But I can't so instead I will offer up the memories of one man who travelled from Manchester to Liverpool during the first decade after it had been built.
This was the remarkable; J.T.Slugg who came to Manchester as a young man and in 1881 published a description of the city of his youth. He was there at the opening of the railway and recalled that “the morning opened most propitiously as to the weather and at about half past ten I set off with my brother and friend to witness the wonderful sight of a train being moved without a horse.”
But for me it is the comments on the daily running of what was the first passenger railway in the world which are more fascinating.
There were only seven trains a day each way and first and second class passengers had their own trains. The last first class train left at 5 p.m. and the last second class at 5.30.p.m., but at a time when the Manchester markets were still a significant factor in the city’s economy “on Tuesday and Saturday, which were then the two principle market days, the last train left at 6 p.m.”
Slugg also seized on the fact that while this was a first the railway still straddled both the past and the future, so the some of the carriages resembled the old stage coaches complete with luggage on the roof with the guard sitting beside it.
Just as every stage coach was designated by some name, so each first class carriage was designated in like manner.
This was the remarkable; J.T.Slugg who came to Manchester as a young man and in 1881 published a description of the city of his youth. He was there at the opening of the railway and recalled that “the morning opened most propitiously as to the weather and at about half past ten I set off with my brother and friend to witness the wonderful sight of a train being moved without a horse.”
But for me it is the comments on the daily running of what was the first passenger railway in the world which are more fascinating.
There were only seven trains a day each way and first and second class passengers had their own trains. The last first class train left at 5 p.m. and the last second class at 5.30.p.m., but at a time when the Manchester markets were still a significant factor in the city’s economy “on Tuesday and Saturday, which were then the two principle market days, the last train left at 6 p.m.”
Slugg also seized on the fact that while this was a first the railway still straddled both the past and the future, so the some of the carriages resembled the old stage coaches complete with luggage on the roof with the guard sitting beside it.
Amongst the names I remember were King William, Queen Adelaide, Duke of wellington, Sir Robert Peel, Earl Wilton and William Huskinson.”
And like so much of what the railway laid down as not changed over much.
And like so much of what the railway laid down as not changed over much.
Steam locomotives more or less resembled the winning design, and carriages as these from the late 1830s testify looked very similar.
Pictures; Traveling the 1830s way, 2008, from the collection of Andrew Simpson Greater Manchester Science and Industry Museum
*Slugg, J.T., Reminiscences of Manchester, 1881 page 234
Pictures; Traveling the 1830s way, 2008, from the collection of Andrew Simpson Greater Manchester Science and Industry Museum
*Slugg, J.T., Reminiscences of Manchester, 1881 page 234
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