1848.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNTAL. 



3fi] 



GEORGE STEPHENSON. 

 fContinued from page 333.J 



VII. STEPHENSON, GRAY, AND JAMES. 



The share which Stephenson had in brinejinfr railways to the 

 height at whicli they now are has been much foug-ht about. He 

 has been named the " Father of Railways" by many of his friends ; 

 but there are others who are put forward. By what he did with 

 the locomotive he had made a step onwards, and tliis he followed 

 up by tlie Stockton and Darlington Railway. These were great 

 works; but no one who fairly looks at it can 'believe that to George 

 Stephenson only is owing our wide net-work of railways. At forty, 

 Stephenson was hardly more than a working man, with little 

 weight even among his own friends ; and he had no means, had he 

 had the wish of moving the world to the great step, thereby the 

 bounds of neighbourhood were to be widened, tlie furthest shires 

 of England and Scotland brought within a few hours reacli, and 

 the householders of London and of Paris, sundered from the be- 

 ginning of the world, made to know each other as friends and as 

 brothers. He had his share, and a great share, but no more, in 

 this mighty stride towards the fellowship and brotherhood of all 

 mankind, which the wise of old have sighed for and dreamed of, 

 but which they durst never hope should be so nearly brouffht 

 about. 3 a 



The earth has this year taken to itself Thomas Gray, as well as 

 Stephenson, so that each can be as fairly brouglit to doom. Had 

 not the former come forward while living, perhaps his name would 

 have never been heard, nor would he have been called the " Railway 

 Pioneer." It seemed hard, however, that a ijrey-headed old man, 

 who, m his youth, had seen so far beyond his fellows, should be 

 left to starve in the sight of the wonders wliich he had foretold. 

 There is always a feeling for the seer who ishajipy in his bodings; 

 more, perhaps, than for the workman who has slowly wrought out 

 the task with which he set forth. There is a feeling of kindness, 

 too, for one who has wished to do well, and on wliom good luck 

 has not smiled. There was a forbearance, therefore, in searching 

 into what Thomas Gray had done, and meting it out narrowly by 

 the wand of truth, yet the utmost of what could be said of "him 

 was, that he was one of those who, like Sir Richard Phillips' and 

 others, but later, had laid down wliat was witliin the bounds of 

 skill to do. ^V^hat Thomas Gray wrote and spoke in 1820, hun- 

 dreds had said when Trevithick run his first steam-engine on the 

 Merthyr Railway : to have seen his engine and the Croydon tram- 

 way was enough ; any man of common daring would foretell the 

 greater speed and might of the iron horse, wliicli would grow with 

 his growth. To map out the railways as Thomas Gray did needed 

 no skill, for they must be made wliere the trade already flowed, 

 and not over the highlands of Scotland, the wastes of Dartmoor 

 or the heights of Snowdon. That Gray did good in writing his 

 book no one will gainsay, for it awakened others to tlie worth of 

 railways, so far as it went ; but others did the same work, and 

 others did still more. Trevithick, Blenkinsop, Wm. Chapman, 

 Blackett of Wylam, and George Stephenson, set the iron Iiorse 

 going, others laid down tramways: in 1818, R. Stevenson, of Edin- 

 burgh, wrote for a great railway from Edinburgli ; and later, \S/m.. 

 James brought forward his great railway undertakings. 



On February 11, 1800, Mr. Thomas, of Denton, read before the 

 Literary and Philosopliical Society of Newcastle a paper, styled 

 "Observations on tlie Propriety of introducing Roads on the 

 Principle of the Coal ^Vagon-ways, for the General Carriage of 

 Goods &c. This is the first proposition that we know of for a 

 general railway system, and nearly twenty years before Gray's. 



In 1814., George Stephenson had in his 'm'ind's eye a better road 

 and a greater speed, and he soon brought them to iiear; the others, 

 each in their way, did something ; but Tliomas Gray only wrote 

 as Sir Richard Phillips had done. By writing. Gray might have 

 done much, had he, without doing anything, only shown to others 

 something new, which might be done : but this' cannot be said for 

 him ; and he stands as a writer and talker, while the others were 

 doers. 



Not so, however, with William James, of Warwick. He not 

 only saw what railways could do, but he set to work to make them. 

 It is now almost forgotten that the busy time of 1825 teemed with 

 railway undertakings, as much as 1835 or 1845. Then were laid 

 down all the great works, wliich have since been made, and these, 

 in a great way, through the earnestness of James. The Liverpool 

 and Manchester Railway, and tlie London and Birmingham Rail- 



w',w?'^k'""''"'''!1^1'';;^'" ,"?',"''".-'• "*-'^' "''■'^h 1^'°'" Sir Richard's " Mormng 

 ^r Ri.S,?r ■ P'"'''^5^f'" '^'g'/""* 'i''*"'"^ q'-^'ea by tl,e •■ Manchester Examiner." 

 sir Kichard was an upholder of Blenkinsop's engine. 



way, must be looked upon as his offspring ; and had it not been for 

 his unwearied earnestness, they might have been longer put off. 

