further duty of innkeeper.

The goods guards of those carly days had no vans or waggons, but rode in an exalted position on top at the rear, after the pattern of the guard or conductor of the stage coach they were rapidly superseding. To stop the train they ran along the top to apply the brake with a sort of forked stick, known as a "sprigger." On the narrow little footplates of the engines the levers were always in motion, causing many drivers to receive smart raps and bruises. The cab, as we know it to-day, was in 1830 only a strip of standing room flanked by a short sailing.

Wooden ways, with wood or cast iron rails on wood sleepers, had been instituted as early as 1630 to facilitate horse transit upon constantly used tracks, and in 1767 the Colebrookedale Ironworks cast iron plate rails. In 1789 William Jessop, of Loughborough, introduced flanged wheels, but the nineteenth century had run more than twenty years of its course before men thought of using the power of steam to expedite transport. When Geo. Stephenson asserted that he could run passenger coaches at twelve to fifteen miles an hour he was regarded with suspicion as an optimist, but now "on fire horses and wind horses we career," as Carlyle said, at anything up to eighty miles an hour.

Steam power was realised as much as 2,000 years ago, for Hero of Alexandria, about 200 B.C., wrote a book on the expansive force of steam, in which he described the cylinder, piston, slide-valve, and common clack-valve. The first attempts to harness steam and to make it do the behest of men was about 250 years ago, for stationary engines. It was not, however, until the year 1803 that the first tramroad or railway locomotive engine was constructed. The name "locomotive" is derived from two Latin words, "locus," a place; and "motio," motion; the locomotive engine being therefore an engine capable of moving itself from place to place.

Richard Trevithick is without any doubt the father of the locomotive engine. He built the first in 1803, with money provided by his cousin Vivian. He employed high pressure steam, smooth fat wheels, and conveyed the exhaust steam from the cylinder to the chimney by a pipe. The first engine is naturally a matter of close interest to those who man the giants of to-day, and it may be added that the boiler of Trevithick's engine was six feet in length, and contained a return flue tube, the chimney being at the same end as the fire door. The engine had one cylinder placed horizontally, eight inches diameter, the stroke being extremely long, four feet six inches. It was an extraordinary looking object, with its conspicuous cog wheels and tall chimney.

It was tried on February 24th, 1804, upon the Perrydarran cast-iron plateway, or tramroad, when it conveyed trucks containing ten tons of bar iron and about seventy excited persons for a distance of nine miles to Merthyr Tydvil. This triumph showed that Trevithick had started well, and on sound principles. He did not follow up the perfecting of his machine, leaving that to others, but to him goes the honour of building, and to Merthyr goes the honour of receiving, the first locomotive that ever ran a journey on rails.

The scene is transferred to Leeds in the year 1811, when Mr. John Blenkinsop, proprietor of the Middleton Colliery, near that city, decided to have his coals conveyed from Middleton to Leeds by a locomotive engine instead of by horses. He therefore gave an order to Matthew Murray, a Leeds engineer, to construct such an engine. Murray and Blenkinsop agreed that sufficient adhesion could not be obtained between smooth wheels and smooth rails to control loads, and they adopted the rack-rail and cog-wheel gear. The power developed by the steam cylinders was communicated to the large cog or driving wheel, the four ordinary wheels of the engine being simply for support, and having no contact with the motive force. This engine ran its first trip in August of 1812, and for several years worked with others of a similar design in conveying coal from Middleton to Leeds.

In the meantime Chapman's chain engine had been tried on the Hetton Colliery Tramroad, near Newcastle-on-Tyne (patented December, 1811), but it proved a failure. There were other failures too, for William Hedley, in February, 1813, tried his first locomotive, intended for use on Mr. Blackett's Wylam Colliery line, but it proved a failure for want of steam. Mr. Blackett, however, retained his faith in steam power, and he instructed Hedley to build a second engine, completed in May of 1813, named "Puffing Billy." This engine, tried on the Wylam line, had a wrought iron boiler, with a return flue, and like Trevithick's pioneer engine, it had the chimney at the same end as the fire-door, It had two vertical cylinders, the piston-rods being connected to beams, from which motion was communicated to the four smooth driving wheels by means of toothed gear. This engine continued working at Wylam until 1862, when it was removed to the South Kensington Museum. Hedley and Blackett, it should be noticed, followed Trevithick in preferring smooth wheels on smooth rails, and they did not follow Murray and Blenkinsop as to cogs.

