Castle Aching

[Nearholmer]

The Edwardians were as much into their version of "tech" as we are into our version now, so how about we bring together a few strands of thought, and have the Ashing Hall Estate Railway powered by a couple of internal combustion-engined locomotives, a la Blakesley Hall crossed with Eaton Hall and a few other things.

 

Daimler himself had an Eaton Hall style set-up at Canstatt as early as c1887, using his "motorised park bench" vehicles; Panhard et Levassor built some little locos with their version of the Daimler engine from about 1900 (see picture below); the Blake motor car company of Kew made one, possibly more, tiny locos pre-CA; and, by 1905/06 some semi-respectable British-made i.c. locos were on the market. If the locals have German contacts, things are even easier, as we saw with the Kaiser's majolica works at Kadinen, because they were churning out very good, solid i.c. locos by this date.

 

Some Z gauge mechanisms, and a bit of plasticard should get things moving, and there is a chap who makes superb etches for Heywood-type rolling stock .......

 

Or, as suggest by Caley Jim, we could go electric, although that was getting a bit retro as a "tech toy" for the landed classes by 1905.

 

I've probably tried this on before, but persistence sometimes pays off!

Edited December 7, 2017 by Nearholmer

[Nearholmer]

This is the Blakesley Hall line, and the "thing" pulling the train is their first, somewhat primitive, internal combustion loco dating from 1905. Barely anything is known about this loco, but my surmise is that it in its initial form it had an Otto-style engine, of the sort that one sees in stationary operation at traction-engine rallies, probably a Crossley, or maybe a small Hornsby-Akroyd-Stuart hot-bulb engine. It is recorded as 8hp, single-cylinder, 100 cubic inch, which would neatly describe either of those two engines, but not a Daimler-style engine.

 

A couple Edwardian tech-heads in attendance on the right. It is possible that the left-most of the two is W J Bassett-Lowke; he was certainly pals with the family that built the line, and a few years later his firm built a far better (after early teething troubles) steam-outline petrol loco for the line, which survives to this day.

Edited December 7, 2017 by Nearholmer

[Northroader]

Routier du Nord is jumping up and down saying “Midi banjo, n’est ce pas?” And I’m saying “Non, mon ami, do not derange yourself, c’est impossible”

Edited December 7, 2017 by Northroader

[runs as required]

...I've probably tried this on before, but persistence sometimes pays off!

Bless you Kevin.

In that estate railway post earlier,I really did hope to lever you into down loading a lot more on little known/lightly laid ephemeral dead ends byeways - preferably in Irish bogs.

dh

 

PS.I glanced at two magazines: one with a picture of a 1903 GW 4-6-0, the other an article about a  Panhard Levassor brand new new in 1903 being fettled for the London Brighton Run.

I meant this to imply how the 1903 Churchward locomotive looked pretty much like the well sorted Jubilee I knew of 50 years later whereas the 1903 Panhard seemed like Drake might have pootled in driving it from playing bowls on the Hoe to take command against the Spanish Armada.

[Nearholmer]

Monsieur le Routier should calm down: it's a Sykes electric banner signal, as sold to main line railways as "banner repeaters". I think we're looking at the rear of it.

 

RaR, the nearest bog railway that I can think of to Blakesley Hall would have been the one at Flitwick in Bedfordshire ....... tragically, so obscure that no photographs are known to exist.

 

And, for completeness-sake, here is a tiny picture of Daimler's 1887 version. A slightly later version of one of these contraptions was demonstrated on a track laid at the Imperial Institute (now UCL) in London.

 

At the bottom is a Daimler feldbahnlok from 1892. This beast is now preserved in the Mercedes Benz museum. 4.6hp 1900cc V-twin of c600rpm ....... Clarkson wouldn't be overly impressed!

 

"Everyone" thinks that petrol locomotives were first used in WW1 ...... I hope I've convinced you otherwise.

