RAILWAY RECORDS

‘The Industrial Revolution powered the expansion of the railways’

The age of public passenger railways started in Shildon, County Durham, when the Stockton & Darlington Railway (S&DR) opened on 27 September 1825. It became a true new-age railway when locomotive-hauled passenger trains were introduced in 1833. In 1821 Shildon’s population was just 115, but by the end of the century the railway town, now part of the North Eastern Railway (1863), was firmly established. Its population had grown to about 8,000, of which some 2,900 were railway workers at its height. An article on the website of the railway museum Locomotion in Shildon (locomotion.org.uk) gives insight into what life was like at the New Shildon Railway Works. It shows how it set the benchmark for future workshops with tough rules and regulations.

The Industrial Revolution