A patent was obtained in 1813 by Mr. Brunton, of the Butterley Ironworks, Derbyshire, for the locomotion of an engine without the aid of the adhesion of the wheels. It was literally a steam horse, having a pair of hind legs actuated by steam cylinders, but it proved a failure.

We now come to the entry of George Stephenson into the locomotive world, Ideas had hitherto been confined ta crude engines intended to pull coal along colliery tracks, but Stephenson nursed an altogether wider vision of the new possibilities. Let us briefly trace the life of this remarkable man, the father of footplate workers. He was born in a small cottage between Close House and Wylam, in Northumberland, within nine miles of Newcastle, about 1772, and on June 9th, 1781, he started work at twopence per day on a farm, and was attending the plough at early hours when little children ought to be in bed. His next duty was to pick bats and coal droppings, and when the overseer came round he used to hide lest he be thought too little to earn a living. Like all the poor children of his day, he was working hard before he could read or write, but he mastered those arts later.

Shortly after the age of 13, George Stephenson worked as a brake-man for Waterrow Pit, on the tramway between Wylam and Newburn, his father being at Walbottle. A large dog fetched his dinner daily from Walbottle to Wylam tramway. A removal of the family brought him to Killingworth, where George Stephenson became stoker to a colliery engine. Working early and late and at all hours of the night, his wages were then only one shilling a day. He really thought his fortune was made when his wage rose to twelve shillings weekly. He was still a stoker when advanced to 17s. a week, with overtime added, and as a young man he was sober, industrious, and very studious of all the ways of steam engines. He ran the risk of being forced into the Militia, or being seized by a press gang for the Navy, and, like many other young men, thought of going to America. He was married at the age of 22, and in 1803 his only child Robert was born.

Stephenson tried his hand at laying down tramways, or waggonways as they were called, and he was making headway as a mining engineer. "I was, however, a poor man," he afterwards said, and in order to educate his son, "How do you think I did? I betook myself to mending my neighbours' clocks and watches at night after my day's work was done, and thus I got the means of bringing up my son." He had seen a locomotive as Wylam, and set himself to contrive one which would work much better, as the irregular action of the cylinders made such jerks in the working as continually tended to shake it to pieces. Lord Ravensworth and the Killingworth owners supplied him with money to make a locomotive, and in July 1814, it was tried upon the tramway, being patented in 1815, and bearing the name of "Blucher."

It was fifteen years after building his first engine, years crowded with effort and further adventure, that the victory of Stephenson's life was won on the Liverpool & Manchester Railway. The intervening period was, however full of importance. Stephenson built a second engine in 1815, in which the connecting-rods were attached direct to crank-pins on the wheels. The Duke of Portland ordered one of his engines in 1817, for use on his Kilmarnock and Troon tramroad, but here the cast-iron tramplates were found too weak to carry any engine.

The owners of the Hetton Colliery decided in 1819 to alter their old horse tramroad into a locomotive line, and engaged Stephenson to lay out the line and build the engines. This was completed for opening on November 18th, 1822, when five of Stephenson's engines were working on the system.

