The Story of the Cambrian

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This is the Van line, which ran from Caersws (whose station is built on
the site of an old Roman settlement) up to the Van mines, once productive
enough of valuable lead ore, but now derelict. Constructed under the
Railways Construction Facilities Act, 1864, the line was opened for
mineral traffic on August 14th, 1871 and for passenger traffic on
December 1st, 1873. It was leased to the Cambrian, but got into Chancery
and was closed a few years later. While it ran many made pilgrimage
along its short length, less for the purpose of traversing its rather
uninteresting course than for a chance of conversing with one of the most
notable characters, under whose charge the trains ran. To many Welshmen,
indeed, who never travelled on or even heard, except perhaps quite
incidentally, of the Van Railway, the name of John Ceiriog Hughes is a
household word.

Born at Llanarmon-Dyffryn-Ceiriog, in Denbighshire, on September 25th,
1832, he passed his early years in the romantic vale of the Ceiriog,
amidst the glowing memories of Huw Morris of Pont-y-Meibion. Beginning
his business career in Manchester, he soon returned to his native land,
and, after occupying a position as stationmaster at Llanidloes, was
appointed to the management of this little line. The duties were not
particularly arduous, and, in any case, "Ceiriog" was apt to take life
with a light heart. Whether he sat in his office or in the cosy corner
of some favourite rural inn the muse burned brightly within him, and,
from his remote retreat among the hills which look down on the infant
Severn, he poured out his soul in poetry, which ranks high in Celtic
literature. Welsh verse always suffers in translation into the more
cumbrous English, but there are many who have known the charm even of an
Anglicised version of "Myvanwy Vychan," and when he died, in 1887, he was
acclaimed by such an authority as the Rev. H. Elvet Lewis, to be "one of
the best lyrical poets of Wales," who had "rendered excellent service to
the national melodies of 'Cymru Fu' by writing words congenial to their
spirit,--a work which Robert Burns did for Scottish melodies." He was
buried in Llanwnog churchyard, where a simple plate marks his resting
place, and friends and neighbours who attended the funeral service on the
following Sunday did not feel that it was out of place that it should
have been based on the text "Know ye not that there is . . . a great man
fallen this day." They did know it, humble as his station might be; and
more than one of his admirers has since visited the little deserted
office where he worked on the Van line and ransacked its drawers and
cupboards for hidden gems of poesy he might have left behind him. Alas!
nothing more inspiring was ever found there than faded way-bills and torn
invoices! But who shall say that there is no romance clinging close
around even the humblest, and now the most woe-begone, of all the little
offshoots of the Cambrian?

CHAPTER IX. CONSOLIDATION.

"_Facility of communication begets_ '_community of interests_,'
_which is the only treaty that is not a_ '_scrap of paper_.'"--

THE LATE LORD FISHER.

Lord John Russell, it is said, used, in conversation with Queen Victoria,
to date all political development from the Revolution of 1688. If those
mystic figures signalize the birthday of Whiggery, in the political
world, in much the same way we may date the constitution of the Cambrian,
as we know it to-day, from the year 1864. In more than one way it was a
notable period in Welsh railway annals. The various independent links in
the chain were either completed and wholly or partially in working order,
or in course of construction. Thanks to the influential efforts of the
Earl of Powis, arrangements had been made with the Post Office and the
London and North Western Railway Company, through Sir Richard Moon, for
the conveyance of mails from Shrewsbury to Borth, the then terminus.
Through working arrangements were also in force among the various local
companies, and it was obvious that the time had come to face the problems
of future policy. These were not altogether of simple solution.

[Picture: A Group of Old Officials. Standing--From left to right--The
first figure is unidentified; Mr. Geo. Owen, Engineer; Mr. Henry Cattle,
Traffic Manager. Seated--Mr. A. Walker, Locomotive Supt.; Mr. George
Lewis, Secretary and General Manager; Mr. H. C. Corfield, Solicitor]

Very early in the year Mr. Abraham Howell was moved, in one of his
frequent letters to the Earl of Powis, to warn his lordship that he
scented "another crisis coming on in the affairs of the Welsh Railways."
Once more there was division of opinion and "parties" were forming. Mr.
Piercy and the majority of the directors were for extending "the Welsh
system so as to make it independent of the great companies and set aside
existing agreements and obligations." Mr. Howell himself, with Mr. Savin
and a minority on the Board, inclined rather to the course of
accommodation with circumstances, making the best of the lines and
properties of the companies as they stood, avoiding extensions and
increasing capital, while cultivating friendly arrangements with
neighbouring companies and so avoiding as much as possible Parliamentary
and legal conflicts.

