Wellington Bank is a steep railway embankment and associated climb located on the Bristol to Exeter line, that climbs from just northeast of Wellington, Somerset, until its peak at Sampford Arundel, where it enters Whiteball tunnel and travels under the Whiteball Hill.
The Bristol & Exeter Railway was authorised by act of Parliament in 1836, following quickly on the 1835 act for construction of the Great Western Railway. Bristol merchants were anxious to secure a railway route to Exeter, which was an important commercial centre, and which had a harbour on the south coast, in the English Channel. Coastal shipping from the South coast and from continental Europe making for Bristol needed to navigate the hazardous north Cornwall coast after negotiating the waters round Land's End. [1] [ page needed ]
Isambard Kingdom Brunel was appointed engineer, and his assistant William Gravatt surveyed the route in 1835 and was resident engineer for the section between Bristol and White Ball, with William Froude supervising the section from Whiteball to Exeter. [2] Brunel himself was in charge of the design of White Ball tunnel. [3]
The first 7 ft (2,134 mm), broad gauge, section of the line was completed to Bridgwater on 14 June 1841, and the extension to Taunton in July 1842 – both using trains leased from the Great Western. At Norton Fitzwarren just west of Taunton, the intention was to split the railway three ways:
From Creech St Michael westwards, the B&ER had followed the gently flowing valley of the River Tone. But just east of Wellington, the river moved further west up the steep sides of the Blackdown Hills. Brunel chose to follow a smaller valley eastwards, and pass under the Blackdowns further west, through a place called White Ball, a hill made up of easy to dig white sandstone (NB: next to it is Red Ball, a hill of red sandstone). This route would reduce the need for additional tunnelling, and allow connection with and traffic from Wellington. However, the choice also meant the construction of a long inclined bank, with a tunnel at its peak.
Wellington station opened when the line reached the town on 1 May 1843, laid out as a standard Brunel railway station. The line then proceeded west at gradients averaging a 1 in 80 incline towards Sampford Arundel, a village situated 10 miles (16 km) south west of Taunton, where the tunnel entrance was to be dug.
Digging of the tunnel commenced in 1842. A temporary terminus was established in the hamlet of Beam Bridge on 1 May 1843, from which passengers were taken by carriage to the far side of the hill, and then taken by another train from Burlescombe, Devon to Exeter.
From January 1842, 1,000 navvies were encamped at White Ball. [4] With access to a local Tommy shop, they sank 14 vertical shafts during the 1,092-yard (999 m) tunnel's construction. [5] [ page needed ] The temporary terminus at Beam Bridge stayed in place for a year, until the tunnel was opened on 1 May 1844. [1] [6]
The Bristol & Exeter Railway was a considerable financial success and between 1844 and 1874, paying an average annual dividend of 4.5 per cent. The city fathers of Exeter refused the railway access to the dock of the Exeter Canal until 35 years after it entered the city in 1844. The railway was fully amalgamated with the Great Western Railway on 1 January 1876. [1]
Due to the steepness of the bank, special operational procedures were required.
With the full introduction of higher powered diesel locomotives, the banking procedure was ceased in the late 1960s.
On 9 May 1904, whilst descending Wellington Bank, the GWR 3700 Class No. 3440 City of Truro was timed at 8.8 seconds between two quarter-mile posts, whilst hauling the "Ocean Mails" special from Plymouth [8] to London Paddington. This timing was recorded from the train by Charles Rous-Marten, who wrote for The Railway Magazine and other journals. If exact (Rous-Marten's stopwatch read in multiples of 1/5 second), this time would correspond to a speed of 102.3 mph (164.6 km/h), while 9 seconds would correspond to exactly 100 mph.
