It's curtains for you, see!

[What About The Bee]

When the LMR was authorized by Parliament, the Board appointed George and John Rennie as the principal Engineers of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway. Stephenson was not selected, as the surveys performed by George were found defective. The Rennies chose Charles Vignoles, surveyor, to correct those defects. After a fair degree of politics at the LMR, the Rennies were out and George was back in. As Stephenson resumed control, his new subordinate Vignoles was forced out. 

Vignoles then found himself as Engineer in the development of the St Helens & Runcorn Railway, authorized by Parliment in 1830. Many will have seen that railway and not have known they were observing it.  The St Helens & Runcorn is the railway on the famous Intersection Bridge. The LMR passes underneath the bridge.

The first railway to cross another railway NOT at a level crossing, because George Stephenson demanded it go either over or under the LMR. Equally renowned for being a girder bridge of cast iron beams. 

Why the excitement over a mundane girder bridge? The deflection of a cast iron beam was the subject of empirical studies during the early 1800s, analytic solutions were simply not possible then. What shape was the best? Compressive strength is greater than the tensile strength in cast iron. Big solid beams would work, but are entirely wasteful of material.   The solution is an I-beam with a larger cross-sectional area in the lower web to account for the weaker tensile strength. They did find this solution by trial and error, yet to optimize the solution, they required composite beam theory; something far beyond their time.

Stephenson boldly utilized the new cast iron beams, when stone arch bridges were ubiquitous. An astonishing achievement, an LMR marvel executed at the Water Street Bridge in Manchester. 

The Water Street Bridge is featured in many period illustrations. The Water Street Bridge preceeded the Intersection Bridge and served as inspiration. With Stephenson's requirement of over or under, Vignoles submitted plans for the Intersection Bridge to the LMR Board in 1831 and Stephenson approved them. A single line crossed the bridge, widened to 2 lines in 1850. The locomotive on top of Intersection Bridge looks to be of the "William the Fourth" class*, by Braithwaite and Ericsson. William the Fourth class were originally intended for the LMR, but were incapable of meeting LMR contractual obligations. B&E sold them on to St Helens & Runcorn Railway.

This image has the tender in the correct orientation for the William the Fourth class.

In the well known image, the tender is on the wrong end of the locomotive! Possibly we can forgive the artist, as the locomotive has an unusual configuration. The bridge was the center of attention, not the locomotive. The artist did manage to render the details of the tender correctly.

The St Helens & Runcorn Railway was constructed to handle freight, coal in particular. After public demand, passenger carriages were coupled to the end of freight trains.

Charles Vignoles provides us with this marvelous image, certainly of the St Helens & Runcorn Railway.

Novelty** worked the St Helens & Runcorn Railway after the Rainhill Trials and is key indicator of what we are examining. Novelty was manufactured by Braithwaite and Ericsson, as was the "William the Fourth" class. Novelty is shown with a representative consist. Freight is present, with one item clearly labeled "wool". 

The two trailing railway wagons are personal carriage wagons. The passengers in the riding compartments of the personal carriages are all of upper social status, given the exorbitant cost of this mode of transportation.

Which leaves us with the "Railway Omnibus" in the center. The male passengers of the Railway Omnibus all appear to be in tophats, and the standing individual has a jacket with tails and high waisted trousers. I believe the standing individual was known as a dandy. The seated lady on the left has a headdress of the same type as those in the personal carriages. Are we looking at passengers of high social standing? I think so. No one is bundled up for the cold, it must be warm out, suggesting summer. Does the Railway Omnibus represent 1st class? Probably, but not certainly.

Which at last, brings us to the curtains. Curtains, see! The Railway Omnibus is shown with curtains. The valence is draped beautifully for each of the two compartments as well as the central passageway. Examine the curtains behind the seated passengers, its an enclosure. While the enclosure material could be anything, the draped valence is more suggestive of cloth.

This has been a long way around to saying that curtains could be of cloth, and not necessarily leather, as they were on LMR 1st Queen Adelaide. Cloth curtains are plausible.

