I'VE lost count of the number of books that local enthusiast Colin Maggs has produced about railways but now, thanks to Stroud-based Amberley publishing, comes yet another, The GWR Bristol to Bath line.
Packed with interesting anecdotes this has got to be the definitive publication on our 12 mile section of the GWR line which, in the next few years, is due for electrification.
Of extra interest is the chapter, "Accidents, Mishaps and Noteworthy events" which includes the story of John Chiddy, the quarryman who lost his life removing a large boulder from the line in 1876 in the face of an oncoming express train.
In 1840 the first services between Bristol and Bath offered 10 trains a day, with the fastest taking about 25 minutes.
By contrast, but taking at least four times as long (and that depending on the season and weather), were 13 horse-drawn coaches a day between the two cities.
A year later, with the track now fully open all the way from Bristol to London, an extra five trains were laid on.
Third class passengers, who could now use the service, were carried in open trucks with drainage holes in them to cater for inclement weather.
With rail travel between Bristol and Bath now costing at least 50 per cent less than any other forms of transport, stage coach operators saw their profits evaporate, virtually overnight.
Surprisingly the Kennet and Avon canal company, who would become big losers to the railway, seem to have made little objection.
London time, says Maggs, was kept at all the stations, which must have caused some confusion as this was then about 11 minutes before local time in the two cities.
Greenwich time was not, in fact, adopted in Bristol and Bath until 1852.
The idea of building a line between Bristol and London was first mooted, says Maggs, by a group of Bristol merchants, including the well known road surveyor John McAdam, as early as 1824.
Nothing came of this, however, and history had to wait until 1830 when another meeting, this time in Bath, proposed a Bath and Bristol railway carried on viaducts through Saltford and Brislington and terminating in Bristol's Old Market area.
Two years later, however, the ball was back in Bristol when four prominent citizens got together in a small office in Temple Back to get things moving.
A committee of 15 men, representative of the city's five main public organisations – including the Bristol and Gloucestershire Railway which already had a goods line into the Floating Harbour – finally met in 1833 and agreed on organisation and funding.
After this things moved fairly rapidly. The all-important post of engineer was offered to 27-year-old Brunel, already well known as consulting engineer to the city's dock company and as the winning designer for the Clifton Suspension Bridge.
After surveying the lie of the land throughout the spring he decided that the best route from Bath to London would be via Swindon and the Vale of the White Horse.
After a detailed report had been made to a public meeting held in Bristol's Guildhall in the summer of 1833, a company with directors was set up to raise funding and obtain the necessary Act of Parliament.
At the same time another committee, set up at the instigation of George Gibbs of Tyntesfield, was set up in London.
Working in conjunction, the two committees, meeting at the Gibbs' counting house in London's Lime Street, decided on a name – the Great Western Railway.
The advantages of a line, said the promoters, would be enormous – goods could reach London in two to three hours instead of two to three days, and locally, travel from Bristol to Bath would be less than an hour instead of two or three by land, and even longer by water. No wonder so many people, especially merchants, were so in favour of the project.
After some opposition from the London and Southampton railway, who planned to end their line at Bath, and from the House of Lords, the GWR finally got its Royal Assent in August 1935.
With a total GWR subscription of just over £2 million, and an Act of Parliament now in place, Brunel could really get moving.
Work on the section between Bristol and Bath, which included three tunnels, started in April 1836 with 600 navvies.
The track was to be broad gauge – seven feet in width – which Brunel reckoned made for a smoother ride than narrow gauge.
It was hoped to be finished in two years, but trouble with an unreliable contractor (who was sacked) and delays on bridges and tunnels held up the work. An unusually wet winter, which led to landslips and flooding just as the works were nearing completion, delayed things further.
By the spring of 1840, however, Brunel was convincing the directors that the official opening date was near, just a matter of a few months away.
But what has Maggs got to say about the men who actually built the railroad, the navvies?
These hard-working labourers earned between four and eight shillings a day, a very good wage when compared with that of agricultural workers.
An opportunity for overtime, of course, brought in even more cash, which the men would spend liberally in a pub, or beer shop.
"The navigator appears to belong to no country, wandering from one public work to another – now alone, then with a party of two or three," wrote a reporter for the Bath Chronicle in 1839.
"As long as he has sixpence in his pocket he seems content, but set so little value on the earnings of his slavish employment as never to be at ease unless in squandering them, although well paid for his labour.
"He knows no other pleasure, or domestic comfort than is afforded in a public house, brawling or drinking with his companions after the toils of the day."
Those men that were not local were billeted in cottages, farmhouses, inns of huts.
Despite the ever present dangers, especially tunnelling, very few injuries were recorded on this 12 mile section of line.
Sunday was the men's day off, with those that wished to attending services held in the railway chapel at Temple Meads.
Despite some minor works being incomplete, the first journey from Temple Meads to Bath was made at daybreak on August 21, 1840.
The pulling engine, the Arrow, had been made by Stothert, Slaughter and Co at their yard in St Philips.
Five directors, Brunel and other company VIPs alighted at Keynsham and then at Bath station, a temporary affair, before returning to Temple Meads.
The GWR, the pride of the West, was finally on track.
This well-researched and authoritative publication takes the GWR story in our part of the world from Victorian times right up to the present day.
Well illustrated, often with photos and drawings from the author's collection, I can't recommend this book too highly.
Every train buff in the region, whether young or old, should certainly have a copy.
The GWR Bristol to Bath Line is by Colin Maggs. Published by Amberley, it costs £18.99
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