Initially, mindful of the need to preserve their reputation for safety, the railway company allowed only the overall timings for the run to be put into print; neither The Times report of the following day [9] nor Rous-Marten's article in The Railway Magazine of June 1904 mentioned the maximum speed. However the morning after the run two local Plymouth newspapers did report that the train had reached a speed between 99 and 100 miles an hour whilst descending Wellington Bank. This claim was based on the stopwatch timings of a postal worker, William Kennedy, who was also on the train. [10]
Rous-Marten first published the maximum speed in 1905, though he did not name the locomotive or railway company: [11]
On one occasion when special experimental tests were being made with an engine having 6 ft. 8 in. coupled wheels hauling a load of approximately 150 tons behind the tender down a gradient of 1 in 90, I personally recorded a rate of no less than 102.3 miles an hour for a single quarter-mile, which was covered in 8.8 seconds, exactly 100 miles an hour for half a mile which occupied 18 seconds, 96.7 miles an hour for a whole mile run in 37.2 seconds; five successive quarter-miles were run respectively in 10 seconds, 9.8 seconds, 9.4 seconds, 9.2 seconds and 8.8 seconds. This I have reason to believe to be the highest railway speed ever authentically recorded. I need hardly add that the observations were made with the utmost possible care, and with the advantage of previous knowledge that the experiment was to be made, consequently without the disadvantage of unpreparedness that usually attaches itself to speed observations made in a merely casual way in an ordinary passenger train. The performance was certainly an epoch-making one. In a previous trial with another engine of the same class, a maximum of 95.6 miles an hour was reached.
— C Rous-Marten: p2118, Bulletin of the International Railway Congress – October 1905
Before his death in 1908 Rous-Marten did name the locomotive as City of Truro. Official confirmation from the Great Western Railway came in 1922 when they published a letter written in June 1905 by Rous-Marten to James Inglis, the general manager, giving further details of the record. [12]
...What happened was this: when we topped the Whiteball Summit, we were still doing 63 miles an hour; when we emerged from the Whiteball Tunnel we had reached 80; thenceforward our velocity rapidly and steadily increased, the quarter-mile times diminishing from 11 sec. at the tunnel entrance to 10.6 sec., 10.2 sec., 10 sec., 9.8 sec., 9.4 sec., 9.2 sec., and finally to 8.8 sec., this last being equivalent to a rate of 102.3 miles an hour. The two quickest quarters thus occupied exactly 18 sec. for the half-mile, equal to 100 miles an hour. At this time the travelling was so curiously smooth that, but for the sound, it was difficult to believe we were moving at all...
This sequence of eight quarter-mile timings is thought to start at milepost 173, the first after the tunnel, with the maximum speed at milepost 171.
From 1922 onwards City of Truro featured prominently in the Great Western Railway's publicity material.
Doubts over the record centred on the power of the locomotive and some contradictions in Rous-Marten's passing times. However his milepost timings are consistent with a speed of 100 mph or just over. The latest research examines the evidence and uses computer simulation of the locomotive performance to show that a speed of 100 mph was possible and that the timings do indeed support such a speed. [13]
This record was set before any car or aeroplane had attained such a speed. However, in May 1904 City of Truro was not the fastest vehicle in the world, as 130 mph (210 km/h) had been reached the previous year on an experimental electric railway near Berlin.
Bristol Temple Meads is the oldest and largest railway station in Bristol, England. It is located 118 miles 31 chains away from London Paddington. It is an important transport hub for public transport in the city; there are bus services to many parts of the city and surrounding districts, with a ferry to the city centre. Bristol's other major station, Bristol Parkway, is a more recent station on the northern outskirts of the conurbation. It is the busiest station in South West England.
The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, received its enabling act of Parliament on 31 August 1835 and ran its first trains in 1838 with the initial route completed between London and Bristol in 1841. It was engineered by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, who chose a broad gauge of 7 ft —later slightly widened to 7 ft 1⁄4 in —but, from 1854, a series of amalgamations saw it also operate 4 ft 8+1⁄2 in standard-gauge trains; the last broad-gauge services were operated in 1892.
Wellington is a market town in Somerset, England. It is situated 7 miles (11 km) south west of Taunton, near the border with Devon, which runs along the Blackdown Hills to the south of the town. The town had a population of 14,549, which includes the residents of the parish of Wellington Without, and the villages of Tone and Tonedale.
The Great Western Railway 3700 Class, or City Class, locomotives were a series of twenty 4-4-0 steam locomotives, designed for hauling express passenger trains.
GWR 3700 Class 3440 City of Truro is a 4-4-0 steam locomotive built in 1903 for the Great Western Railway (GWR) at Swindon Works to a design by George Jackson Churchward. It was partially rebuilt in 1911 and 1915, and renumbered 3717 in 1912. Although it is a point of contention, some believe the locomotive to be the first to attain a speed of 100 miles per hour (160.9 km/h) during a run from Plymouth to London Paddington in 1904.