After all the tribulations through which these undertakings had passed
the more politic and pacific course certainly had its advantages, but one
Parliamentary adventure could not easily be avoided. Whether the policy
was to be one of splendid isolation or of neighbourly friendship, the
moment was obviously ripe for some measure of internal consolidation, and
powers were sought for this purpose. The Bill had to pass through the
now familiar ordeal of battle, both in the Committee of the House of
Commons and in the House of Lords, when many of the old arguments and
some new ones were skilfully marshalled on behalf of the Great Western
Railway Company and rolled on the tongue of eminent and eloquent counsel.
Even the little Bishop's Castle undertaking threw in its lot with the
opposition, finding a powerful protagonist in Mr. Whalley. But the
Cambrian had stout friends to put in the witness-box. Earl Vane proved a
tough nut to crack in cross-examination. So did the Earl of Powis, still
apparently tinged with a North Western bias. With the result that after
much forensic oratory, closing appropriately on a reminder of "the
troubles and difficulties the companies had gone through," and a well
deserved "tribute to the energy and talent of their solicitor, Mr.
Abraham Howell," the Amalgamation Bill, excluding for the time being the
Welsh Coast line, was passed into law in July, 1864.

It set up a joint board, limited to a minimum of six and a maximum of
twelve, the first directors chosen being those who had similarly served
the several independent companies, some of whom, of course, had acted on
more than one of these concerns. The following year, some previous
difficulties being removed, the Welsh Coast Railway was brought into the
combine, and the Cambrian then assumed the organic shape in which it
remained until the further amalgamation with the Mid-Wales Railway in
1904.

Financially, however, the directors still swam in troubled waters.
Creditors became impatient and began to press their claims. More than
one suit was brought against the Company involving long and expensive
proceedings in the Court of Chancery, and very early in 1868 it was found
necessary to convene, at Oswestry, a meeting of the "mortgagees, holders
of certificates of indebtedness and other creditors, and of the
preference and ordinary proprietors for the consideration of the best
means of dealing with the conflicting and other claims and interests of
the company's creditors and proprietors and of passing such resolutions
in regard thereto, or any of them, as might at such meeting be deemed
expedient." To obtain some means of getting out of the financial morass
in which the undertaking was floundering was "expedient" indeed, and it
is hardly surprising to find that, in view of the many conflicts of
interest, the assembly is recorded to have been both "large and
influential." Mr. Bancroft presided in the absence of Earl Vane,
chairman of the Company, and he was supported by the directors and
officials who had done much to bring the Cambrian into existence and were
now struggling to put it on its feet. The scheme which was laid before
the meeting was long and complicated. More than one meeting was required
to thrash matters out, but in the end a readjustment was arrived at, and
a new scheme was adopted for constituting the board. From July 1st,
1868, until December 31st, 1878, it consisted of ten directors, four of
whom were elected by the Coast Section and four by the Inland Section,
the other two seats being in the nomination of Earl Vane and the Earl of
Powis. The revenue from the whole undertakings went into a common fund,
and, after deducting working expenses, the surplus was divided between
the Coast and Inland Sections in certain proportions, to be determined by
arbitrators and an umpire. Admirable as this arrangement might be in
theory, in practice we know what generally happens when

"United, yet divided, twain at once
Sit two Kings of Brentford on one throne,"

and it is hardly astonishing that this form of dual authority should have
led to a good deal of squabbling between the rival "monarchs." It
proved, indeed, a cumbrous contrivance, and, when the period for its
operation terminated, with the close of 1878, the constitution of the
board was allowed to revert to the limits laid down under the Act of
1864, without any provision for sectional directors at all. During these
intervening years, indeed, questions of finance and of the upkeep of the
lines were still for ever cropping up, and not always as readily disposed
of. It is a long and dreary story of the inevitable struggles with ways
and means which so often marks the life of pioneer undertakings. For
years these Chancery suits hung like chains about the company's neck, and
even into the eighties the directors were never free from sudden
embarrassments and never knew from what quarter they might proceed.

One such difficulty, indeed, ultimately proved a blessing in disguise.
In 1884, at the instance of the Company's bankers, the line was placed in
the hands of a Receiver, Mr. John Conacher, fortunately, being chosen for
this office. The line was ripe for a great and final effort to place the
undertaking on a firmer footing, and, together with the late Mr. A. C.
Humphreys-Owen, Mr. Conacher drew up a scheme of arrangement between the
Company and its creditors under which about seventy different stocks were
consolidated into ten; and it was their patient and skilful work in thus
formulating what became known as the scheme of 1885, that laid the
foundation of the Company's improved financial position of which the
proprietors and the public have reaped the benefit in subsequent years.

