© Railway Wonders of the World 2012-
The story of the Midland Railway -
THE TRENT VIADUCT AND REDHILL TUNNEL, showing the castellated portal.
OF the three trunk roads which connect London with
© Railway Wonders of the World 2012-
The story of the Midland Railway -
THE TRENT VIADUCT AND REDHILL TUNNEL, showing the castellated portal.
OF the three trunk roads which connect London with Scotland the story of none, perhaps, is so fascinating as that which is known to-
In the early days of the nineteenth century the coalfields of Leicestershire were sorely handicapped by the absence of cheap and expeditious transportation facilities. True there was the Charnwood Forest Canal, extending to the county city, but it was an uncertain highway. ln winter movement was held up by frost and ice, and when the waterway finally burst things were reduced to a critical condition. The city suffered severely from the dearth of fuel, but its loss was trivial in comparison with that of the collieries, which were deprived of their ways and means of disposing of their produce.
It is an ill wind which blows nobody good. Leicestershire’s disaster was the opportunity for the rival coal producing country of Derbyshire and Nottingham. The collieries in the latter county did not let slip the chance to forge ahead, to the detriment of the Leicestershire fields.
This state of affairs became so intolerable that one or two prominent figures in the Leicestershire colliery industry conceived a bold master-
But Ellis was not to be thwarted. He invited the Father of Railways to a bumping dinner, which proved so satisfactory that the eminent inventor was induced to reconsider his refusal. He promised to go over the country with Stenson’s surveys so as to become acquainted with the situation at close quarters. He did so, and reported so favourably upon the project, that he even undertook to raise the money to defray the cost of construction if necessary. As, however, his hands were so full with other plans for railway conquest he pointed out that he could not supervise construction, but strongly recommended that his son, Robert, who had been called home from South America, should be appointed engineer-
THE “JENNY LIND”. An early type of the single driver locomotive.
Parliamentary sanction for the construction of the Leicester and Swannington Railway, as it was called, was extended in 1830. It was not a big enterprise as railways go, being only sixteen miles in length, but it involved some problems which in those days were by no means so simple to solve as now. The Glenfield Tunnel tripped up the contractors badly. It is perfectly straight, level, and 1,796 yards in length, but it extends through running sand. Boring for a single line of standard gauge was comm-
The opening of this short line solved the coal transportation problem for Leicestershire very effectively, but to the dis-
Another system was the Birmingham and Derby, carried out between these two points by George Stephenson, while the “North Midland” was projected by the same engineer to provide a railway route between Derby and Leeds. In this work Stephenson had a pretty stiff tussle with the treacherous shale when driving the Ambergate Tunnel.
LATER TYPE OF THE “SINGLE DRIVERS”, built June 1865.
The completion of the “North Midland” and the “Derby and Birmingham” lines precipitated a result which was somewhat common in the early railway days, when roads were run to competitive points, and which, while beneficial to the travelling public, affected the shareholders somewhat adversely. Both lines were able to give and take traffic from the London and North Western Railway as it is now. Both fought hard for this business. The competition produced a rate war, with fares and tariffs cut mercilessly. This condition of affairs prevailed until at last, additional competition being threatened from new construction, the rivals awoke to the fact that if further lines were completed the traffic would be divided still more, and they decided that it was better to combine forces. Accordingly a permanent peace was secured in an effective manner -
Then the railway speculating mania broke out with fearful virulence. With it was associated the man who had undertaken the chairmanship of the amalgamated concerns -
LOCOMOTIVE NO. 820, remarkable for its heavy outside frame.
Although Hudson was assailed when the railway bubble was pricked, in reality he established tin Midland Railway. He had embarked upon a wholesale policy of expansion and absorption, and the outcome was that the system of which he con-
Growing rapidly and prospering immensely, it was not surprising that some curious situations were provoked at times. For instance, the Midland cast covetous eyes upon Manchester. There were two lengths of line lying between Ambergate and “Cottonopolis” which would offer the very means of access to the desired city. Overtures for the acquisition of these two stretches of road were