Robert Stephenson and Company was a locomotive manufacturing company founded in 1823 in Forth Street, Newcastle upon Tyne in England. It was the first company in the world created specifically to build railway engines.
Famous early locomotives were Locomotion No. 1 and Rocket. By 1899, 3,000 locomotives had been built at the Forth Street site, and a new company was formed, Robert Stephenson and Company Limited, and the Darlington works was opened.
The company's first engine was Locomotion No 1, which opened the Stockton and Darlington Railway, followed by three more: Hope, Black Diamond, and Diligence. Their vertical cylinders meant these locomotives rocked excessively and at the Hetton colliery railway Stephenson had introduced "steam springs" which had proved unsatisfactory. In 1828 he introduced the "Experiment" with inclined cylinders, which improved stability, and meant that it could be mounted on springs. Originally four wheeled, it was modified for six and another example, Victory, was built. Around this time, two locomotives were built for America. The first, a four coupled loco named America, was ordered by the Boston and Providence Rail Road. The second, six-coupled and named Whistler, was built for the Boston and Providence Railroad in 1833.
In 1829, the company built a new, experimental locomotive to enter in the Rainhill Trials. Rocket had two notable improvements—a multi-tube boiler and a separate firebox. Rocket won the trials and convinced the directors of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway to use steam locomotives on their railway, and to order these locomotives, Rocket's cylinders were originally angled at an angle of 45 degrees, but were later moved to be horizontal.
The Invicta was the twentieth Robert Stephenson & Co. locomotive, and was built for the Canterbury and Whitstable Railway. Its cylinders were inclined, but moved to the front end. In 1830 came the Planet class with the cylinders inside the frames, followed by the Patentee, which added a pair of trailing wheels for greater stability with a larger boiler. This 2-2-2 design became the pattern for most locomotives, by a variety of manufacturers, for many years.
A modern replica of Adler, an example of the company's 2-2-2 design
The increased distance travelled by many trains highlighted corrosion problems on fireboxes and chimneys. With the co-operation of the North Midland Railway at their Derby works, Robert Stephenson measured the temperature of the exhaust gases, and decided to lengthen the boilers on future engines. Initially these "long-boiler" engines were 2-2-2 designs, but in 1844, Stephenson moved the trailing wheel to the front in 4-2-0 formation, so that the cylinders could be mounted between the supporting wheels. It was one of these, the "Great A" along with another from the North Midland Railway, which was compared with Brunel's "Ixion" in the gauge trials in 1846. In 1846 Stephenson added a pair of trailing wheels - the first with eight wheels. Another important innovation in 1842 was the Stephenson link motion.
Robert Stephenson and Company built a number of Crampton type locomotives for the South Eastern Railway and the London, Chatham and Dover Railway. These were all of 4-2-0 wheel arrangement with inside cylinders and indirect drive. The inside cylinders drove a crankshaft located in front of the firebox and the crankshaft was coupled to the driving wheels by outside rods. They were unsuccessful on the LCDR, and the five Echo class locomotives were rebuilt as conventional 4-4-0 locomotives after only four years of service.[3]
The first public railway in Russia, the Tsarskoye Selo Railway, opened in 1837 using imported Stephenson locomotives.
The first railway proposal in Egypt came about when Pasha Muhammad Ali asked the British engineer T.H. Galloway to design a railway in 1834. Instructions to make it followed in 1836. Materials were delivered but little real construction followed. No Ottoman firwan (permission) was issued and the French objected.[4] Progress was really made when in 1849 Muhammad Ali died, and in 1851 his grandson Abbas I of Egypt contracted Robert Stephenson to build Egypt's first standard gauge railway.[4] The first section, between Alexandria on the Mediterranean coast and Kafr el-Zayyat on the Rosetta branch of the Nile was opened in 1854. This was the first railway in the Ottoman Empire as well as Africa and the Middle East.[5] In the same year Abbas died and was succeeded by Sa'id Pasha, in whose reign the section between Kafr el-Zayyat and Cairo was completed in 1856 followed by an extension from Cairo to Suez in 1858. This completed the first modern transport link between the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean, as Ferdinand de Lesseps did not complete the Suez Canal until 1869.
At Kafr el-Zayyat the line between Cairo and Alexandria originally crossed the Nile with an 80 feet (24 m) car float. This was the single largest project of the South Street Works.[6] However, on 15 May 1858 a special train conveying Sa'id's heir presumptive Ahmad Rifaat Pasha fell off the float into the river and the prince was drowned. Stephenson therefore replaced the car float with a swing bridge nearly 500m (1,640ft) long.
The Egyptian connections to Robert Stephenson were very considerable and a wealth of consequential artefacts are in Cairo Railway Museum. This includes what could well be the single most extravagant piece built by the Robert Stephenson Works. This is works number 1295 of 1862 whose artistic design was by Matthew Digby Wyatt. This 2-2-4T for the Egyptian Railways survives with all its fantastical marquetry in the Egyptian Railway Museum at Cairo.[7] It is called the Khedive's Train.[8][9]
Over the remainder of the century, the company prospered in the face of increasing competition, supplying railways at home and abroad. By 1899, around 3,000 locomotives had been built and a new limited liability company was formed, Robert Stephenson and Company Limited and the works was moved to Darlington, the first locomotive leaving the shop in 1902.