Meantime, however, other matters not directly bearing on finance, engaged
the attention of the directors. Amongst these was the question of the
works, which it was found necessary to erect, since the Company was
working its own line. In July 1864, the inhabitants of Welshpool,
conscious of the prominent part which the town had played in the
inauguration of the Oswestry and Newtown Railway, presented a memorial to
the board in which they urged its central position on the system and the
recent completion of the waterworks as strong arguments for favourable
consideration of the borough's claims to such an advantage. Nor was it
without an eye to future development that Welshpool station was built in
a manner capable of allowing its upper stories to be used as the
Company's offices. Here, for the brief space, the offices were, but in
both these cases ambitious Poolonians were doomed to disappointment.

[Picture: The late MR. A. C. HUMPHREYS-OWEN, M.P. Chairman, 1900-1905]

The official headquarters of the Newtown and Machynlleth Railway Company
were destined for some time to remain at Machynlleth, where Mr. David
Howell, its secretary, practised as a solicitor; but in January 1862 the
staff of the Oswestry and Newtown had removed from Welshpool, and,
together with those of the Llanidloes and Newtown, the Oswestry,
Ellesmere and Whitchurch, the Buckley and the Wrexham Mold and Connah's
Quay, jointly occupied two rooms on the second floor of No. 9a, Cannon
Row, Westminster, Mr. George Lewis being secretary of all five companies.
On the floor below the Aberystwyth and Welsh Coast Company cohabited with
some dozen slate and stone companies, while Mr. Benjamin Piercy sat in
state hard by in Great George Street, and Mr. Thomas Savin weaved his
ambitious schemes around the corner, at No. 7, Delahay Street, with Mr.
James Fraser (father of the auditor of the Cambrian in recent years)
acting, under power of attorney, as his manager. This proved quite a
convenient arrangement so long as Parliamentary Committee work absorbed
much of the time of these officials, and here all the companies held
their board meetings, generally on the same day.

There were stirring times without, and it is scarcely strange if Cannon
Row did not live up to the reputation of its suggestive name. Rows,
indeed, were frequent and occasionally threatened to reverberate beyond
the walls of the official sanctum. There is an old and honoured Cambrian
official, then a young clerk sitting at his desk in the office above the
board room, who remembers the occasion when an extraordinary scene was
enacted on that dusty little stage. From a scuffle of some sort in the
board room Mr. Gartside, a Director of the Oswestry and Newtown Railway
Company, beat a hasty retreat up the stairs to the clerk's room, closely
pursued by Mr. Whalley. Mr. Gartside being rather portly, was much out
of breath, and suddenly pausing and turning round to recover himself on
gaining the hearthrug he received Mr. Whalley's fist full in the stomach,
which completed his exhaustion. Recovering his breath and as much of his
dignity as the circumstances would permit, the disabled Director
appealing dramatically to the astonished clerks, exclaimed "Gentlemen, I
call on you to witness that the hon. Member for Peterboro' has struck
me." But the clerks unable to grapple with so unaccustomed a situation,
beat a hasty retreat, and nothing more was heard of what was presumably a
more or less accidental "assault."

From Great George Street, the offices were subsequently moved to No. 3,
Westminster Chambers, and soon after Mr. Savin's failure, in 1866, when
the directors took over the working of the line from the unfortunate
lessee, after a short trial of another London office, the Secretary and
his staff, in August of that year, packed up pens, ink, paper and
documents and settled themselves in Oswestry, where they have since
remained. In Oswestry, too, on a site under the Shelf Bank, close to
where the first sod on the Ellesmere and Oswestry line was cut, the works
were erected and have continued to be maintained.

[Picture: Oswestry station and Company's Head Offices. Reproduced from
the "Great Western Magazine."]