Up to this stage locomotives were still confined to private colliery lines, but the Stockton & Darlington public railway project proved a turning point in Stephenson's career, and in locomotive history. Stephenson was appointed engineer, and application was made to Parliament for powers in 1818, but twice the Bill was rejected, being eventually passed in 1821. This, the first public railway in the world, was opened for traffic on Tuesday. September 27th, 1825, and the only engine possessed by the company when the first train steamed out bore the name "Locomotion." Handbills announcing this novel service of steam carriages depicted "Locomotion" as "The Company's Locomotive Engine and the Engine's Tender." The total weight of this first publicly used engine and tender was eight tons, and her full dimensions will always be a matter of interest to enginemen. They were as follow:—

Cylinders, 10 inches diameter; stroke, 24 inches; wheels, 4 feet diameter; boiler, 10 feet in length, 4 feet diameter; boiler pressure, 25 lbs, to square inch: weight of engine without tender, 64 tons. She worked on the Stockton & Darlington line from September 27th, 1825, to 1841, and is still in working order and capable of being put in steam. It remains on a pedestal at the entrance to North Road Station, Darlington. At the opening of the Middlesbrough & Redcar Railway, this engine headed the procession, and it was taken from its pedestal to work on the Darlington section of the North Eastern Railway at the Stockton and Darlington Jubilee in 1875. The following year it went to the Philadelphia Exhibition, and van for the Stephenson Centenary in 1881. Her show career also included the Liverpool Exhibition of 1886, and the Paris Exhibition of 1889. Stephenson erected three similar engines for the Stockton & Darlington Railway; their "No. 5" was supplied by Messrs. Gilkes, Wilson & Co., of Leeds, and "No. 6" was Stephenson's engine, "Experiment," having six coupled wheels and outside inclined cylinders. Messrs. Stephenson & Co, built in 1827 an engine named "Twin Sisters," employed as a ballast engine on the construction of the Liverpool & Manchester Railway. It had twin hailers and two tall chimneys, with two blast pipes. In 1828, Stephenson & Co, built a four-wheeled coupled engine, named "The Lancashire Witch," for the Bolton & Leigh Railway, with cylinders outside and inclined. This engine hauled 58 tons up a gradient of 1 in 432 at nearly nine miles an hour, and worked traffic for several years. To Messrs. Foster, Rastrick & Co., of Stourbridge, belongs the honour of building the first locomotive ever tried on rails in America. This engine, "Stourbridge Lion," was one of two built in 1829, and when it was tried on a short section of local line in America, in 1830, it caused a great sensation, people gathering from considerable distances to see the trial of this strange British steam engine.

We have seen so far the first locomotives built and proved worthy, we have seen the opening of the world's first public railway, and the emergence of George Stephenson to fame as a pioneer of locomotive construction. We now come to a conspicuous success of his career, the romantic way in which he scored at the opening of the Liverpool & Manchester Railway, which has been truly designated as the Grand British Experimental Railway. The structure and opening of this line was mooted in 1829, and the question how to work the projected line naturally came before the directors—should they rely upon horses, fixed engines and ropes, or the new locomotives. They preferred the last named, and one

Robert Stephenson & co., Engineers,

Newcastle-On-Tyne.

1829.

"The Great Bear," Great Western Railway, 1920.

of their number, Mr. Harrison, proposed that a reward be publicly offered for the most likely method of achieving their object. They decided to that effect on April 20th, 1829, and on April 25th appeared the announcement of a premium of £500 offered for the best locomotive engine, subject to eight conditions as to weight, load, pressure of steam, price, and speed,

The public trials of competing engines took place on the Manchester side of Rainhill Bridge, upon a level portion of line, from October 8th to 14th, 1829.

Those entered were:—

The Rocket	George Stephenson
The Novelty	Braithwaite & Erickson.
The Sans Pareil	Hackworth.
The Perseverance	Burstall.

The tests conclusively proved "The Rocket" to be the best engine, meeting all the conditions laid down and performing all tests in a more than satisfactory manner, "The Novelty" and "Sans Pareil" broke down, and "Perseverance," an engine designed for road work as well, was withdrawn. To George Stephenson was awarded the prize of £500, and it may be said that at Rainhill, in 1829, Stephenson proved the locomotive to be a practical proposition, and laid the foundation of the railways of the world.

