In the Newcastle dialect, a chare is a narrow street or lane. At the local assizes some years since, one of the witnesses in a criminal trial swore that “he saw three men come out of the foot of a chare.” The judge cautioned the jury not to pay any regard to the man’s evidence, as he must be insane. A little explanation by the foreman, however, satisfied his lordship that the original statement was correct. ‘Six Months’ Tour,’ vol. iii. 9 Father of Mr. Locke, M.P., the engineer. He afterwards removed to Barnsley, in Yorkshire. The Stephenson Memorial Schools have since been erected on the site of the old cottage at Willington Quay represented in the engraving at the head of this chapter. This incident was related by Robert Stephenson during a voyage to the north of Scotland in 1857, when off Montrose, on board his yacht Titania; and the reminiscence was communicated to the author by the late Mr. William Kell of Gateshead, who was present, at Mr. Stephenson’s request, as being worthy of insertion in his father’s biography. Speech at Newcastle, on the 18th of June, 1844, at the meeting held in celebration of the opening of the Newcastle and Darlington Railway. Robert Stephenson was perhaps, prouder of this little boyish experiment than he was of many of his subsequent achievements. Not having been quite accurately stated in the first edition of this book, Mr. Stephenson noted the correction for the second, and wrote the author (Sept. 18th, 1857) as follows:—“In the kite experiment, will you say, that the copper-wire was insulated by a few feet of silk cord; without this, the experiment cannot be made.” Mr. Zerah Colburn, in his excellent work on ‘Locomotive Engineering and the Mechanism of Railways,’ points out that Mr. Davies Gilbert noted the effect of the discharge of the waste steam up the chimney of Trevithick’s engine in increasing the draught, and wrote a letter to ‘Nicholson’s Journal’ (Sept. 1805) on the subject. Mr. Nicholson himself proceeded to investigate the subject, and in 1806 he took out a patent for “steam-blasting apparatus,” applicable to fixed engines. Trevithick himself, however, could not have had much faith in the steam-blast for locomotive purposes, or else he would not have taken out his patent for urging the fire by means of fanners. But the fact is, that while the speed of the locomotive was only four or five miles an hour, the blast was scarcely needed. It was only when high speeds were adopted that artificial methods of urging the fire became necessary, and that the full importance of the invention was recognised. Like many other inventions, stimulated if not originated by necessity, the steam-blast was certainly reinvented, if not invented, by George Stephenson. ‘Mining Journal,’ 9th September, 1858. Other machines, with legs, were patented in the following year by Lewis Gompertz and by Thomas Tindall. In Tindall’s specification it is provided that the power of the engine is to be assisted by a horizontal windmill; and the four pushers, or legs, are to be caused to come successively in contact with the ground, and impel the carriage! Speech at the opening of the Newcastle and Darlington Railway, June 18, 1844. The Editor of the ‘AthenÆum’ having (Nov. 8th, 1862) characterized the author’s account of this affair as “perfectly untrue” and a “fiction,” it becomes necessary to say a few words in explanation of it. The Editor of the ‘AthenÆum’ quotes in support of his statement a passage from Mr. Nicholas Wood, who, however does not say that the anecdote is “perfectly untrue,” but merely that “the danger was not quite so great as is represented:” he adds that “at most an explosion might have burnt the hands of the operator, but would not extend a few feet from the blower.” However that may be, we were not without good authority for making the original statement. The facts were verbally communicated to the author in the first place by Robert Stephenson, to whom the chapter was afterwards read in MS., in the presence of Mr. Sopwith, F.R.S. at Mr. Stephenson’s house in Gloucester Square, and received his entire approval. But at the time at which Mr. Stephenson communicated the verbal information, he also handed a little book with his name written in it, still in the author’s possession, saying, “Read that, you will find it all there.” We have again referred to the little book which contains, among other things, a pamphlet, entitled Report on the Claims of Mr. George Stephenson relative to the Invention of his Safety Lamp. By the Committee appointed at a Meeting holden in Newcastle, on this 1st of November, 1817. With an Appendix containing the Evidence. Among the witnesses examined were George Stephenson, Nicholas Wood, and John Moodie, and their evidence is given in the pamphlet. We quote that of Stephenson and Moodie, which was not contradicted, but in all material points confirmed by Wood, and was published, we believe, with his sanction. George Stephenson said, that he tried the first lamp “in a part of the mine where the air was highly explosive. Nicholas Wood and John Moodie were his companions when the trial was made. They became frightened when they came within hearing of the blower, and would not go any further. Mr. Stephenson went alone with the lamp to the mouth of the blower,” etc. This evidence was confirmed by John Moodie, who said the air of the place where the experiment was about to be tried was such, that, if a lighted candle had been introduced, an explosion would have taken place that would have been “extremely dangerous.” “Told Stephenson it was foul, and hinted at the danger; nevertheless, Stephenson would try the lamp, confiding in its safety. Stephenson took