On a subsequent occasion, however, they were the ostensible cause of one
of those sudden storms which, as we have said, from time to time assailed
the board-room or even periodical assemblies of the proprietors. On this
occasion it was, indeed, a bolt from the blue. A few days before the
date fixed for the half yearly meeting, at Crewe, in February 1879, there
had been placed in the hands of the shareholders a pamphlet bearing the
innocent title "Cambrian Railways Workshops." But, when they read it,
the recipients discovered that, whatever the reason for the choice of
such a heading, the sermon was founded on a much wider text. It
traversed the whole policy of the Board, the constitution of the Company
and the management of its property, and it was written in highly
censorious terms. That, in itself, might have been of comparatively
little moment, for the directors were not without their critics--no
directors of public companies ever are. But the author, who did not
withhold his name, was Mr. David Davies, constructor of much of the line
and now one of the most influential directors. Here, apparently, was a
matter for serious concern, and the seriousness was not diminished when
to the pamphlet itself was added a speech, at the shareholders' meeting,
in which Mr. Davies did not scruple to suggest that the line was being
expensively worked, that the rolling stock had not been adequately
maintained, that the road was defective and that, some of the stock being
worthless, the whole undertaking was in a false position. It was what
Earl Vane (now become Marquess of Londonderry), who presided, called "a
stab in the dark." The stab in the open with which Mr. Davies followed
it up was certainly not less sensational. He declared that "the line at
the moment was not safe, and he should not be at all surprised to see the
rails sprinkled with human blood before they were very much older." He
alleged that a fellow director (Mr. S. H. Hadley) had expressed a wish to
see the Oswestry shops burnt down and new shops erected at Aberystwyth
instead. The balance-sheet was "an insult." He washed his hands of the
whole affair and demanded a Committee of Inquiry. A hub-bub ensued,
amidst which it was not impertinently pointed out that Mr. Davies had
himself laid much of the road which he now condemned, and, backed by a
letter from Mr. George Owen, the engineer, it was shown that his
strictures on its existing condition were unsubstantiated by facts. But
Mr. Davies stuck to his guns, and before what was well described in the
local Press as "a stormy meeting" terminated, he had left the room and
his seat on the Board. It was a matter of doubt, for some moments,
whether the noble Chairman would not go too, but, happily, he discovered
enough signs of confidence among the proprietors present to encourage him
to continue his thankless task.

It was a tremendous tempest while it lasted, but it was soon over. At
the next half-yearly meeting, in the following August, the directors were
able to report that, instead of spilt blood, the summer had brought a
considerably increased weight of tourist traffic, hearty congratulations
were showered on Mr. George Lewis, the Secretary, on his efficient
administration of the line, and Capt. R. D. Pryce, presiding, in the
absence of the Marquess, concluded the proceedings on a happy note of
assurance that directors and shareholders were "of one mind," and full of
sanguine expectations as to the future of their undertaking. The throes
of consolidation are sometimes not less severe than those of birth
itself, but they can be as successfully survived.

CHAPTER X. INCIDENTS AND ACCIDENTS.

"_Railway travelling is safer than walking, riding, driving, than
going up and down stairs . . . and even safer than eating_, _because
it is a fact that more people choke themselves in England than are
killed on all the railways of the United Kingdom_."--THE LATE SIR
EDWARD WATKIN.

Looking back on considerably more than half a century of history it is no
small tribute to human care and human ingenuity that serious accidents on
the Cambrian Railways have been relatively rare. This is all the more
remarkable because all but some twelve miles of its total length, and up
to a few years ago, not even as much as that, has had to be worked on a
single line, and with the rapidly increasing tourist traffic of recent
times, this has placed a strain on both the human and the metallic
machine which may easily try the strongest nerves and the most powerful
appliances. Obviously it is due to the special care taken in management,
and observed, with few if tragic exceptions, by those directly
responsible for the working of the trains.

Early in their inception, elaborate regulations were drawn up by the
organisers of the original local undertakings, of which a copy, issued by
the Oswestry and Newtown Company, as adopted "at a meeting of the Board
of Directors, held on Saturday, the 25th February, 1860," and preserved
among the papers of the late Mr. David Howell of Machynlleth, gives some
interesting indication. It is bound in vellum, fitted with a clasp, and
adorned within with a series of woodcuts, descriptive of the old-day
signalman, clad in tall hat, tail coat and white trousers, explanatory of
the hand signal code, with flags, which preceded the more general use of
the modern signals, controlled from a signal box. Following the precept,
made familiar by the nursery rhymes of our childhood, it informs us that

"RED is a signal of DANGER, and to STOP.

GREEN is a signal of CAUTION, and to GO SLOWLY.

WHITE is a Signal of ALL RIGHT, and to GO ON.

As an additional precaution, should no flag be handy, it warns drivers
that "anything moved violently up and down or a man holding both hands up
is a sign of danger."

Some of these early regulations were extremely primitive. For instance,
long before the scientific system of the block telegraph and the tablet
were thought out, it was deemed sufficient to ordain that "On a Train or
Engine stopping at or passing an intermediate station or Junction, a STOP
Signal must be exhibited for FIVE minutes, after which a CAUTION Signal
must be exhibited for FIVE minutes more." After that, apparently, any
train might proceed--and take its risk of the one in front having reached
the next signalling point! At level crossings at any distance from the
signalman, the gate-keeper was advised to "ring a small hand-bell, or use
a whistle to call the attention of the signalman, who must then put up
his 'Danger' signals."