"The Rocket," in working trim, without tender, weighed 4 tons 5 cwts., and her dimensions were:—Cylinders, 8 ins, diameter; stroke, 16 inches; driving wheels, 4 feet 8½ inches; boiler, 6 feet long, 3 feet 4 inches diameter; pressure of steam in boiler, 50 lbs, per square inch; firebox, 2 feet long, 3 feet broad by 3 feet deep; tubes, 25 of 3 inches diameter; area of fire grate, 6 square feet; weight of loaded tender, 3 tons 4 cwts. The maximum speed attained by "The Rocket" at the Rainhill trials was 29 miles an hour. To take the test she was conveyed by road to Carlisle, and thence by water to the Mersey.

"The Rocket" is preserved in the South Kensington Museum, and has been described as consisting of "a boiler, a stove, a space, and a bench." At the conclusion of the trials. Stephenson received orders to build seven other engines to he ready for the opening of the Liverpool & Manchester Railway. These, constructed in 1830, were "Meteor," "Comet," "Arrow," "Dart," "Phoenix," "North Star," and "Northumbrian," all "outside" cylinder engines. When the line was opened on September 15th, these eight engines drew trains containing about 600 people in procession from Liverpool

in the following order:—

The Northumbrian,	driven by George Stephenson.
Phoenix	driven by„ Robert Stephenson.
North Star	driven by„ Robert Stephenson (brother of George).
Rocket	driven by„ Joseph Locke.
Dart	driven by„ T.C. Gooch.
Comet	driven by„ William Allcard.
Arrow	driven by„ F. Swanwick.
Meteor	driven by„ Anthony Harding.

It was at this triumphal opening that Mr. Huskisson was knocked down and run over by "The Rocket" at Parkside, and George Stephenson ran the dying man fifteen miles in 25 minutes, a speed of 36 miles an hour, on "The Northumbrian," to Eccles Hospital. Mr. Huskisson was a member for Liverpool, and had rendered great service in getting the Bill through Parliament. He had just stepped aside to speak to the Duke of Wellington, who was on the train, when be was knocked down. A monument at Parkside, 17 miles from Liverpool, marks the spot. On the following day the regular traffic of the line commenced, and "The Northumbrian" conveyed a train of 130 people from Lime Street. Liverpool, to Manchester (Liverpool Road Station), a distance of 30 miles 53 chains, in one hour and 50 minutes. The reader may recall how John Ridd, the hero in "Lorna Doone," thought it was tempting Providence when stage coaches began to run at twelve miles an hour. When "The Rocket' made 36 miles a world's record in speed was attained.

"The Planet," tried for the first time on December 4th, 1830, was a striking improvement on its predecessors. It drew a train of passengers and coaches weighing 76 tons inclusive from Liverpool to Manchester in 2 hours and 39 minutes!

The standard rail gauge of 4 feet 8½ inches had been fixed before Stephenson began as engineer, but he approved it as.a safe and reasonable gauge, and maintained it on the Stockton & Dartington, Liverpool & Manchester, Canterbury & Whitstable, and Leicester & Swannington railways. "They may be a long way apart now," he said, "but depend upon it they will be joined together some day."

The first bogey engine was built by Messrs. Carmichael & Co.. Dundee, "The Earl of Airlie," which commenced work on the Dundee & Newtyle Railway, September, 1833, and ran until 1850.

The early railway tickets were metal discs, which the passenger received at one station and gave up for further use when he alighted.

The Canterbury & Whitstable Railway referred to was opened on May 3rd, 1830, the first train being drawn by the company's only locomotive, "Invicta," built by Stephenson & Co. This engine is preserved at the Ashford Works of the South Eastern Railway Company.

