TheWollaton Wagonway(orWaggonway), built between October 1603 and 1604 in theEast MidlandsofEnglandbyHuntingdon Beaumontin partnership withSir Percival Willoughby,[1]has sometimes been credited as the world's firstovergroundwagonwayand therefore regarded as a significant step in the development ofrailways.Its primacy has been recently questioned because of a wagonway built atPrescot,nearLiverpool,sometime around 1600 and possibly as early as 1594. Owned by Philip Layton, this line carried coal from a pit near Prescot Hall to a terminus about half a mile away.[2]Also, a wagonway atBroseleyin Shropshire was probably earlier.[3]
The wagonway was the earliest form ofrailway.Although modern historians are uncertain as to whether it evolved gradually or was invented at a particular time, it is known that, between the Autumn of 1603 and 1 October 1604, a wagonway had been built nearNottingham,byHuntingdon Beaumontwho was the partner ofSir Percival Willoughby,the local land-owner and owner ofWollaton Hall.It ran for approximately two miles (3 km) fromStrelleytoWollatonto assist the haulage ofcoal.The actualtrack gaugeis unknown but some websites state it was4 ft 6 in(1,372 mm).[4]No documentary evidence exists to support such statements although Lewis' work (1970) on early wooden railways, and the practicalities of horse haulage, suggest a gauge close to that dimension is plausible.
alonge the passage now laide with railes, and with suche or the lyke Carriages as are now in use for the purpose.
The above is from Sir Percival Willoughby's agreement with Huntingdon Beaumont dated 1 October 1604. Sir Percival wasLord of the Manorof Wollaton and Huntingdon Beaumont was the lessee of the Strelley coal pits. They worked the Strelley mines in an equal partnership.
Comparatively little is known of the wagonway. It cost £172 (equivalent to £51,299 in 2023),[5]and ended at Wollaton Lane End, from where most of the coal was taken onwards by road to Trent Bridge and then downstream on theRiver Trentby barge. The wagons or carriages were drawn by horses on wooden rails. The Strelley mines were worked only until about 1620, by which time all readily recoverable coal had probably been mined. The wagonway was presumably then abandoned.
The success of the Wollaton Wagonway led to Huntingdon Beaumont building other wagonways for his other mining leases nearBlythinNorthumberland.A continuous evolution of railways can be traced back to the Wollaton Wagonway.
See also
editReferences
edit- Notes
- ^Hylton, Stuart (2007).The Grand Experiment: the Birth of the Railway Age 1820-1845.Ian Allan Publishing.ISBN978-0-7110-3172-2.
- ^Jones, Mark (2012).Lancashire Railways – The History of Steam.Newbury: Countryside Books. p. 5.ISBN978-1-84674-298-9.
- ^P. King, 'The First Shropshire Railways' in G. Boyes (ed.),Early Railways 4: Papers from the fourth early railways conference(Six Martlets, Sudbury 2010), pp. 70-84.
- ^"Huntingdon Beaumont's Wollaton to Strelley Waggonway".Nottingham Hidden History. 30 July 2013.Retrieved23 August2017.
- ^UKRetail Price Indexinflation figures are based on data fromClark, Gregory (2017)."The Annual RPI and Average Earnings for Britain, 1209 to Present (New Series)".MeasuringWorth.Retrieved7 May2024.
- Sources
- Smith, R. S. (1957), "Huntingdon Beaumont Adventurer in Coal Mines",Renaissance and Modern Studies,I:115 to 153,doi:10.1080/14735785709366320.
- Smith, R. S. (1960), "England's First Rails: A reconsideration",Renaissance and Modern Studies,IV:119 to 134,doi:10.1080/14735786009391434.
- Lewis, M J T (1970),Early Wooden Railways,Routledge Keegan Paul,London, England.
- Smith, R. S. (1989),Early Coal Mining Around Nottingham 1500 - 1650,University of Nottingham (out of print).
- New, J. R. (November 2004), "400 years of English railways - Huntingdon Beaumont and the early years",Backtrack,18(11): 660 to 665.
- New, J. R. (2014), "Wollaton or Broseley? The gap narrows", in Gwyn, Dr. D. (ed.),Early Railways 5,Six Martlets Publishing, Sudbury, UK, pp.1–11
- Lewis, M. J. T. (2006), "Reflections on 1604", in Bailey, M. R. (ed.),Early Railways 3,Six Martlets Publishing, Sudbury, UK, pp.8–22
- Ashworth, W. (1986),The History of the British coal industry,Oxford University Press, p. 168
External links
edit- Waggonway Research Circle:The Wollaton Wagonway of 1604. The World’s First Overland Railway,August 2005