I note that the Hornby illustration is merely a CAD render. While the curtain color Hornby have presented for the Booth Carriage in R30090 is within the realm of possibility, my personal preference would be something else. The Booth illustration is black and white. The colors we do see on period engravings are limited by that process. Those engravings absolutely do have color variation between prints, so we cannot even be certain of the colors we do see! Whatever color Hornby finally does select will be acceptable, since an accurate color will never be known.

Yet, a rare image of Novelty on the mainline after Rainhill, the fantastic Intersection & Water Street Bridges, and the Railroad Omnibus could not be passed up.

Bee

*Not on my wishlist. YMMV.

**Novelty is very high on my wishlist, as are all Rainhill competitors like San Pareil, Cycloped and Perseverance. https://uk.hornby.com/community/forum/200th-anniversary-rainhill-trials-1829-2029-328559  I've even gone so far as to identify the carriages used at Rainhill, used by all the competitors, within that thread. Enjoy!

[threelink]

Another informative and detailed post, Bee. Many thanks. The standing individual is indeed a dandy and the passengers are undoubtedly upper middle class, but not aristocracy. I can speak on this with some confidence, having studied the history of costume as part of an art A level. It was 50 years ago or more but I still have the text book!

Without seeking to denigrate Stephenson's achievements, it has to be said that the use of cast iron in structures subject to distortion by high loadings was ultimately doomed to fail, as witness the infamous Dee Bridge collapse. I think it was more a question of undetectable flaws in the material than of its well known (even at the time) poor resistance to tension.

Cloth curtains are always a possibility but I still think unlikely on open sided carriages simply because of the inevitably rapid deterioration of cloth of any sort when exposed to the elements. Leave, say, a curtain on a washing line out in all weathers during autumn and winter and it will start to fall apart after a few months.

[What About The Bee]

Hi 3Link

I do take on board your comments vis longevity of cloth curtains. There is no doubt that cloth curtains exposed to the environment simply will not last.

I think these types of carriages were seasonal only. Late spring, summer, early autumn. Too cold to otherwise be practical. Perhaps 16 weeks before it was simply too cold for 1st class passengers.

We do not observe curtained carriages for long in the record and the longevity issue, even for leather, may have spelled their end.

I don't know if you caught the post about the Walker print and 2nd class carriages. It was a ridiculous oversight, I hadn't properly observed the wheels and completely misidentified the carriage in question. I correct it here https://uk.hornby.com/community/forum/henry-booth-and-the-new-hornby-lmr-carriage-338251?ccm_paging_p=3#end-of-replies

In my defense, the way the artist depicted the light, with the consist being in both bright light and shadow, fooled my eye. Other than that, I plead lunacy!

Bridges and beams are designed for a load. Modern material science permits fine design with minimal material, but certainly Stephenson did not have that luxury. He did a fabulous job, given the state of mechanical engineering and material science of his time.

Cast iron is brittle. Steel is not. The difference is in the way the material reacts to loads. Materials bend like a spring until they reach what is called 'yield', when deformation occurs. If force continues to be applied, it can reach what is called 'ultimate tensile strength' when rupture and failure occurs. Brittle describes materials in which yield and ultimate tensile strength are fairly close to each other, that is, when the material deforms, it ruptures. That is cast iron. Steel is not brittle, that is, yield is sufficiently far from ultimate tensile strength such that steel bends long before it ruptures.

When designing a bridge for loads, material selection as well as the load case must be carefully selected. Simply placing the load mid beam will not do. Suppose the locomotive bounces over a join in the track. When it comes down, shock loading due to deceleration of the locomotive on the rail will occur. It is important to provide the proper time sample, or the initial shock load case can be missed. High G forces, say 20G, can be readily observed. So a 4 ton locomotive suddenly becomes an 80 ton locomotive.

And yes, the material in the design is considered homogeneous, without internal defect.

