The principal parliamentary battle I had was in 1844-5; and in the following year I had another with the Great Northern Railway. The late Mr. Gravatt had the dual line from King’s Cross by Barnet, Welwyn, Stilton, Stamford, Corby, Lincoln, Asking to York; this was in every respect the shortest and the most easy of execution; unfortunately, our company was not formed until the end of September, so that it was extremely difficult, in so short a time, to get the surveys and levels made correctly. The late Mr. Francis Giles undertook to have the whole completed in the most perfect manner by the 30th November, 1844, for depositing with the respective Clerks of the Peace, as required by the Standing Orders of Parliament. Mr. Giles’s well-known reputation as a first-rate engineering surveyor appeared to Mr. Gravatt and myself a sufficient guarantee that the surveys would be well completed by the required time; in this, unfortunately, we were most grievously disappointed, for Mr. Giles, who had a good deal of other business in hand, could not devote his whole attention to it, which was absolutely necessary; in fact, he ought never to have undertaken it; but he always assured us that it would be properly done in time. However, finding that he did not go on so well as we expected, we endeavoured, as far as practicable, to remedy the evil by setting on additional surveyors ourselves, under the control of Mr. Giles; but in spite of all our exertions, Mr. Giles failed completely, and our line, in consequence of the numerous defects in the survey, was thrown out upon Standing Orders, and the present Great Northern line, which was our rival, but acknowledged to be not so good, notwithstanding a strong opposition, was carried through Parliament, very much to the annoyance of Mr. Gravatt and myself, and Mr. Gravatt never forgave Mr. Giles’s neglect.

My rule on all these occasions was to endeavour to conciliate the landowners through whose estates we went, always asking and obtaining their permission before entering upon their lands, and by this means we made friends wherever we went; amongst other great proprietors we went through a considerable portion of the Marquis of Exeter’s estate, near Stamford. Upon going down the line I found one of our surveyors drunk, and he had so completely departed from his instructions that I paid and discharged him at once. I called on the Marquis to explain this, but he was not visible, as he was busy with preparations for the reception of Her Majesty and H.R.H. the Prince Consort, who were expected to arrive the next day. I then went down the line as far as York, and upon my return called again upon the Marquis at Burleigh, who received me very coldly, and said when he gave me permission to go through his estate, it was upon a particular line, which I faithfully promised to adhere to; but he was much surprised and sorry to find that I had broken my word, for that when H.R.H. the Prince Consort was shooting in his preserves he found one of my surveyors with several assistants breaking into and carrying the line through them, which he had strictly forbidden, and which I had as strictly promised to his Lordship that I would not touch; and it was most fortunate that the surveyor and his assistants were not shot, for it was never for a moment expected that they would be there. After having heard his Lordship quietly, and having asked the day, and the name of the surveyor, which his Lordship told me, I said that the man was not in my employment, for the very day on which I last called at Burleigh I found this same surveyor drunk, and carrying the line into the preserves, which I had strictly forbidden, and I immediately discharged him. And I added that as his Lordship found him in the preserves, he must have been sent there by somebody else. His Lordship was at once perfectly satisfied with this explanation, and became as friendly as ever, and pressed me to stop and dine with him; this invitation I courteously declined, for I was so much occupied that I had not an hour to spare.

One very important feature of our line, besides making it shorter, more direct, and easier of execution, was the position of the station at York, which we proposed to make on the main line, immediately outside the walls of the city; and in order to effect this we carried our line by a bridge across the railways then entering the York station, while our rivals proposed to carry their line into the station itself; which scheme having been adopted, compels them to back in and out, and not only occasions considerable loss of time, but materially increases the risk of collisions.

Another important line was the Bristol and Chepstow, which would materially have shortened the distance between Bristol, Birmingham, and Liverpool, instead of going round by Gloucester, and would have enabled the South Wales Railway to shorten materially their distance to London. In order to effect this I proposed to carry the line across the Severn at the old passage by an iron bridge, with a clear height of 100 feet above the high-water level of spring tides, so as to enable the largest ships to pass under. It happened that the rocks in the river afforded excellent foundations for the piers.

The late Mr. Cobden was chairman of the Committee in the House of Commons to whom this Bill was referred, and they were all astonished at the boldness and grandeur of the undertaking; although the late Mr. Brunel and others did not deny its practicability, yet the promoters of the undertaking could not see their way to find the means for carrying it into effect, and therefore the Bill was withdrawn.

I forgot to mention the Central Kent Railway line, 1838. It had long been considered a desirable object to connect Dover and London by a railway for the Continent, and the South-Eastern had already obtained an Act to make a line by Redhill, thence to Tunbridge, Ashford, and Folkestone, to Dover, the distance being 86 miles, whereas the old coach road was only 72. Moreover, the South-Eastern avoids all the principal towns and population in Kent; so much so, that it was considered to be very objectionable, and that it would not pay.