Most railways in Britain were building their own rolling stock, so most of the output was for export, from 4-4-0's for the Oudh and Rohilkhand Railway to GS (4-6-0) and HS (2-8-0) classes for the Bengal Nagpur Railway. These preceded the slightly larger BESA standard designs for the Indian railways.[10] The works built the first British 2-10-0 for the Argentine Great Western Railway in 1905.
In 1937, the company merged with the locomotive interests of Hawthorn Leslie and Company to form Robert Stephenson and Hawthorns Limited. The company's shipbuilding activities continuing separately. Main line locomotives continued to be built at Darlington, while industrial engines were built at Hawthorne Leslie's works at Forth Bank, Newcastle. in 1938 the goodwill of the Kitson and Manning Wardle companies was bought.
The last steam locomotives to be built were a conventional 0-6-0T in 1958 and a six-coupled fireless locomotive in 1959. The Forth Street works were closed in 1960 and the Darlington Works, continuing with diesel and electric locomotives, became the English Electric Company Darlington Works in 1962.
Redevelopment
The office block and one workshop of Stephenson's Forth Street Works in South Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, were restored by The Robert Stephenson Trust. The Trust lost its lease to these buildings in February 2009, following purchase of the whole Robert Stephenson and Hawthorn Leslie locomotive works sites for redevelopment as the "Stephenson Quarter". The restored block and several other buildings are protected by United Kingdom listed building status, but future public access is uncertain.
Commencing in 2013, the site started to be redeveloped.[11] The landlord fronting this operation was initially Silverlink Developers,[12] later Clouston Group.[13] As part of their commitment to the area's heritage, they hosted a once monthly opening of the South Street buildings housing a music, food and drink festival branded as the Boiler Shop Steamer.[14] Councillor Nick Forbes, leader of Newcastle City Council, visited the development on 8 April 2014 to give the city's seal of approval to the project.[15]
A website for Stephenson Quarter maintained by Clouston Group indicates the first phase of the project was completed in 2018, while the "remainder of the site awaits development".[16]
George Stephenson was a British civil engineer and mechanical engineer. Renowned as the "Father of Railways", Stephenson was considered by the Victorians a great example of diligent application and thirst for improvement. Self-help advocate Samuel Smiles particularly praised his achievements. His chosen rail gauge, sometimes called "Stephenson gauge", was the basis for the 4 feet 8+1⁄2 inches (1.435 m) standard gauge used by most of the world's railways.
Stephenson's Rocket is an early steam locomotive of 0-2-2 wheel arrangement. It was built for and won the Rainhill Trials of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway (L&MR), held in October 1829 to show that improved locomotives would be more efficient than stationary steam engines.
Timothy Hackworth was an English steam locomotive engineer who lived in Shildon, County Durham, England and was the first locomotive superintendent of the Stockton and Darlington Railway.
A steam locomotive is a locomotive that provides the force to move itself and other vehicles by means of the expansion of steam. It is fuelled by burning combustible material to heat water in the locomotive's boiler to the point where it becomes gaseous and its volume increases 1,700 times. Functionally, it is a steam engine on wheels.
Robert Stephenson FRS HFRSE FRSA DCL was an English civil engineer and designer of locomotives. The only son of George Stephenson, the "Father of Railways", he built on the achievements of his father. Robert has been called the greatest engineer of the 19th century.
A Crampton locomotive is a type of steam locomotive designed by Thomas Russell Crampton and built by various firms from 1846. The main British builders were Tulk and Ley and Robert Stephenson and Company.
The Vulcan Foundry Limited was an English locomotive builder sited at Newton-le-Willows, Lancashire.
Locomotion No. 1 is an early steam locomotive that was built in 1825 by the pioneering railway engineers George and Robert Stephenson at their manufacturing firm, Robert Stephenson and Company. It became the first steam locomotive to haul a passenger-carrying train on a public railway, the Stockton and Darlington Railway (S&DR).
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Robert Stephenson and Hawthorns Ltd (RSH) was a locomotive builder with works in North East England.
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R. & W. Hawthorn, Leslie and Company, Limited, usually referred to as Hawthorn Leslie, was a shipbuilder and locomotive manufacturer. The company was founded on Tyneside in 1886 and ceased building ships in 1982.
Invicta is an early steam locomotive, built by Robert Stephenson and Company in Newcastle-upon-Tyne during 1829. She was the twentieth locomotive built by railway engineers the Stephensons, being constructed immediately after Rocket. Invicta marked the end of the first phase of locomotive design, which had started with Richard Trevithick's Coalbrookdale locomotive of 1802.
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The NER 708 Class was a class of 0-6-0 freight steam locomotive of the North Eastern Railway, designed by Edward Fletcher in 1870. A total of seventy-of the class were built for the NER.
References
↑ Stretton, Clement E. (June 1897). "Early Engines of Stephenson and Company". The Railway World.
↑ Obituary of James Kennedy. Institution of Mechanical Engineers. 1886.
↑ " Stephenson Quarter steams ahead A prime city centre development gathers pace." in North East Times, retrieved 30 April 2014 from http://www.northeasttimes.co.uk/ArticleDetail.aspx?id=2516 . The timetable has slipped from that described there but building work commenced in 2013.
↑ Cited as such within the Robert Stephenson Trust website retrieved 30 April 2014 at http://www.robertstephensontrust.com/development.pdf "Our original landlord, the St Mary the Virgin Charitable Trust sold the freehold of the site to Silverlink Holdings in 2004".
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