Sampford Arundel is a village and civil parish in Somerset, England. It is situated near Wellington and 10 miles (16.1 km) south west of Taunton. The village has a population of 268.
The South Wales Main Line, originally known as the London, Bristol and South Wales Direct Railway or simply as the Bristol and South Wales Direct Railway, is a branch of the Great Western Main Line in Great Britain. It diverges from the core London-Bristol line at Royal Wootton Bassett beyond Swindon, first calling at Bristol Parkway, after which the line continues through the Severn Tunnel into South Wales.
Bridgwater railway station serves the town of Bridgwater in Somerset, England. It is on the Bristol to Taunton Line and is operated by Great Western Railway. It is 151 miles 47 chains from the zero point at London Paddington via Box.
Weston-super-Mare railway station serves the seaside town of Weston-super-Mare in North Somerset, England. It is situated on a loop off the main Bristol to Taunton Line, 137 miles 33 chains from the zero point at London Paddington via Box.
The Cornwall Railway was a 7 ft 1⁄4 in broad gauge railway from Plymouth in Devon to Falmouth in Cornwall, England, built in the second half of the nineteenth century. It was constantly beset with shortage of capital for the construction, and was eventually forced to sell its line to the dominant Great Western Railway.
Isambard Kingdom Brunel was a British civil engineer and mechanical engineer who is considered "one of the most ingenious and prolific figures in engineering history", "one of the 19th-century engineering giants", and "one of the greatest figures of the Industrial Revolution, [who] changed the face of the English landscape with his groundbreaking designs and ingenious constructions". Brunel built dockyards, the Great Western Railway (GWR), a series of steamships including the first purpose-built transatlantic steamship, and numerous important bridges and tunnels. His designs revolutionised public transport and modern engineering.
The Bristol and Exeter Railway (B&ER) was an English railway company formed to connect Bristol and Exeter. It was built on the broad gauge and its engineer was Isambard Kingdom Brunel. It opened in stages between 1841 and 1844. It was allied with the Great Western Railway (GWR), which built its main line between London and Bristol, and in time formed part of a through route between London and Cornwall.
The Bristolian is a named passenger train service from London Paddington to Bristol Temple Meads. It starts at Weston-super-Mare in the London-bound direction.
The South Devon Railway Company built and operated the railway from Exeter to Plymouth and Torquay in Devon, England. It was a 7 ft 1⁄4 in broad gauge railway built by Isambard Kingdom Brunel.
There are 22 disused railway stations on the Bristol to Exeter line between Bristol Temple Meads and Exeter St Davids. The line was completed in 1844 at which time the temporary terminus at Beambridge was closed. The most recent closure was Tiverton Junction which was replaced by a new station} on a different site in 1986. 12 of the disused stations have structures that can still be seen from passing trains.
Wellington railway station was a former railway station located in Wellington in Somerset on the Bristol–Exeter line. It served the town between 1843 and 1964, when it was closed as part of the Beeching cuts. In recent years proposals to reopen the station have been advanced. It was known as Wellington (Somerset) to distinguish it from Wellington Station in Shropshire.
The South Devon Banks are a series of steep inclines on the ex-GWR railway line linking Exeter and Plymouth in Devon, England. These two cities are separated by the rocky uplands of Dartmoor forcing the early railway surveyors to propose that the line skirt the difficult terrain of the comparatively sparsely populated moorland. Isambard Kingdom Brunel, in surveying the South Devon Railway, opted to push a line along a coastal strip between the Exe and Teign valleys, and then to climb the southern outliers of Dartmoor making for the head of the Plym estuary. From Newton Abbot, the line climbs Dainton Bank, and from Totnes it climbs Rattery Bank, reaches a peak at Wrangaton summit, and then descends Hemerdon Bank to reach Plymouth. These three are collectively known as the South Devon Banks.
The Bristol to Exeter line is a major branch of the Great Western Main Line in the West of England and runs from Bristol, to Exeter, from where it continues as the Exeter to Plymouth line. It was one of the principal routes of the pre-1948 Great Western Railway which were subsequently taken over by the Western Region of British Railways and are now part of the Network Rail system.
Charles Rous-Marten (1842–1908) was a New Zealand journalist and British railway writer and recorder.
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