Rambles on Railways

by Sir Cusack P. Roney

Reply of Robert Stephenson, Esq., M.P., President of the Institution of Civil Engineers, to observations in the Second Report of the Postmaster-General. Delivered at the Meeting of May 20th, 1856.

Gentlemen,

You will no doubt remember, that on taking this chair for the first time after election to it, I addressed you, according to the custom of the President of the Institution, upon matters of interest connected with civil engineering. The special points to which I directed your attention, were connected with the rise and progress of the railway system in this country; and amongst other matters referred to, were the facilities afforded by railways to the Post Office, which were described “as of the highest public consequence.” In enumerating those facilities, I observed that speed might, at first sight, appear to be the greatest item in the catalogue. But I said, “it may be doubted if it is the most important”:—“What is really of the greatest value to the Post Office, is the facility afforded of carrying bulk.” And then I went on to state that, “without railway facilities, it was not too much to say, that the excellent plans of Mr. Rowland Hill for the reduction of the rates of postage, could not have been carried out to their full extent,” and to give a variety of reasons in support of that position.

I had hoped that throughout the section of the Paper in which this subject was considered, I had guarded myself very carefully against the slightest appearance of impugning the merit of Mr. Hill’s plan, or its influence for good upon the British people, as no one can appreciate more thoroughly than I do the value of the penny postage system, and the boon it confers upon the public. It has been, therefore, with regret that I have seen in the “Second Report of the Postmaster-General on the Post Office,” dated the 30th January 1856, observations upon the Railway companies of England and upon my own statement, which appear to misconstrue the object of my remarks.

The tendency of the Post Office Report is to depreciate the advantages afforded to the Post Office by Railways. It is said that the railway working is “so irregular as to require from the Post Office serious and repeated remonstrances,” and also that against the advantages afforded by railways “there is an important set-off in increased expenses,” that “that change, which to the public at large has so much reduced the charge for the conveyance, whether of persons, or goods, has had precisely the reverse effect as regards the conveyance of mails.” It is also alleged, that the claims of the companies are often exorbitant, and that the loss inflicted upon the companies by the Post Office, in undertaking the carriage of parcels by their book post, is not, as the railways allege, “an injury, but is, in reality, a benefit,” and that even if it were otherwise, the companies “are compensated by the law relieving newspapers from the compulsory stamp, which has largely transferred the conveyance of newspapers from the mail bags to the luggage vans.” Annexed to the Report, which contains these statements, is a letter from Mr. Page, the Inspector-General of Mails, who carries these allegations still further.

I shall endeavour in reply, not only to sustain my own argument, but to show, that the assertions contained in the Report are fallacious; and that on the contrary, railways, viewed in reference to postal facilities, are “the great public instructors and educators of the day.”

The Post Office Report commences with certain admissions. It introduces the subject by the following sentence:—“Increased use has been made of several of the railways.”

Now, if the railways are so irregular, if their claims are so exorbitant, and if, as the Report says, the same work could be done by the old mail coaches at much less expense, why is “increased use made of the railways?”

The next sentence states, that “By means of the establishment of an additional express mail train from London to Dover, ... a much later despatch from London of the day mail to France has been afforded, the time being now as late as 1·30 p.m. This change, besides affording to the merchants in London the opportunity of replying, the same morning, to letters from France, received by the night mail, admits of letters from Scotland, Ireland, and the north and south-west of England, which arrive in London by the day mail, being sent forward by the day mail to France, instead of being detained, as previously, for the night mail.”

The Post Office claims the merit of this. Nothing is said of the facilities afforded by the railway. The mail, here referred to, leaves London at half-past one in the afternoon. It stops only at the four junction stations on the line;—Reigate, Tunbridge, Ashford, and Folkestone;—reaching Dover at four o’clock, and thus, in two hours and a-half, carrying all the correspondence with Europe to the confines of England. Twice a month this train carries the Indian Mail. It conveyed, last year, nearly two million letters, exclusive of newspapers, to and from the army and navy in the Crimea. It will thus be seen, that this train performs important services for the Post Office and the public, and that it travels with great speed. The Post Office complains that the South-Eastern Railway Company are exacting “enormous prices,” because they pay for the service of this train at the rate of 2s. 3d. per mile! But when it is considered that this train was put on purely for Post Office purposes, and that the ordinary train, which previously left at the same hour, has not been superseded, but has been put back, in order to give facility to this train, the rate charged cannot be considered unreasonable:—in my opinion it is too low.