[Picture: An Early Cambrian Passenger Engine. Original Form (top), As
Re-built (bottom)]

The guard of the first passenger train from Oswestry was instructed to
"set his timepiece by the Platform Clock, and give the Clerk at every
station the time, so that he may regulate the clock at his station by
it," and similar arrangements operated up the branch lines. Porters were
told that on the arrival of a train they were to "walk the length of the
platform and call out, in a clear and audible voice, the name of the
station opposite the window of each carriage; and at Junctions the doors
of every carriage must be opened, and the various changes announced to
all passengers"--a regulation which, if still on the rule-book, is, like
that against receiving tips, nowadays more often honoured in the breach
than in the observance. It was even felt obligatory to include a
regulation as to what should be done if a train should arrive before its
advertised time, though it must appear a little superfluous to those who
remember the ways of the Cambrian in those happy days, when a captious
correspondent could write to the local Press to aver that, after seeing
his father off at Welshpool station, he was able to ride on horseback to
Oswestry and meet him on his arrival there! It was certainly a
remarkable feat--though, perhaps, not so remarkable either--for, as "an
official" of the Company was moved to explain in a subsequent issue, the
old gentleman must have travelled by a goods train, to which passenger
coaches were attached "for the convenience of the public," and it "often
did not leave Welshpool until an hour after the advertised time."

Those "mixed trains" survived until some thirty years ago, when an
unregenerate Board of Trade regulation prohibited them, and the wonderful
jolts and jars which the public experienced for their "convenience" and
the benefit of their liver, if not their nerves, became a thing of the
past. But, as an old driver remarked to the writer not long ago,--"It
was very comfortable working in those days," and no doubt, for the
traffic staff, it was.

We may smile to-day at some of these old ordinances and habits, but
traffic then was not as congested as it is on an August day now, when
thousands of tourists are being carried in heavily ladened trains to the
coast of Cardigan Bay. The rolling stock at that time was as light as
the signals were haphazard. We have read of references, in these early
days, to "powerful" engines; but they were mere pigmies to the modern
locomotive, and some of those pioneer machines which were the pride of
the dale sixty years ago have been relegated long since to the humble
duty of the shunting yard, or rebuilt altogether.

[Picture: An Early Cambrian Tank Engine. Original Form (top), As
Re-built (bottom)]

An old engineman, writing some little time since in the "Cambrian News,"
gives an interesting retrospect of the "comforts" of railway travel on
the Cambrian in those early days. "The original passenger rolling stock
on service on the line when opened," he says, "was of a small
four-wheeled type, similar in construction to the coaches on other
company's lines; about 25 feet long over all, 13 feet wheel base, or half
the length and a third the weight of the bogie stock of the present day.
The coaches were built by contract, the work being divided between two
well-known firms of builders,--the Ashbury Co., Manchester, and the
Metropolitan Railway Carriage and Wagon Company, Birmingham. The Ashbury
stock was slightly larger with more head room than the Metropolitan. The
coaches were built of the very best material, the lower part of body
being painted a dark brown, the upper part, from the door handles to
roof, a cream colour. {114} Each coach weighed about 8 tons. The 'third
class' coaches were made up of five compartments or semi-compartments.
Cross seats, back to back sittings for five aside--accommodation for
fifty passengers--bare boards for the seats, straight up backs, open from
end to end. Our forefathers evidently believed, when constructing
rolling stock, in fresh air in abundance instead of the closed up
compartment of late years. The thirds were lighted at dusk with two
glass globe oil lamps fixed in the roof, one at each end of the coach.
Firsts and seconds were provided with a lamp for each compartment. The
only other difference between the seconds and thirds was that the seats
of the seconds were partly covered with black oilcloth. The latter
carriage proved unremunerative, the public hardly ever patronising
seconds. Therefore they were abolished. In addition to the ordinary
screw coupling, coaches in those days were provided with side chains as
security in case of breaking loose on the journey. Side chains, however,
were abolished on the advent of the continuous brake. The buffers were
provided with wooden block facings with a view of silencing and to
prevent friction when travelling round curves--not at all a bad idea
either. Wheels in those days were constructed entirely of iron with
straight axles and spokes, not wooden blocked as at present to deaden
noise. Owing to the lightness of the stock, when travelling at a fair
rate of speed, oscillation occurred and passengers had to sit firm and
fast, which everyone in those days seemed to enjoy."

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