Edited December 7, 2017 by Nearholmer

[Edwardian]

 

I meant this to imply how the 1903 Churchward locomotive looked pretty much like the well sorted Jubilee I knew of 50 years later whereas the 1903 Panhard seemed like Drake might have pootled in driving it from playing bowls on the Hoe to take command against the Spanish Armada.

 

Presumably this is something to do with the rate of development where a technology is new. 

 

By the time of Churchward, railway steam locomotive technology was approaching its maturity (certainly on the Great Western!).

 

Whereas, if you compare how the appearance and design of steam locomotives changed in the Nineteenth century through what Flashman called "the Earlies", with the development in cars in the early Twentieth Century, you see a similar rate of change.

[drmditch]

Bless you Kevin.

In that estate railway post earlier,I really did hope to lever you into down loading a lot more on little known/lightly laid ephemeral dead ends byeways - preferably in Irish bogs.

dh

 

I meant this to imply how the 1903 Churchward locomotive looked pretty much like the well sorted Jubilee I knew of 50 years later whereas the 1903 Panhard seemed like Drake might have pootled in driving it from playing bowls on the Hoe to take command against the Spanish Armada.

 

Drake did not 'command against the Spanish Armada' ! That was Howard of Effingham. I think you may be confusing your Jubilees. (Not that I have much knowledge of three cylinder engines with three sets of valve gear, well not ones not painted Saxony Green anyway.)

 

On the other hand, Drake would have been keen on any technical innovation that gave him an advantage. That however leads onto a whole separate subject. Wasn't 'Revenge' also a locomotive name?

 

To avoid any confusion, Howard did appoint Drake as one of the four squadron commanders in the Armada campaign. Drake, in addition to being an original and brilliant sailor, was also one of the founders of the English contribution to the Atlantic Slave Trade.

 

Be wary of looking for unblemished historical heroes!

 

Sorry for the 'off-topic' post, but Steam Locomotives and Sailing Ships are two of the subjects about which I get quite carried away!

[Edwardian]

Drake did not 'command against the Spanish Armada' ! That was Howard of Effingham. I think you may be confusing your Jubilees. (Not that I have much knowledge of three cylinder engines with three sets of valve gear, well not ones not painted Saxony Green anyway.)

 

On the other hand, Drake would have been keen on any technical innovation that gave him an advantage. That however leads onto a whole separate subject. Wasn't 'Revenge' also a locomotive name?

 

To avoid any confusion, Howard did appoint Drake as one of the four squadron commanders in the Armada campaign. Drake, in addition to being an original and brilliant sailor, was also one of the founders of the English contribution to the Atlantic Slave Trade.

 

Be wary of looking for unblemished historical heroes!

 

Sorry for the 'off-topic' post, but Steam Locomotives and Sailing Ships are two of the subjects about which I get quite carried away!

 

 

I believe that it was the Portuguese who pioneered the Atlantic slave trade.

 

In the West Indies, the Spanish had initially contented themselves with enslaving the local Carib population, thereby driving them almost to extinction.  It was the Portuguese, with plantations in Brazil, who, I believe, first hit upon the idea of large-scale importation of West African slave labour.   This idea was seized upon by the 'interlopers', such as the English and French, and it enabled them to establish their highly lucrative sugar islands.

 

The advent of large numbers of West African slaves was a great advantage to the planters.  Hitherto they had relied in part upon indentured servants - white Europeans - who were trapped into long-term contractual servitude and whose conditions and prospects were exceedingly grim.  The workforce could be supplemented by convict labour, e.g. Monmouth rebels (see Captain Blood).  The importation of significant numbers of African slaves by the English was established in the late Seventeenth Century. 

 

With the advent of the Atlantic slave trade, slavery was 'refined' to its dehumanised extreme; the horrific conditions of the passage are widely understood, but extent of the exploitation was really made possible by the concept of chattel slavery.  If you can persuade yourself that people are mere chattels, any moral inhibitions or legal protections there might otherwise have been cease to apply.   