the lamp and went with it into the place in which Moodie had been, and Moodie and Wood, apprehensive of the danger, retired to a greater distance,” etc. The other details of the statement made in the text, are fully borne out by the published evidence, the accuracy of which, so far as the author is aware, has never before been called in question. The tankard bore the following inscription—“This piece of plate, purchased with a part of the sum of £1000, a subscription raised for the remuneration of Mr. George Stephenson for having discovered the fact that inflamed fire-damp will not pass through tubes and apertures of small dimensions, and having been the first to apply that principle in the construction of a safety-lamp calculated for the preservation of human life in situations formerly of the greatest danger, was presented to him at a general meeting of the subscribers, Charles John Brandling, Esq., in the Chair. January 12th, 1818.” The accident above referred to was described in the ‘Barnsley Times,’ a copy of which, containing the account, Robert Stephenson forwarded to the author, with the observation that “it is evidently written by a practical miner, and is, I think, worthy of record in my father’s Life.” Mr. Pease died at Darlington, on the 31st of July, 1858, aged ninety two. The story has been told that George was a former suitor of Miss Hindmarsh, while occupying the position of a humble workman at Black Callerton, but that having been rejected by her, he made love to and married Fanny Henderson; and that long after the death of the latter, when he had become a comparatively thriving man, he again made up to Miss Hindmarsh, and was on the second occasion accepted. This is the popular story, and different versions of it are current. Desirous of ascertaining the facts, the author called on Thomas Hindmarsh, Mrs. Stephenson’s brother, who assured him that George knew nothing of his sister until he (Hindmarsh) introduced him to her, at George’s express request, about the year 1818 or 1819. The author was himself originally attracted by the much more romantic version of the story, and gave publicity to it many years since; but after Mr. Hindmarsh’s explicit statement, he thought fit to adopt the soberer, and perhaps, the truer view. The first clause in any railway act, empowering the employment of locomotive engines for the working of passenger traffic. This incident, communicated to the author by the late Edward Pease, has since been made the subject of a fine picture by Mr. A. Rankley, A.R.A., exhibited at the Royal Academy Exhibition of 1861. Middlesborough does not furnish the only instance of the extraordinary increase of population in certain localities, occasioned by railways. Hartlepool, in the same neighbourhood, has in thirty years increased from 1330 to above 15,000; and Stockton-on-Tees from 7763 to above 16,000. In 1831 Crewe was a little village with 295 inhabitants; it now numbers upwards of 10,000. Rugby and Swindon have quadrupled their population in the same time. The railway has been the making of Southampton, and added 30,000 to its formerly small number of inhabitants. In like manner the railway has taken London to the sea-side, and increased the population of Brighton from 40,000 to nearly 100,000. That of Folkestone has been trebled. New and populous suburbs have sprung up all round London. The population of Stratford-le-Bow and West Ham was 11,580 in 1831; it is now nearly 40,000. Reigate has been trebled in size, and Redhill has been created by the railway. Blackheath, Forest Hill, Sydenham, New Cross, Wimbledon, and a number of populous places round London, may almost be said to have sprung into existence since the extension of railways to them within the last thirty years. Lives of the Engineers, vol. i. p. 371. Mr. Gooch’s letter to the author, December 13th, 1861. Referring to the preparations of the plans and drawings, Mr. Gooch adds, “When we consider the extensive sets of drawings which most engineers have since found it right to adopt in carrying out similar works, it is not the least surprising feature in George Stephenson’s early professional career, that he should have been able to confine himself to so limited a number as that which could be supplied by the hands of one person in carrying out the construction of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway; and this may still be said, after full allowance is made for the alteration of system involved by the adoption of the large contract system.” Letter to the author. Letter to Mr. Illingworth. September 25th, 1825. Letter to Mr. Illingworth. April 9th, 1827. ‘Geological Transactions of Cornwall.’ i. 222. The arguments used by Mr. Stephenson with the directors, in favour of the locomotive engine, were afterwards collected and published in 1830 by Robert Stephenson and Joseph Locke, as “compiled from the Reports of Mr. George Stephenson.” The pamphlet was entitled, ‘Observations on the Comparative Merits of Locomotive and Fixed Engines.’ Robert Stephenson, speaking of the authorship many years after, said, “I believe I furnished the facts and the arguments, and Locke put them into shape. Locke was a very flowery writer, whereas my style was rather bald and unattractive; so he was the editor of the pamphlet, which excited a good deal of attention amongst engineers at the time.” The conditions were these:—
1. The engine must effectually consume its own smoke.
2. The engine, if of six tons weight, must be able to draw after it, day by day, twenty tons weight (including the tender and water-tank) at ten miles an hour, with a pressure of steam on the boiler not exceeding fifty pounds to the square inch.