One of the early tests of "The Planet" was on December 4th, 1830, conveying a special train of voters from Manchester to Liverpool for an election. "The time of setting out was delayed says the official report, "rendering it necessary to use extraordinary dispatch," and the journey was performed in sixty minutes, including a stop of two minutes for water. No. 11 engine, "Mercury," was delivered by Stephenson in December, 1830, of a considerably improved pattern and better appearance. It was of bigger dimensions and weighed thirteen tons, and it was followed in January, 1831, by two "goods" engines " of extraordinary power," and aptly named " Samson" and" Goliath." The former, in February, "accomplished the great feat" of drawing 164 tons, exclusive of engine and tender, from Liverpool to Manchester in 2½ hours! Stephenson built an engine of the same class to go to America (Hudson & Mohawk Railway) in 1831, and he named it "John Ball."

In the same year the Glasgow and Garrnskirk Railway was opened, and George Stephenson drove the first engine, bearing bis own name and built at his Newcastle works. In May of 1832 came the Leicester & Swannington Railway, referred to at the opening of this chapter, and Stephenson drove "The Comet," accompanied by his son and the regular driver. Robert Weatherburn. The chimney stood thirteen feet high from the rail level, but on the opening day it was knocked down in the Glenfield tunnel, being then reduced to 12 feet 6 inches. Other firms were busy constructing engines for the various lines now established, but they did net have the consistent success of Stephenson. He gradually developed to the six-wheeled type, and extended to the horizontal shape and shorter funnel, a notable example being "Atlas No. 8," issued in February, 1834, for the Leicester & Swannington Railway. Its weight was 20 tons, and pressure of steam 70 lbs. It was of a type afterwards very largely employed; it worked faithfully for 25 years, and became the property of the Midland Railway when they took over the Leicester & Swannington.

The Newcastle to Carlisle Railway was opened on March 9th, 1835, with the "Comet," built by Messrs. Hawthorne & Co., of Newcastle.

The locomotive of to-day is not the invention of any one man. Hundreds of able engineers and draughtsmen have improved it step by step since 1825, and many controversies have turned around every section of its structure. Failures contributed as vitally as successes in those early days to show the way. The opening of the Great Western Railway (broad gauge) in 1837 opened "The battle of the gauges," which continued for fifteen years afterwards, and the rivalry itself assisted the development of the engine. Messrs. Brunel & Gooch placed engines on that line having driving wheels eight feet in diameter and in 1837-8 Mr. Brunel designed, and Messrs. Hawthorne constructed the "Hurricane," having a pair of ten feet wheels, the largest wheels ever made. William Howe, in 1843, invented the well-known "link-motion" valve gear, which became generally adopted for locomotives.

The Midland Counties Railway was opened in 1840, and Thomas West Smith, one of our early members previously referred to, was stationed at Derby, working to Rugby and Nottingham. This Company, with the North Midland, became the Midland Railway Company in 1844, and Smith, taken over with all his colleagues and the rolling stock, worked a train to Leeds (Hunslet), Birmingham, and Lincoln. Smith, in 55 years' life on the line, drove some two million miles—85 times round the globe—and never met with an accident until knocked out just before his retirement.

George Stephenson, speaking at the opening of the Newcastle & Darlington Railway in 1844 said:—

"I got leave to go from Killingworth to lay down a railway at Hetton, and next to Darlington, and after that I went to Liverpool to plan the line to Manchester. I there pledged myself to attain a speed of ten miles an hour. I said I had no doubt the engine would go much faster, but we had better be moderate at the beginning. The directors said I was quite right, for if when they came to Parliament I talked of going at a greater rate than ten miles an hour, I would put a cross on the concern. It was not an easy task for me to keep engines down to ten miles an hour, but it must be done, and did my best. I had to place myself in the most unpleasant of all situations, the witness-box of a Parliamentary Committee. Someone inquired if I was a foreigner, and another hinted that I was mad. Many became alarmed at this "Watt run wild," and in order to prevent these mad steam engines running beyond an old horse trot, they got two eminent engineers to act as Lunacy Commissioners. These gentlemen proved it was practically and commercially inexpedient. I put up with insult and rebuff, and went on with my plans, determined not to be put down. Improvements were made every day, and to-day a train has brought me from London in the morning and enabled me to take my place in this room."