Cast iron would not be my ideal choice for any high loading. Stephenson rejected cast iron rails. He had no choice for the bridges, except stone.

Is there some reference for LMR period manner of dress? When I try googling it, I get such a bewildering swirl of costume that it is difficult to make heads or tails of it. I can see passengers here and there, but I am at a loss. What about aristocracy, like the Duke of Wellington? Queen Adelaide? Rich merchant? Laborer? Etc. What is correct?

Bee

[threelink]

@Bee

Yes, I did read your post about the Walker print - again absorbing and informative. Any one could be forgiven for the interpretation difficulties caused by smoke and steam effects, perspective and, not least, the not entirely successful efforts of artists to render an accurate portrayal of something with which they would be wholly unfamiliar. I recall with some horror my first effort to draw an aeroplane at an airshow. The compound curves defeated me for some time.

Seasonal use of curtained open sided carriages certainly makes sense.

As I said, I do not and would not seek to denigrate Stephenson's achievements. The man was a genius. He was working with the available materials, with all their shortcomings, to stunning effect. The metallurgical history of iron and steel production pre-Bessemer is a fascinating subject.

So far as concerns costume there are no rules but in simple terms the tendency was for the aristocracy to follow fashion trends set by royalty, the richer upper and middle classes to follow the aristocracy, and the lower classes to do their best with whatever they had at their disposal. Typical labourer's costume would be either a sort of shepherd's smock or trousers and shirt. Footplate crews tended to prefer moleskin trouses and jackets (moleskin being a heavy cotton fabric with a brushed nap on one side rather like suede and similar to the skin of a mole). Moleskin was flexible, durable and, in heavier gauges, windproof and almost waterproof.

[What About The Bee]

Whilst researching Planet, I encountered a set of mechanical drawings, drawn by authors who also wrote a book, among other tomes, on mechanical drawings! From this, I can infer drawing accuracy in the plates you are about to see.

The Planet class drawings are simply fabulous. More details than I can shake a stick at. Apparently, they were used to construct the Planet replica that steams today. More on those drawings at another time.

Armengaud et Armengaud, L'Industrie des Chemins de Fer, 1839. Yes, in French.

Plates 22 and 23 are very interesting on the topic of curtains.

Exterior and Undercarriage

Exterior end views and cut away interior

These drawings show an "Ordinary Wagon for Travelers". We can be quite sure that this is an early carriage, as there is nothing other than dumb buffers in the undercarriage. The text associated with this carriage indicates it was used on the railway between St. Germain and Versailles.

Note the steps. They are the exact steps that appear on Hornby LMR stock. The text does state that the roof has a metal sheath over wood.

The upper sides of the carriage are composed of "curtains" and "hangings". Those were the exact words used, albeit in French. The text does not specify what they are made of.  

Now I can not state what the curtains are made of, but the bottom hem and the drape of those curtains is very suggestive. 

Click on the image and select "view image". Then zoom in for a very close inspection. 

What do you think these curtains are made of?

Bee

[threelink]

Hello Bee. It looks like fabric rather than leather, but what fabric I cannot begin to guess, beyond saying that it must have been something robust and resistant to rot.

[Tom-378683]

Just a query over ‘Charles Vignoles provides us with this marvelous image, certainly of the St Helens & Runcorn Railway.’ I wasn’t aware this image was attributed to Charles.

’The lithograph was published by Robert Martin of 124 High Holborn. According to his biographical details at the British Library he lived from the 1770s to1838 and had a number of addresses including at Carey Street, Long Acre and St Martin’s Lane.’

Before accepting it as a genuine historical source I would suggest checking some background. Novelty was favoured by the London fraternity and much London financed publicity was given to it, many images of Novelty pulling trains. These were fantasy. See the work of Anthony Dawson and others particularly on this subject.

One measurement this beautiful image allows us is the carriage trucks. Note the carriages on the trucks have their wheels between those of the rail wagon’s. This means the carriage truck bed has a maximum width of only 4’ 6”. The road carriages, a Landau and a Travelling Chariot(?), would require nearer 6’. Have a look at Henry Austen’s two images for a better more realistic depiction of a carriage truck from this period.

