CHAP. VII.] GEORGE STEPHENSON'S SECOND MARRIAGE.

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acter, sensible, and intelligent, and of a kindly and affectionate nature. George's son Robert, whom she loved as if he had been her own, to the last day of his life spoke of her in the highest terms; and it is unquestionable that she contributed in no small degree to the happiness of her husband's home.

The story was for some time current that, while living at Black Callerton in the capacity of engine - man, twenty years before, George had made love to Miss Hindmarsh, and, failing to obtain her hand, in despair he had married Paterson's servant. But the author has been assured by Mr. Thomas Hindmarsh, of Newcastle, the lady's brother, that the story was mere idle gossip, and altogether without foundation.

CHAPTER VIII.

GEORGE STEPHENSON ENGINEER OF THE STOCKTON AND DARLINGTON RAILWAY.

It is not improbable that the slow progress made by railways in public estimation was, in a considerable measure, due to the comparative want of success which had attended the first projects. We do not refer to the tram-roads and railroads which connected the collieries and iron-works with the shipping-places. These were found convenient and economical, and their use became general in Durham and Northumberland, in South Wales, in Scotland, and throughout the colliery districts. But none of these were public railways. Though the Merthyr Tydvil Tramroad, the Sirhoway Railroad, and others in South Wales, were constructed under the powers of special acts,* they were exclusively used for the private purposes of the coal-owners and ironmasters at whose expense they were made.

The first public Railway Act was that passed in 1801, authorizing the construction of a line from Wandsworth to Croydon, under the name of "The Surrey Iron Railway." By a subsequent act, powers were obtained to extend the line to Reigate, with a branch to Godstone. The object of this railway was to furnish a more ready means for the transport of coal and merchandise from the Thames to the districts of south London, and at the same time to enable the lime-burners and proprietors of stone-quarries to send the lime and stone to London. With this object, the railroad was connected with a dock or basin in Wandsworth Creek capable of containing thirty barges, with an entrance lock into the Thames.

The works had scarcely been commenced ere the company got into difficulties, but eventually 26 miles of iron-way were con

*The act for constructing the Merthyr Tydvil Tram-road was obtained from Parliament as early as 1794; that for the Sirhoway Railroad in 1801; the Carmarthenshire Railroad was sanctioned in the same year; and the Oystermouth Railway in

CHAP. VIII.] FAILURE OF THE CROYDON RAILWAY.

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structed and opened for traffic. Any person was then at liberty to put wagons on the line, and to carry goods within the prescribed rates, the wagons being worked by horses, mules, and donkeys. Notwithstanding the very sanguine expectations which were early formed as to the paying qualities of this railway, it never realized any adequate profit to the owners. But it continued to be worked, principally by donkeys for the sake of cheapness, down to the passing of the act for constructing the London and Brighton line in 1837, when the proprietors disposed of their undertaking to the new company. The line was accordingly dismantled; the stone blocks and rails were taken up and sold; and all that remains of the Wandsworth, Croydon, and Merstham Railway is the track still observable to the south of Croydon, along Smitham Bottom, nearly parallel with the line of the present Brighton Railway, and an occasional cutting and embankment, which still mark the route of this first public railway.

The want of success of this undertaking doubtless had the effect of deterring projectors from embarking in any similar enterprise. If a line of the sort could not succeed near London, it was thought improbable that it should succeed any where else. The Croydon and Merstham line was a beacon to warn capitalists against embarking in railways, and many years passed before another was ventured upon.