 

As an aside, the West Indian sugar islands were far more important to Britain than the Thirteen North American colonies, and legislation that favoured the former tended to aggravate the latter. 

 

The ability to ignore, overlook and 'normalise' the horrific, or to accept the status quo as natural or inevitable, even if distasteful, must have played a part.  As a species, we have an unfortunate aptitude for this (see Hitler's Willing Executioners).  In my reading on the subject in earlier years, I don't think I found an English example of moral condemnation earlier than the 1730s, probably a couple of generations into the era of mass importation of slaves.  It took another Century before slavery was ended in the British Empire, only a generation ahead of the Americans and Russians.   As late as the Eighteen Teens, none of the characters in, and, presumably, few enough of the readers of, Mansfield Park had shown any qualms concerning chattel slavery. 

[Compound2632]

As late as the Eighteen Teens, none of the characters in, and, presumably, few enough of the readers of, Mansfield Park had shown any qualms concerning chattel slavery. 

 

Though in Emma, the dreadful Mrs Elton, whose Bristol family made their money in trade - presumably the slave trade - is quick to distance herself from it in the company of her new genteel Surrey neighbours.

[Edwardian]

Though in Emma, the dreadful Mrs Elton, whose Bristol family made their money in trade - presumably the slave trade - is quick to distance herself from it in the company of her new genteel Surrey neighbours.

 

True, though I venture to suggest that this is not based upon fear of disapproval of human trafficking and exploitation, but upon a desire not to be associated with trade.

 

I suspect, therefore, it rather underscores the peculiar (in both senses of the word) perspective possessed by much of middle class society in the early 1800s.

[Regularity]

I suspect, therefore, it rather underscores the peculiar (in both senses of the word) perspective possessed by much of middle class society in the early 1800s.

Two questions:

Do you mean early 19th century, rather than (say) 1800-1804?

(I think I am in a dwindling majority of people who think 1800s defines a decade, and not a decade of decades...)

What makes you think that this perspective isn’t still prevalent in some parts of middle class society - more people get degrees than ever, but the engineering degrees and other technical qualifications are still woefully undersubscribed...?

[TheQ]

What makes you think that this perspective isn’t still prevalent in some parts of middle class society - more people get degrees than ever, but the engineering degrees and other technical qualifications are still woefully undersubscribed...?

That's partly because many see engineering and technical degrees as Difficult...

[Compound2632]

True, though I venture to suggest that this is not based upon fear of disapproval of human trafficking and exploitation, but upon a desire not to be associated with trade.

 

I suspect, therefore, it rather underscores the peculiar (in both senses of the word) perspective possessed by much of middle class society in the early 1800s.

 

Emma, Ch 35:

 

[Jane Fairfax] 'There are places in town, offices, where enquiry would soon produce something - Offices for the sale - not quite of human flesh - but of human intellect.'

[Mrs Elton] 'Oh! my dear, human flesh! You quite shock me; if you mean a fling at the slave-trade, I assure you Mr Suckling was always rather a friend to the abolition.'

'I did not mean, I was not thinking of the slave trade,' replied Jane; 'governess-trade, I assure you, was all that I had in view; widely different certainly as to the guilt of those who carry it on; but as to the greater misery of the victims, I do not know where it lies.'

Edited December 8, 2017 by Compound2632

[Regularity]

That's partly because many see engineering and technical degrees as Difficult...

Even people who don’t would rather go into law, medicine or accountancy, as you don’t get your hands dirty. (Just elbow deep in gore, if you are a surgeon!)

[Edwardian]

Two questions:

Do you mean early 19th century, rather than (say) 1800-1804?

(I think I am in a dwindling majority of people who think 1800s defines a decade, and not a decade of decades...)

What makes you think that this perspective isn’t still prevalent in some parts of middle class society - more people get degrees than ever, but the engineering degrees and other technical qualifications are still woefully undersubscribed...?