 As it is, we are now only doing in 1845 what might have been done 

 in 1825 ; and in the outcry against railway calls and works, many 

 railways, the want of which" was seen in 184S, will not be made 

 until 1855 or 1865. We hear a great talk about mad-brained 

 undertakings; but the cool looker-on must weep to see how, by blind- 

 ness, the works most needful for the good of England are hindered 

 and kept back. How mueli better should we be now if the works 

 laid down in 1825 had then been begun and set out ! All that 

 good to which we now own in better liusbandry, cheaper coal, and 

 quicker trade, would now have reached a greater height. Had 

 Brindley or Stephenson been listened to when they first spoke of 

 canals and railways, England would have been much more forward 

 than she is, and s'till more a-head of other lands. We may still 

 learn from wliat has gone by, but it does not seem as if we were 

 willing to do so. 



We are not called upon to search why James did not fully fol- 

 low up his great railway undertakings, nor why he did not reap a 

 better or greater reward. Too little is known about him ; his life 

 has yet to be written ; and, until then, we cannot coolly settle 

 whether he were the loser by the carelessness and unthankful- 

 ness of the world, or, like Trevithick, by his own want of steadi- 

 ness. That to him very mucli is owing ought to be acknowledged ; 

 and now, that death does not hinder us from speaking freely," the 

 works of James are likely to be set in a liigher light. By George 

 Stephenson and his son they were acknowledged ; and the latter 

 took the lead when a call was made on railway shareholders and 

 engineers for the widow and children of James,' who are left be- 

 hind to' witness his works, but without sharing in the wealth which 

 they have yielded to others. The Stepliensons, however, after- 

 wards withdrew, and the subscription fell to the ground. 



William James laid down the first railway of any length in 

 England, the Stratford and JNIoreton Railway,- finished in 1821 ; 

 the London and Brighton Railway, %vhich he surveyed in 1812.^ 

 the Liverpool and iManchester Railway;* the Lon'don and Bir- 

 mingham Railway ;= and the Canterbury and Whitstable Railway." 

 We may, without any very great wron'g, belie\e tliat two sucli m'en 

 as Ralph Dodd and VVilliam James must have done much in 

 strengthening the mind, and awakening the hopes of George Ste- 

 phenson. The former had a share in fostering the steam-boat, as 

 well as the locomotive ; his engineering works were daring. James 

 drew the outlines of our great" iron roads. The former was un- 

 timely in his end; botli unhappy in their lives, and ever beset by 

 iR-luck. With these two Stejihenson was in fellowship ; but hap'- 

 pier in his lot, and liappier than Trevithick, in whose path he fol- 

 lowed, and carried out what the other liad left undone. It is not 

 needful now to say anything of the others' ill-luck ; it is enough to 

 say again, that the root of Stephenson's happiness lay within him- 

 self. He, too, had a struggle with the world. He had been in 

 want of work and bread : he could not get a patent for his first 

 engine ; and for liis next, he had no good partner in Dodd ; and 

 with his safety lamp he was overshadowed by the greater name of 

 Davjr, and reaped but a slender reward. He was laughed at by 

 the mighty, and set down as a quack and a cheat ; bul he looked 

 more to himself than the world, and he overcame it. 



It must be borne in mind, tliat before James and he set 

 about the Liverpool and iManchester Railway, Stephenson had set 

 the locomotive going, and was busy on the Stockton and Darling- 

 ton Railway. Steplienson was reiuly for his task ; but the strong 

 hand of a man who knew the world well must have been a great 

 help to him, and the time was most smiling. It was when Pros- 

 perity Robinson had fanned the flame of greediness ; and when the 

 fulness of wealth sent a stream of English gold to the mines of 

 Brazil, Mexico, and Peru. Ten years before, had there been sueh» 

 an opening, Stephenson would have been found unready for it : 

 he had not got his engine in full work ; lie knew little of rail- 

 ways ; and he had not put off his workman's apron. He had 

 neither the strength nor trust within him ; and though he and 

 Dodd may ha\e talked over what was to be thereafter, yet the 

 mind of Dodd, daring as it was, does not seem to have been 

 avvakened fully to what was to do greater wonders, and bring 

 greater wealth than even the steamboat. In taking a share with 

 Stephenson in the patent for the locomotive, Dodd must have seen 

 its worth, and may liave looked forward to its becoming the iron 

 horse, which it ha's been fondly named ; but he did not feel the 

 time come to ask for railways all over the land, as James did, m iio 



2 Ritchie on Railways, p. 37. a Weale's Ensamples of Railways, p. 4. 



* Ritchie OD Railways, p. 238. o Bilchie on Railways, p 238. 



* Railways of Great Britain, by Francis Whishaw, C.E.,— Art. Canterbury and 



Whitstable. ' 



47 



