In the first post in this series, we looked at the development of railway technology leading up to the Rainhill Trials of 1829. The trials were designed to determine whether a steam-powered engine could be the locomotive power for the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, the first purpose-built intercity railway to carry passengers.
The trials were held on a section of the line that had already been built, near the village of Rainhill, and featured a number of entries. Rocket was the entry from George and Robert Stephenson; George had been busy with the railway line, and so much of the work was done by his son, Robert.
The original Rocket, at Locomotion in Shildon
Replica of Rocket, at Locomotion, in Shildon
Sans Pareil was the entry from Timothy Hackworth, and perhaps Rocket's strongest competitor, and like Rocket, the original has survived.
Sans Pareil, at Locomotion in Shildon
Replica of Sans Pareil at Locomotion in Shildon
The other entrants were: Novelty, built by John Ericsson and John Braithwaite; Perseverance, built by Timothy Burstall; and Cycloped, a horse-powered locomotive built by Thomas Shaw Brandreth. The latter was never really a serious contender, but rather included because some men behind the new railway wanted some sort of "classic" power to be included.
The trials occurred largely as I've written them in the book, although I've compressed certain aspects of the timeline and omitted some details for the sake of not going into too much "inside baseball." One of the key details was that the locomotives were supposed to consume their own smoke, out of concern for the landowners whose land they went past, some of whom were not too happy about the railways smoking up their land. This wasn't really possible at the time, so they all burned coke rather than coal, to reduce exhaust; early on Rocket was given the wrong fuel, resulting in some concerns that it wouldn't meet this requirement.
If you've been following the beta for A Dangerous Connection, you know already that Rocket won. There were several novel designs for locomotives in the competition, but Rocket's was the one that proved to be the foundation for locomotive design in the future, because it was the first to use multiple tubes for its boiler.
Cutout of a later locomotive at York Railway Museum, showing the boiler tubes
Rocket's design was groundbreaking, but the real reason it won was reliability. The other locomotives had a series of problems, resulting in delays in the trials, during which George Stephenson would trot out Rocket to entertain the crowd. This includes the rides offered in carriages pulled by the locomotive that I feature in the book.
Replica of Rocket at the National Railway Museum in York
Now, there's one thing to note when we talk about these other locomotives and reliability, and that's that Sans Pareil failed because a part cracked, and that part had in fact been cast by the Stephensons, because Hackworth did not have the capabilities to cast his own parts. So there's certainly a bit of conflict of interest there!
From its influence on all locomotive engines that followed, however, it's probably for the best that Rocket won.
Rocket was a part of the opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, where it received a macabre addition to its history. On the opening day of the railway, September 15, 1830, the locomotive struck MP William Huskisson, who had stepped out of the carriage he was traveling in to speak to the Duke of Wellington. Huskisson later died from his injuries.
This tragic beginning did not put a damper on the success of this railway, and what followed was nothing short of railway mania. That will be for part 3, however, and I'll leave you with two videos if you'd like to see more about the Ranhill Trials. The first is a shorter piece showing replicas of most of these engines in action, and the second is a longer documentary that also includes a recreation of the trials with replicas.
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