 

It did strike me that 1800s meant 1800-1809, but I am guilty here if using it to refer to the century, rather than the decade.  So, a conscious error, which, perhaps makes it worse!

 

I am afraid that I am the product of a system that put a premium upon an arts degree, which was senseless, and fairly useless to boot.  To be fair, I was a duffer at maths and physics, though, without wishing to excuse my failings, I am convinced that both subjects were badly taught at my schools. The salient fact is that a career in science or industry was not something to which we were encouraged to aspire.  A 'systemic' fault, as they say.    

[Branwell]

Even people who don’t would rather go into law, medicine or accountancy, as you don’t get your hands dirty. (Just elbow deep in gore, if you are a surgeon!)

 

Not strictly true. I've got absolutely filthy rooting about trying to find old deeds before now. And then there was the site visit when I got covered in paint, but that's another story.

[BG John]

Even people who don’t would rather go into law, medicine or accountancy, as you don’t get your hands dirty.

Guilty I'm afraid. I was going to do an engineering apprenticeship*, passed all the tests etc. at various places, but didn't get offered one, until just after I'd decided I wasn't sure it was what I wanted. I stayed on at school to do A levels, and started training to be a cost accountant, so I could get involved in engineering without getting my hands dirty! Got rather sidetracked into areas other than cost accounting though.

 

I might be getting more modelling done now if I'd done an apprenticeship, and might even be able to earn some money from some sort of modelling business, as there's now no realistic way for me to go back to accounts work.

 

*Back in the days when apprenticeships really were apprenticeships!

[Regularity]

I should own up here and admit that after A levels in maths, physics and chemistry, I was going to read (civil) engineering, until I found out how much work was involved (I have since met a guy who did his first degree in civil engineering and followed it up with a PhD in nuclear reactor physics, which he said was not as difficult, mathematically, as his first degree!) so ended up doing a science, yes, but psychology. That wasn’t down to anything other than laziness, and the way that engineering was being run down so much in the early 80s. Also, I wanted to work on the railways, but less than 100% colour vision put the kybosh on that.

But I did go to some evening classes and learned how to use a lathe and a mill.

[Edwardian]

Emma, Ch 35:

 

[Jane Fairfax] 'There are places in town, offices, where enquiry would soon produce something - Offices for the sale - not quite of human flesh - but of human intellect.'

[Mrs Elton] 'Oh! my dear, human flesh! You quite shock me; if you mean a fling at the slave-trade, I assure you Mr Suckling was always rather a friend to the abolition.'

'I did not mean, I was not thinking of the slave trade,' replied Jane; 'governess-trade, I assure you, was all that I had in view; widely different certainly as to the guilt of those who carry it on; but as to the greater misery of the victims, I do not know where it lies.'

 

Indeed.  I think that, by this date, there was undoubtedly a certain amount of moral traction gained by the likes of Clarkson and Wilberforce, hand in hand with the rise in Evangelism, a trend that was to flower in the moralizingly repressive, po-faced, religious hypocrisy that so exercised the likes of Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins. 

 

I think these leaves the characters in Emma in the sort of complacent and ineffectual state of expressing the sentiment, common at the time, "yes, it all sounds dreadful, but they say nothing can be done".  By this time, much of the anti-abolition arguments were based upon the impracticality and ruinous cost of abolition, and this was a serious barrier to change; many seem simply to have accepted the argument that, like the poor, the slaves would always be with us.  For this reason, when abolition came in the 1830s, it was considered necessary to compensate the owners, an idea that is offensive to modern sensibilities as the right to ownership is implicit in the notion of compensation, but it was believed necessary at the time.

 

No doubt Emma's circle could bemoan the slave-trade, if anyone was indelicate enough to bring it up (and Jane, the character forced to live a lie due to a secret engagement, often sounds an off note in the novel).  In this, perhaps, they are rather like today's ladies who lunch, when forced to respond to a news item concerning the sweat shops used to produce the 'designer' clothes they wear. Nevertheless, in terms of what the ladies of of Regency Surrey really cared about, being in trade would have been more of a concern than being a landowner whose holdings included slave-worked plantations.