3. The boiler must have two safety-valves, neither of which must be fastened down, and one of them be completely out of the control of the engineman.
4. The engine and boiler must be supported on springs, and rest on six wheels, the height of the whole not exceeding fifteen feet to the top of the chimney.
5. The engine, with water, must not weigh more than six tons; but an engine of less weight would be preferred on its drawing a proportionate load behind it; if only four and a half tons, then it might be put on only four wheels. The Company to be at liberty to test the boiler, etc., by a pressure of one hundred and fifty pounds to the square inch.
6. A mercurial gauge must be affixed to the machine, showing the steam pressure above forty-five pounds per square inch.
7. The engine must be delivered, complete and ready for trial, at the Liverpool end of the railway, not later than the 1st of October, 1829.
8. The price of the engine must not exceed £550. The inventor of this engine was a Swede, who afterwards proceeded to the United States, and there achieved considerable distinction as an engineer. His Caloric Engine has so far proved a failure, but his iron cupola vessel, the “Monitor,” must be admitted to have been a remarkable success in its way. The “Rocket” is now to be seen at the Museum of Patents at Kensington, where it is carefully preserved. Tubbing is now adopted in many cases as a substitute for brick-walling. The tubbing consists of short portions of cast-iron cylinder fixed in segments. Each weighs about 4½ cwt., is about 3 or 4 feet long, and about ? of an inch thick. These pieces are fitted closely together, length under length, and form an impermeable wall along the side of the pit. During this period he was engaged on the North Midland, extending from Derby to Leeds; the York and North Midland, from Normanton to York; the Manchester and Leeds; the Birmingham and Derby, and the Sheffield and Rotherham Railways; the whole of these, of which he was principal engineer, having been authorised in 1836. In that session alone, powers were obtained for the construction of 214 miles of new railways under his direction, at an expenditure of upwards of five millions sterling. The question of the specific merits of the atmospheric as compared with the fixed engine and locomotive systems, will be found fully discussed in Robert Stephenson’s able ‘Report on the Atmospheric Railway System,’ 1844, in which he gives the result of numerous observations and experiments made by him on the Kingstown Atmospheric Railway, with the object of ascertaining whether the new power would be applicable for the working of the Chester and Holyhead Railway, then under construction. His opinion was decidedly against the atmospheric system. The Marquis of Clanricarde brought under the notice of the House of Lords, in 1845, that one Charles Guernsey, the son of a charwoman, and a clerk in a broker’s office, at 12s. a week, had his name down as a subscriber for shares in the London and York line, for £52,000. Doubtless he had been made useful for the purpose by the brokers, his employers. “When my father came about the office,” said Robert, “he sometimes did not well know what to do with himself. So he used to invite Bidder to have a wrestle with him, for old acquaintance’ sake. And the two wrestled together so often, and had so many ‘falls’ (sometimes I thought they would bring the house down between them), that they broke half the chairs in my outer office. I remember once sending my father in a joiner’s bill of about £2. 10s. for mending broken chairs.” The simple fact that in a heavy storm the force of impact of the waves is from one and a-half to two tons per square foot, must necessarily dictate the greatest possible caution in approaching so formidable an element. Mr. R. Stevenson (Edinburgh) registered a force of three tons per square foot at Skerryvore, during a gale in the Atlantic, when the waves were supposed to run twenty feet high. Robert Stephenson’s narrative in Clark’s ‘Britannia and Conway Tubular Bridges,’ vol. i. p. 27. ‘Account of the Construction of the Britannia and Conway Tubular Bridges.’ By W. Fairbairn, C.E. London, 1849. Mr. Stephenson continued to hold that the elliptical tube was the right idea, and that sufficient justice had not been done to it. A year or two before his death Mr. Stephenson remarked to the author, that had the same arrangement for stiffening been adopted to which the oblong rectangular tubes owe a great part of their strength, a very different result would have been obtained. ‘The Britannia and Conway Tubular Bridges.’ By Edwin Clark. Vol. II, pp. 683–4. No. 34, Gloucester Square, Hyde Park, where he lived. The above anecdote is given on the authority of Mr. Sopwith. F.R.S. The second Mrs. Stephenson having died in 1845, George married a third time in 1848, about six months before his death. The third Mrs. Stephenson had for some time been his housekeeper. In 1829 Robert Stephenson married Frances, daughter of John Sanderson, merchant, London; but she died in 1842, without issue, and Mr. Stephenson did not marry again. Until the close of his life, Robert Stephenson was accustomed twice in every year to visit his wife’s grave in Hampstead churchyard. Address as President of the Institution of Civil Engineers, January, 1856.