These are certainly fantasies. However we can’t make the same deduction for the Omnibus. So perhaps a possibility of this.. I don’t know. There aren’t any records to my knowledge.

[What About The Bee]

Hello Tom

Welcome Aboard!

I will defer to the Science Museum Group for the attribution of the image. Please inspect the record for the named artist

https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/objects/co421097/colour-lithograph-view-of-train-carriages-by-charles-vignoles-c-1830-print-lithograph

Bee

[What About The Bee]

Tom

As to Henry Austen, I find most of his depictions to be derivative of others. That is, he was not a first hand observer, he essentially draws a new scene from other images. Look at his depiction of Planet, for example. Where did the front buffer go? His consist images are a rehash of Ackermann. So I do not anguish over second hand interpretations, even if they are period depictions. Similar to Reynolds and Freeling, Austen's images are derivative.

Now when it comes to the Vignoles image, it is in perfect side elevation. Meaning it is not a natural depiction, it would be impossible for Vignoles to ever see the consist like that in real life, where everything is in 3 dimensions, not 2. Inferring carriage width may be possible, but with the unnatural depiction, uncertain. I am still researching the personal carriage wagons and the particular carriages depicted on them. I am not prepared to disclose my uncertain research at this time.

Finally, the issue of Novelty running on St. Helens and Runcorn, in my view, is indisputable. Whilst I cannot vouch for the authority of this page, note the statement of disposition of Novelty after the Rainhill Trials.

https://preservedbritishsteamlocomotives.com/novelty-0-2-2wt-st-helen-runcorn-gap-railway/

So is the image an actual depiction, like a photograph, of the consist? No, I think it representative in nature. It shows a locomotive known to be on the railway, as well as carriages and wagons that were on the railway. In perfect side elevation, as a way for Vignoles to promote the railway to others.

Bee

[Tom-378683]

Hi Bee,

I think we’re going to disagree about Austen. He was a surveyor in Liverpool and his images are most certainly original observations.

His depiction of the carriage truck for example predates the Ackermann print with a carriage truck. (Ackermann’s carriage truck image is in fact the under carriage from the mail coach in the previous version of the long print).

He also depicts the early 4-inside carriages during the their transition to their later mail coach forms. This is clear when you compare the records at the Post Office archive and the minutes at the National Archive.

[Tom-378683]

Hi Bee,

It might be helpful to clarify, Ackermann was a publisher in London, who employed an engraver to produce the long prints based on drawings created by Isaac Shaw. (He’d previously published the work of TT Bury.)

There are two original long prints, dated 1831 and 1832. The second print is a ‘bastardisation’ of the first, but having new detail presumably added from some of Shaw’s drawings not included in the first print. Note the mail coach has been created by colouring in the windows of the Despatch carriage - causing lots of historical confusion.

Austen lived, worked and published in Liverpool.

[Tom-378683]

Cheers Bee, thank you for your welcome.

Just to make sure we’re talking about the same stuff- here’s a link to one of Austen’s prints.

https://artsandculture.google.com/asset/travelling-on-the-liverpool-and-manchester-railway/4wEDeP6z5XjF0A

I’m intriqued by your faith in the Vignoles print. It is beautiful. I can’t get my head around the idea it is a genuine representation - interesting.

Cheers

Tom

[What About The Bee]

Hello Tom

I claim neither authority nor infallibility. It is entirely possible I am wrong about Henry Austen.

Once I examined his imagery vis the Armengaud mechanical drawings, I found Austen wanting.

Perhaps you would share some of the imagery you are referring to? Take note that the moderators here must approve every image, and that may take a bit of time.

I'd be happy to hear more of your views on Austen.

Thank you

Bee

[Tom-378683]

Dear Bee,

apologies, I posted the same reply twice and in deleting my ‘double’ I accidentally deleted your generously worded response.