 

Bear in mind that there might have been far more distaste at the slave-trade, or trafficking, itself, as opposed to ownership on what might fondly be imagined as a paternalistic plantation system.  Don't forget the slave-trade had achieved sufficient opprobrium to be abolished in the British Empire in 1807, but it was not until 1833 that slavery itself was abolished and slaves on the British West Indian islands were emancipated. Plantation slavery was accepted as necessary, perhaps as a necessary evil, but necessary nonetheless, long after the trade became unlawful, nearly a whole generation, in fact.

 

This distinction between trading slaves on the one hand and owning and working them on the other might also reflect the relative social status of sea captains and Bristol merchants on the one had, and gentlemen land-owners on the other.   The fictional plantation and slave-owning gentleman, Sir Thomas Bertram, was not a social outcast, and neither was the real-life plantation and slave-owning George Washington who was, after all, undeniably a gentleman, or the notorious Herveys and their ilk.

[Nearholmer]

I think there has been for hundreds of years an attitude among the British middle class that involves aspiring to be, or at least to ape in small ways, the landed, idle gentry, and that attitude persists, even though the landed, idle gentry barely exists any more. Its probably part of being a society where the royal family, the ultimate idle gentry, sits at the apex. This translates into, among other things, a mild disdain for technical and commercial 'trades', probably less so now than it used to, but still to some degree.

 

On the other side, mathematical subjects are perceived by those who work in 'front line' jobs as being 'too difficult for the likes of us', so they then don't encourage or empower their children to tackle them.

 

And, we have a serious shortage of effective role-modelling or positive-imagery around technical professions, except in the case of software-based.

 

It all adds up to a shortage of engineers, especially in certain branches, a crystal clear example being 'heavy electrical', where a generation of post-war grammar school boys, who attended red brick unis and we're then trained the CEGB, AEBs, big manufacturers etc, have now largely retired.

 

As a nation we badly fluffed Round Two of the Industrial Revolution (c1860 onwards) and continue to fluff many technical matters.

 

Kevin

 

PS: while we are doing CVs, I somewhat vexed my father by leaving school at 16, to become a technician apprentice and study part time to HNC, rather than finishing A levels and going to uni, but then filled the gap by teaching myself to the level where I was accepted as a Chartered Engineer, "by dissertation", then went on to complete an MSc, but sometimes I wish I'd decided to become a lawyer instead!

Edited December 8, 2017 by Nearholmer

[TheQ]

As George Washington was a Traitor to this country I can hardly call him a gentleman...

[Edwardian]

As George Washington was a Traitor to this country I can hardly call him a gentleman...

 

He came from an English gentry family, he had the education and attributes of a gentleman as they were then understood, he was a commissioned officer (obviously rebel rank has no status, but he held a Royal Governor's commission in the Virginia Provincials, IIRC) and he became a property owner.  In the terms of the day, that made him a gentleman, and you cannot take that from him, whatever he did.

 

This, I think, illustrates quite how entrenched these attitudes were.

 

Or are.

 

Save for the comment about the Royal family, which I think forms a case and a class of its own in contemporary Britain, I find myself very much in agreement with Kevin's analysis.   

Edited December 8, 2017 by Edwardian

[Northroader]

We haven’t had a pre raphellite on for a bit, so I thought this was quite apt:

[Nearholmer]

Actually, maybe on reflection I don't agree with my own analysis! It's too simplistic.

[BG John]

We haven’t had a pre raphellite on for a bit, so I thought this was quite apt:66FEA320-5AEF-43A4-AA75-865E356B5BA1.jpeg

That must have been an interesting period in history, when the naughty bits of a horse were regarded as obscene, but those of a female human weren't!