Great Steam Engineers of the 19th century

An example of a long-serving locomotive superintendent is Daniel Gooch on the Great Western Railway, who had been taken on by Brunel in 1837 and served in his position right through to 1864. A contemporary of Daniel Gooch was Joseph Armstrong, who would succeed Gooch in 1864, but in the meantime served as chief engineer at the GWR’s Stafford Road works in Wolverhampton from 1854, where he had considerable autonomy in matters of locomotive design.

In 1853, Armstrong had been appointed locomotive superintendent on the Shrewsbury and Chester Railway (S&CR), which pooled its locomotives with the Shrewsbury and Birmingham Railway (S&BR), and Armstrong moved the maintenance facilities for the combined fleet, to a site at Wolverhampton.In 1854, the S&CR and S&BR amalgamated with the GWR, to become the Northern Division of the GWR and Armstrong remained in his position, reporting to Gooch.

The ex-S&CR and ex-S&BR locomotives were the first standard gauge locomotives to be owned by the GWR, all supplied by independent manufacturers, but the GWR decided to have future standard gauge locomotives built at Wolverhampton. Although Swindon built the first ones, from 1859 Wolverhampton commenced production of standard gauge locomotives to Armstrong’s designs.

Gooch’s masterpiece North Star was rebuilt in 1854 with new cylinders, a new boiler and other modifications including modified springing. By this time, steam engine design was starting to stabilise, and numerous elements of the rebuilt North Star formed the basis of many GWR designs for many years.

BeattieAnother locomotive engineer who was to have a lengthy reign was Joseph Hamilton Beattie, who took over the job on the London & South Western Railway in 1850 and would hold the post for 21 years. Born in Ireland in 1808, he moved to England in 1835 to serve as an assistant to Joseph Locke on the Grand Junction Railway and from 1837 on the London and Southampton Railway, which became the LSWR. He became the carriage and wagon superintendent at Nine Elms and succeeded John Viret Gooch as a locomotive engineer in 1850.

Initially, he designed a series of singles, but the weight of the LSWR expresses led to the development of 2-4-0s, considered to be the first successful locomotives of that wheel arrangement, with the design being developed during the course of Beattie’s reign. He also built 0-6-0s for goods work but is best remembered for his 2-4-0WTs, three of which remained in service for 88 years, until 1962.

The original design of 2-4-0WT with two well tanks between the frames goes right back to 1850 and several different types were built, mainly by Beyer Peacock, until the design was standardised in 1863. Designed for London outer suburban branch line services in the London area, many years later they found favour on the Wenfordbridge china clay branch in Cornwall where no other engines were suitable. Two of the three later-built engines which survived until 1962 have been preserved – No. 30585 at the Buckinghamshire Railway Centre and No. 30587 is part of the National Collection.

Beattie was a highly innovative engineer, pioneering feedwater heating and balanced slide valves. His greatest contribution to the development of steam locomotive design, however, was a boiler suitable for burning coal smokelessly in 1853. Until then, all locomotives had burned the more expensive coke to avoid the excessive production of smoke.

Meanwhile on the London Brighton &South Coast Railway, John Craven served as locomotive superintendent for 21 years from 1847 to 1869, while on the South Eastern Railway, James Cudworth who had become a locomotive superintendent?in 1845, would continue?in this position for 31 years to 1876.

The first engines built at the SER’s Ashford works were 2-4-0s for the Hastings line in 1853. After experiments with Crampton locomotives, by 1855, Cudworth started to introduce more conventional steam locomotives, including double-framed 0-6-0s. Cudworth believed in a policy of standardisation in locomotive design and his 2-4-0s and 0-6-0s gave many years’ service on the SER.