Austen’s mail captures I believe the intermediate stage prior to the conversion of the early carriage into the mail proper with a very dangerous ‘dicky’ seat very much complained of by the Post Office.

[Mick-345930]

Curtains, treated canvas, sailcloth etc. fairly weather resistant?

[What About The Bee]

Hello M*ck [the Hornby word filter will not permit me to use your name. My apologies for that]

Solving the riddle of the type of material would be fantastic.

We know it must be durable to withstand the drubbing it would get, flapping furiously due to the motion of the train. It needs to be adjustable, yet somehow not flap in passenger faces.

The curtain also appears in center glass, end curtain carriages, known first class. Since it is first class, we must assume some degree of class consciousness. Mean forms, like sailcloth, as it would be beneath the hoity-toity first class passengers.

Weather resistance would be limited to rain, as I do not think these carriages were used in cool or cold weather. A sodden curtain however, would be very unappealing, so the ability to shed water, or dry quickly would be valued.

The fabric type is a conundrum!

It is my belief that these carriages faded away, as they offered little utility to the LMR except during the warm summer months. Stored the remainder of the year.

The center glass, end curtain carriages were swiftly converted over. There is no reason to believe these escaped that order.

Bee

[Tom-378683]

Hi M*ck and Bee,

The minutes state there were at least 5 carriages with an enclosed centre compartment between the two curtain compartments: Queen Adelaide, Victoria, Royal William, Croxteth & Fair Trader.

These had leather curtains. But were all converted to regular ‘glass’ carriages by 1833. Crane’s problematic illustration below shows the curtains more clearly.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ec/WP_Phoenix_-_W_Crane.jpg

[96RAF]

Hello M*ck [the Hornby word filter will not permit me to use your name. My apologies for that]

......

Bee

Mod note - ''M i c k'' is a derogatory term for an Irishman hence why it is in the naughty list, similarly 'T a f f' applies to a Welshman and although acceptable as part of a member's nickname it is flagged if used in text. Hopefully the Moderators will have full control of the naughty list in the next iteration of the forum and thus be able to apply common sense.

[What About The Bee]

Hello Tom

Would you check your print that the Royal Mail carriage image came from? My copy of that, albeit blurry in the lower left corner, seems to indicate 1834.

I think is says "Henry Austen March 1834". The resolution on your image appears to be much better than mine. Thank you.

I've always been intrigued by the "Oxen Wagon" No. 4 on the Goods consist by Austen. It seems to show full divisions across the wagon, but nothing on the sides. The oxen appear tethered, maybe by nose, possibly by halter. What is to prevent a terrified, powerful draft animal, such as oxen, from leaping to their demise? A ring in his nose?

Bee

Edit: NRM asset number 01A87DB3, who claim 1832 for a date. There is no possibility that the date ends in a 2 on the image.

[What About The Bee]

I know this is blurry.

"Drawn by Henry Austen March 1834"

Bee

[What About The Bee]

Dawson presents the image in Locomotives of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway which is dated clearly 1832.

Yet, the Royal Mail carriage appears to have differences as compared to the image I have. That is, the Royal Mail carriage is portrayed as Ackermann.

Perhaps, just maybe, Austen corrected the image, and as a function of the correctIon, changed the date.

Bee

[Tom-378683]

Dear Bee,

interesting stuff. Austen was early - as indicated by the primitive stock development.

I wasn’t aware there were different editions of the print. Obviously lots of these prints were re-editioned at later dates.

I can’t comment on the cattle wagon.

The Austen mail, as I said, I believe to be the ‘experimental form’ - which the Postal Archives record as too dangerous for the guard in the event of the carriages coming together.

The Ackermann form is that produced by the conversions in the summer of 1831 when four mail carriages were made - I believe this was when the the platform for the guard was added by the cutting away of part of the passenger compartment as shown in the first Ackermann. Also likely when the Royal Mail livery was applied. Note also these are tiny mails sitting between the wheels and being only approx. 12’ long.