Generally speaking, I had the hearty co-operation of my brother directors, and doubtless many of the improvements effected during my connection with the Board originated with one or other of their number; but there was one important point on which it was with difficulty that I got my own way, and I advert to this particularly, because I am convinced by a variety of circumstances that laxity thereon is a frequent cause of accident, even to the present day. This was a strict enforcement of penalties—very moderate ones sufficed—on every discovered breach of rule. Of course there was ready concurrence in this whenever the omission resulted in positive accident, but there was no less disposition to condone at other times. “Why punish the poor man?—No harm has been done,” was a frequent remonstrance; and when I pointed out that the amount of blame was nowise affected by the result, my proposition, though admitted in theory, was deemed harsh in practice; so that, while no objection was raised to the soundness of the rule, almost every case seemed to be regarded as an exception. Fortunately, I had enough of support to maintain enforcement, and to this I attribute much of the benefit which followed.
Another useful practice was to diffuse throughout the Company’s force full information as to the cause of accidents, wherever they might occur. For this purpose, we arranged with the proprietors of one of the railway journals, that whenever accounts of accidents were given in the paper we should be supplied with three or four hundred slip-copies of the narrative, and these were distributed to every station-master, engine-driver, guard, and pointsman—in short, to all on whose conduct the safety of the passengers depended.
Again, by occasionally travelling on the engine I discovered defects in the arrangements which might otherwise have been concealed till some catastrophe brought them to light. For instance, the road between London and Brighton at that time belonged to three several companies, each with a different code of signals, or rather, each, with certain exceptions, interpreting the same signals differently. Consequently, the engine-driver, in reading the signal, had to consider on what part of the road the train was then running. The danger of such a state of things was so obvious that I had no great difficulty in establishing a uniform code. I may remark here, that I know of few things more interesting or exciting than to travel on an engine running at high speed, especially on a dark night.
The success of all these precautionary measures was highly satisfactory. It must, indeed, be admitted that in some respects safety was easier of attainment then than now, lines being more simple and the traffic much less. But, on the other hand, experience was then comparatively short, and much was unknown which is now familiar; neither was the electric telegraph yet in use. Be all this as it may, the fact is that during the three years and more that I sat at the Brighton board the Company was subjected to, I believe, but one external claim for compensation. This exceptional case was as follows. It is well known that when a train reaches a terminus it is the duty of a pointsman to direct it into some portion of the station then free to receive it. On one occasion the pointsman at Brighton so blundered that the arriving train struck against a line of carriages, fortunately empty ones, then occupying the rails on to which it ran. As the train was of course preparing to stop, and had brought down its speed almost to a minimum, the collision was slight; and though the alarm was considerable, and several of the passengers were a little shaken, only one sustained any injury. This was a young woman who wore one of the large combs common at the period, and whose scalp was slightly wounded by its teeth. Of course the compensation was trifling. The pointsman, being brought before the Board, at once acknowledged his error, and declared his inability to account for the momentary misapprehension which produced it, but pleaded in excuse that though he had held his present post for several years, and had had on the average to perform the duty in question nearly a hundred times per day, this was his first mistake in its execution. This statement, which, so far as it could be tested, was found to be literally true, appeared so satisfactory to the Board, that, in their judgment, looking at his conduct as a whole, the man deserved praise rather than blame; though, in deference to public opinion, he was for a time removed to an inferior post.
Two improvements adopted by the Board, chiefly, I believe, on my recommendation, are now recognised as established institutions; and by their extension to other lines, and by increase in the scope of their operation, have obtained an importance far beyond any expectation that I could then have formed. These are excursion-trains and express-trains. Our first excursion-train ran on Sundays only. After a time the train was run on Mondays also.
The earliest express-train, intended to accommodate residents in Brighton whose occupation was in London, started from the first at its present hour, though of necessity it occupied more time in the trip; as no engine of the day was able to run fifty miles without stopping to take in water, while no means had yet been devised for supplying it to an engine in motion. The train, however, travelled at the rate of thirty-four miles per hour, including a halt at Redhill, no small achievement at that time. Every one must have remarked how soon the gratification of one desire gives birth to another—how soon we complain of imperfection in what would have been regarded but a few years earlier as unattainable perfection. I happened one day to travel in an ordinary carriage, and, not being known to its other occupants, heard some free remarks on the management of the line, to which I listened for my own edification. Somewhat to my disappointment, I found the late acceleration complained of as insufficient, one of the passengers exclaiming, “This is a slow-coach!—a very slow coach!” Imprudently I asked, “Are you aware, Sir, that the whole distance from London to Brighton is accomplished in an hour and a-half?” “Oh!” was the glib reply, “if they can do it in an hour and a-half, they can just as well do it in an hour!” [28]
By one expedient I sought to combine advantage to my present service with benefit to my former one. Perceiving that residence at Brighton, and therefore custom to the railway, would be increased by every addition to postal facilities between that town and the metropolis, I induced the directors to make an offer to the Post Office for the conveyance of a mail by every train without any additional expense to that department. The result of this offer, which was kept for some time under consideration at the Post Office, will presently appear.
In the course of 1845 the price of the £50 shares had risen, I think, to £75, or more than twice their market value at the time when the new directors were appointed—a price, however, which I knew to be in excess of their real value, and which was due in part to the general inflation at the time, for this, it may be remembered, was the year of the well-known “railway mania.” I may observe here that, pecuniarily speaking, I had been a gainer by my expulsion from the Treasury; the rise in the value of my railway property, resulting in great measure from my own efforts and those of my brother directors, having been so great as to render my previous salary comparatively insignificant; indeed, in one year, while chairman, my total gain was as high as £6,000. Why, then, did I resign so advantageous a position, especially as I could not but foresee a danger, a fear afterwards too well confirmed, that, in the absence of my own direct supervision and control, these great profits might be exchanged for yet greater losses? The answer is to be found in the political circumstances of the day. By this time Sir Robert Peel’s Government was beginning to totter, and the Liberals to have strong hopes of a speedy return to power. Believing that their return would be followed by my own recall, and feeling that my late efforts had drawn considerably on my strength both of body and mind, I resolved to obtain a long holiday—an indulgence impracticable while I retained the chairmanship. I gave notice accordingly, as appears by the following extract from the Railway Chronicle, which will, perhaps, be the more interesting as it announces the result of the offer to the Post Office already mentioned, and indicates probable consequences:—
“The Post Office has accepted the liberal offer of the Brighton Company to carry a bag of letters by every train gratis. As the South-Eastern, following the Brighton’s good example, made a similar proffer, we presume that has been treated in like manner. We congratulate the Post Office on its wisdom, and we are apt to think that a large share of public thanks for the arrangement is due to the new Postmaster-General, the Earl of St. Germans. Coupled with this intelligence, so honourable to the Brighton Company, we regret to hear that the chief instigator of the proposition, the chairman, Mr. Rowland Hill, has intimated to the Board his intention to resign his post for the sake of his health, which has been much affected by his laborious attention to business.
“Mr. Hill’s retirement will be felt by the Company and the public. Since he became chairman, the Brighton Railway has increased more than 50 per cent. in value, and the public accommodation on the line in all respects—cheapness, speed, punctuality, and a kind solicitude for the comfort of all passengers, from highest to lowest—may justly be said to have been raised quite to an equality with that of the best-managed line in the kingdom.”