I was accordingly requested by a most influential committee to examine the county of Kent carefully, and endeavour to find out a better line. I was not long in discovering one, namely, to commence at London Bridge, thence by Lewisham, Eltham, the Crays, the Darent, 4 miles above Dartford, thence by Gravesend, through Gad’s Hill, crossing the Medway a mile above Rochester, thence, within a mile of Maidstone, to Eastwell, where it was to separate into two branches, one to Ashford, and thence on to Folkestone and Dover; another to Canterbury, thence to Sandwich, where it was to terminate; while from the Darent another branch was intended to run up the valley of that river, with a tunnel at its head, and thence to Sevenoaks and Tunbridge. From this it will be seen that the main line connected all the principal towns in the county together; each was at the same time within the shortest distance from the metropolis, and nearly 14 miles nearer to Dover than the present South-Eastern line; and there was no inclination steeper than 1 in 264, or 20 feet to the mile, and the New Cross inclined plane of the Greenwich and Croydon line of 1 in 100 for three miles would have been avoided. This line was so obviously the best for Kent and the sea-coast, that when submitted to the South-Eastern Company, who had not commenced theirs, they admitted it, and told their solicitors, Messrs. Fearon, to tell our solicitors, Messrs. Freshfield, that they would make terms with us for carrying it into effect. How the negotiations fell through I never heard; whether it was from the opposition of Maidstone and Lord Winchelsea, who, as well as Sir Percival Dyke, violently opposed it—although since, I understand, they have sincerely repented—I never could learn; but the negotiation failed, although we were perfectly ready to give up the line to the South-Eastern upon a reasonable compensation, and they (the South-Eastern Railway) commenced and completed their line round by Tunbridge, and bitter cause they had to repent it. Two of my assistants—Crampton and Morris—after leaving me, considering that it would be a good speculation to get up a shorter line to Dover, persuaded a very worthy nobleman, Lord Harris, who has considerable property near, between Sittingbourne and Canterbury, and some other influential landowners on the line, to form a company to make a line between Rochester and Canterbury, and Mr. George Burge, the contractor of the St. Katharine Docks and Herne Bay Pier, under the late Mr. Telford, joined them.

Burge had invested a good deal of money at Herne Bay, and naturally expected that one day a line of railway would be made to it, and that the value of his property would be considerably increased thereby. Morris, a very honest, painstaking, and industrious man, who had been in my service many years, and afterwards became one of the contractors of the South-Eastern Railway, and made a good deal of money there, had the sagacity to purchase the old harbour of Folkestone, it is said for 10,000l., and sold it to the South-Eastern Railway Company, profiting considerably by the transaction. Crampton had made some improvements in the locomotive engine, and afterwards became the principal executive engineer to Messrs. Samuda. At the time Crampton came into my employment Messrs. Samuda had had a vessel constructed, and had made the engines for propelling her upon a new principle. The vessel was called the ‘Gipsey Queen,’ and a day was appointed for the trial. Whether Crampton had some misgivings about the success of the experiment, or whether he was tired of the employment, I do not know, but he was anxious to come under me. Knowing him to be a clever, hard-working person, I took him, and he continued serving me faithfully for four years. Crampton entered my service four days before the experimental trial of the ‘Gipsey Queen,’ which took place, I think, in the year 1840. The result of the trial was that the boiler blew up, Samuda’s brother and four men were killed, and if Crampton had remained in their service, he would probably have been killed also. During the time Crampton was in my service, he made the acquaintance of my solicitors, the Messrs. Freshfield, who conceived a high opinion of his talents and energy.

Morris, Crampton, and Burge, then, commenced the London, Chatham, and Dover Railway with comparatively very little support for an undertaking of the kind, and experienced very great uphill work; so much so, that Burge got alarmed, and Morris and Crampton bought him out. Morris and Crampton still struggled on with it, and then Morris went out, and Crampton remained alone. At last he got Peto and Betts to join him, and then the concern went ahead. Lord Sondes, a large proprietor in Norfolk and in Kent, also joined them, and they completed the original line. They then went to Parliament to extend their railway by an independent line to London, and from Canterbury to Dover, and, subsequently, by lines to the City, so as ultimately to join the Metropolitan Railway, and from thence with the Great Northern Railway at King’s Cross. How they raised the enormous amount of capital to execute these works was a miracle, but the tale has at last been unfolded, and the unfortunate subscribers have found it out, to their cost; the concern has become bankrupt, and the great contracting firm of Peto and Betts, as well as Crampton, have ended in the ‘Gazette,’ as a melancholy example of what energy and capital will come to when pushed beyond their just limits. The original shares of 100l. may now (at the time of writing) be bought at 18l., and the South-Eastern Railway have been compelled to expend nearly 700,000l. to cut off the angle between London and Tunbridge; whereas, if they had only adopted my line of the Central Kent Railway, as they agreed to do in 1838, all this would have been avoided; the London, Chatham, and Dover would never have been made, the enormous losses would not have occurred, thirty-two millions would not have been spent in railways for a single county, and the South-Eastern shares would not (at the time of writing) be at 65.