Sir Richard Phillips was one of the few who early recognized the important uses of the locomotive and its employment on a large scale for the haulage of goods and passengers by railway. In his "Morning Walk to Kew" he crossed the line of the Wandsworth and Croydon Railway, when the idea seems to have occurred to him, as it afterwards did to Thomas Gray, that in the locomotive and the railway were to be found the germs of a great and peaceful social revolution:

"I found delight," said Sir Richard, in his book published in 1813, "in witnessing at Wandsworth the economy of horse labor on the iron railway. Yet a heavy sigh escaped me as I thought of the inconceivable millions of money which have been spent about Malta, four or five of which might have been the means of extending double lines of iron railway from London to Edinburg, Glasgow, Holyhead, Milford, Falmouth, Yarmouth, Dover, and Portsmouth. A reward of a single thousand would have supplied coaches and

other vehicles, of various degrees of speed, with the best tackle for readily turning out; and we might, ere this, have witnessed our mail-coaches running at the rate of ten miles an hour drawn by a single horse, or impelled fifteen miles an hour by Blenkinsop's steam-engine. Such would have been a legitimate motive for overstepping the income of a nation, and the completion of so great and useful a work would have afforded rational ground for public triumph in general jubilee."

There was, however, as yet, no general recognition of the advantages either of railways or locomotives. The government of this country never leads in any work of public enterprise, and is usually rather a drag upon industrial operations than otherwise. As for the general public, it was enough for them that the Wandsworth and Croydon Railway did not pay.

Mr. Tredgold, in his "Practical Treatise on Railroads and Carriages," published in 1825, observes:

"Up to this period railways have been employed with success only in the conveyance of heavy mineral products, and for short distances where immense quantities were to be conveyed. In the few instances where they have been intended for the general purposes of trade, they have never answered the expectations of their projectors. But this seems to have arisen altogether from following too closely the models adopted for the conveyance of minerals, such modes of forming and using railways not being at all adapted for the general purposes of trade.”

The ill success of railways was generally recognized. Jointstock companies for all sorts of purposes were formed during the joint-stock mania of 1821, but few projectors were found daring enough to propose schemes so unpromising as railways. Hence nearly twenty years passed between the construction of the first and the second public railway in England; and this brings us to the projection of the Stockton and Darlington, which may be regarded as the parent public locomotive railway in the kingdom.

The district lying to the west of Darlington, in the county of Durham, is one of the richest mineral fields of the North. Vast stores of coal underlie the Bishop Auckland Valley, and from an early period it was felt to be an exceedingly desirable object to open up new communications to enable the article to be sent to

CHAP. VIII.]

TEES NAVIGATION IMPROVED.

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market. But the district lay a long way from the sea, and, the Tees being unnavigable, there was next to no vend for the Bishop Auckland coal.

It is easy to understand, therefore, how the desire to obtain an outlet for this coal for land sale, as well as for its transport to London by sea, should have early occupied the attention of the coal-owners in the Bishop Auckland district. The first idea that found favor was the construction of a canal. About a century ago, in 1766, shortly after the Duke of Bridgewater's Canal had been opened between Worsley and Manchester, a movement was set on foot at Darlington with the view of having the country surveyed between that place and Stockton-on-Tees.

Brindley was requested to lay out the proposed line of canal; but he was engrossed at the time by the prosecution of the works on the Duke's Canal to Liverpool, and Whitworth, his pupil and assistant, was employed in his stead; George Dixon, grandfather of John Dixon, engineer of the future Stockton and Darlington Railway, taking an active part in the survey. In October, 1768, Whitworth presented his plan of the proposed canal from Stockton by Darlington to Winston, and in the following year, to give weight to the scheme, Brindley concurred with him in a joint report as to the plan and estimate.

Nothing was, however, done in the matter. Enterprise was slow to move. Stockton waited for Darlington, and Darlington waited for Stockton, but neither stirred until twenty years later, when Stockton began to consider the propriety of straightening the Tees below that town, and thereby shortening and improving the navigation. When it became known that some engineering scheme was afoot at Stockton, that indefatigable writer of prospectuses and drawer of plans, Ralph Dodd, the first projector of a tunnel under the Thames, the first projector of the Waterloo Bridge, and the first to bring a steam-boat from Glasgow into the Thames, addressed the Mayor and Corporation of Stockton in 1796 on the propriety of forming a line of internal navigation by Darlington and Staindrop to Winston. Still nothing was done. Four years later, another engineer, George Atkinson, reported in favor of a water-way to connect the then projected Great Trunk Canal, from about Boroughbridge to Piersebridge, with the Tees above Yarm.