ROBERT STEPHENSON'S EARLY LIFE.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XIII, Issue 762, 25 February 1860, Page 2

ROBERT STEPHENSON'S EARLY LIFE.

(From 'Once a Week.')

Robert Stephenson first saw the light in the village of Willington,. at a'cottage which his father occupied after his marriage with Miss Fanny Henderson—-a marriage contracted on the strength of his* first appointment .as " breaksman " to the engine employed - for lifting the ballast brought by the; return collier ships to Newcastle. Here Robert was born on the 17th of November, 180,3. As the cottage looked out/ upon a\ tramway, the eyes of the child were'naturally familiarized from;infancy with sights and scenes most v.-neai'ly connected with his future profession. At this time George Stephenson's meanswere small, as, indeed, may be- guessed from the 'fact that nearly ten years later.be thought /himself a happy'man: when he succeeded in obtaining a post as engineer to a colliery with asalaryof one.hundred pounds;a year. Notwithstanding these slender resources, the liberal-minded father found means; to give his son such an education as could be obtained in a provincial town, to which the energy; and industry of the son superadded such of the' rudiments of mechanics and engineering science as he could pick tip in. the long* winter evenings in the; Library of the Literary and; Philosophical Institute of Newcastle. Mr. Smiles tells us how keenly the father felt, as he grew. up, the want; of a solid education, arid" how perseveringly he laboured, after reaching the years of manhood, to make;up for lost school time during his leisure moments, and; bow he;resolved that, poor as he: was, his son should. not suffer in. like /manner-by the want of early : instruction in reading, writing", and arithmetic, to which he added mechanics /as a fourth; desideratum. ■ The rudimentary and experimental knowledge which .Robert:picked up in his' father's workshop bame "in naturally... to the aid of the theoretic teaching of books, and supplemented his -science .by practical capacity.* As an early- proof- of the latter we, may mention that.there still* stands over the;door of- the •cottage at Killiiigworth,/ then 'occupied by George Stephenson, a sun-dial, the* production of the hands of the son. at the ag; e of thirteen —a work to which the- elder ; Stephenson looked back with an honest pride to his dying dw.-y-Z'Z^ V'" V; -'"' 'Z--:':-':/ -ZZ. * It is. now just forty years ago since Robert was taken from school and tauglit to feel the truth of the old saying of Persius, Magister artis\ venter. In 1818 or 1819 we find him apprenticed as ah under-viewer to a coalmine ' iii the neighbourhood of the place in which he had spent his, childhood. Having devoted a year or. two to making himself .practically acquainted with the machinery and working of a colliery, he was sent tor the University of Edinburgh, where he spent a session in at-' •tending the course of lectures on chymistry, natural philosophy, and: geology. How far he may have profited ,by. this opportunity of increasing; his; scientific knowledge we have the means of ascertaining, for ;he*. brought home a prize for mathematics, much to; the delight of his father. He knew the value of opportunities, and he had the great secret of success—the art of availing himself of them. His mind was too eminently practical to forego any study or pursuit' which was; calculated, even in its remotest bearings; to; help him on in the great struggle of life; and happy, indeed, are they who can look back with regret lipon so few ; opportunities missed, so few court cards thrown away; out; of their hands; as Robert Stephenson. -'; j Having spent a year or two as an apprentice | in his father's manufactory of locomotives at Newcastle (even at that time a school, if not of thohgbt, yet of action); and two-, or three more years-in South America, whither be was sent to bxaminennd report upon tlie gold and j silyer ;inines of Columbia, he; returned, to Erig- J 'land at;the close of 1827. He found' the public mmd greatly excited upon the railway question. " Can locomotives be'successfully and profitably employed for passenger traffic?" was still a moot point of which his father sustained the affirmative alone against a,host. It

was almost a repetition of Athanathius con.tr mundum when George Stephenson fought tl% battle of the Locomotive—of the Rail J? Wheel or, as he himself-'termed them «m arid; Wife.": -Mr/Smiles tells us i low j, struggled for their conjunction in the commit tee-room of the House of Commons, and w]i * men deemed him almost a maniac for pevsevn" ing in his theory how bravely and tenacious!'" he persisted till he had succeeded. Joinir^forces with Mr. Joseph Locke, the emine'^ engineer, the son not only wrote the able-f pamphlets on the. subject in debate, but } greatly, aided his father in the construction of the Rocket, the celebrated prize locomotiv the powers of which as displayed at frverno 6} at. once settled, the question at issue—just ° the trial, trip of the Gre&t Eastern has settle? we presume, the much-debated point as t' whether so large a ship can possibly be _\J ageable in a heavy sea. One of those best qualified to speak to I*. contributions to the development of the loco* motive engine informs us that from about fi v " years from his return from America Ifobert Stephenson's attention was chiefly directed t its improvement. "None but those who ac° companied him during the period in his incessant experiments, can form an idea of tl"* metamorphosis which the.machine underwent in it. The most elementary principles of tlie application of heat; of;the mode of calcula 'ting the strength of cylindrical and other boilers; of the strength of riveting- and of staying flat portions of the boilers, were then ! fixr from being understood, and eacli step i n the improvement of the engine had to be confirmed- by the -most careful experiments before the brilliant results of the Rocket and Planet engines (the'latter being the type of the existing modern locomotive) could be arrived at.''

-'• Stephenson's time- was not, however so fully taken up during the above interval as to precluae attention to his other civil engineering business, and he executed within°it the Leicester and Swannmgton, Whitby and Pickering, Canterbury and Whitstable, and Newton and Warrington Railways, while' lie also erected ;an extensive manufactory for locomotives.at Newton, in Lancashire, in partnership with, the Messrs. Taylour. About the middle of the above period, also, the first surveys and estimates for the London and Birmingham Railway were framed, leading eventually to the obtaining of the act. Then followed the execution of the line, and here Robert' Stephenson had an opportunity of showing his" great talent for management of works on a large scale." This was the first railway of any magnitude exeouted under the contract system; perfect sets. of.plans and specifications (which have since served as a type for nearly all, the subsequent lines) were prepared—no small matter for a series of works extending* oyer 112 miles, involving tunnels arid other works of a then unprecedented magnitude..

Many other railway sin England and abroad were, executed by him in' rapid succession; the Midland,"Blackwall, Northern and Eastern, Norfolk, Chester and Holyhead, together with/numerous branch lines, were executed in this country by him; and among* railways abroad may be enumerated as works either executed by him or.Vecommended in his capacity of a consulting engineer the system of lines in Belgium, Italy, Norway, and Egypt, and in France, Holland, Denmark, India, Canada, and New. Zealand.