North Eastern Express

Volume 58

2019 Number 235

Christopher Dean. Robert Stephenson & Company: a financil basket case? Part 1. 72-.

2019 November Number 236

Christopher Dean. Robert Stephenson & Company: a financil basket case? Part 2. A Phoenix? — and the Darlingon Project. 105-
A new public company was incorporated on 19 July 1899 also called Robert Stephenson & Company Limited (Company No 63005). In addition to Joseph Whitwell Pease (JWP) as chairman, new directors were appointed including Sir Christopher Furness (later Baron Furness of Grantley), Sir William Armstrong, Sir Raylton Dixon, Lieutenant-Colonel Phillip Watts (a director of Sir WG Armstrong Whitworth & Company Ltd) and Henry Withy (Managing Director of Furness, Withy & Company Limited) all of them well-known figures and successful businessmen in the shipping, shipbuilding and engineering industries. Curiously, JWP who was a staunch Quaker and chairman of the Peace Society, was censured by fellow Quakers for his association with Armstrong who was an armaments manufacturer!
The Prospectus for the new company was issued in 1899 to aspiring investors and was to have a share capital of £500,000 (split equally between ordinary and 5½% Cumulative Preference shares) plus powers to raise a further £250,000 by way of 4% Debenture stock. It was to acquire the all the assets of the original business of RS&Co Limited — save for the current work in progress. A professional valuation by Wheatley, Kirk, Price and Company of Manchester, of the assets to be taken over totalled £139,258, excluding goodwill, debtors of the old company and work in progress. However the Prospectus stated that Messrs Pease, Fumess and Dixon had agreed to fix the purchase price for the assets of the old company at £200,000 including goodwill on the basis that they would also underwrite the share issue. The marine business was formally transferred to the new company on 15 October 1899 and that of the locomotive side on 1 January 1900. Three of the directors agreed to guarantee, in certain specific circumstances, the Preference Share dividends and interest on the Debenture stock. Essentially this was to cover any losses caused by disruption during the expansion of the works and the building of the Hebburn dock, the completion of the new works at Darlington and the reorganisation at Newcastle. It was reported at the company's second annual general meeting that the guarantors had paid £3,456 towards the dividends recommended at the meeting. Illustrations: Establishment of a new works at Darlington required the building of workers' housing. This is Locomotive Street looking north in August 2018. (Richard Barber) A postcard showing Stephenson's Darlington Works, postmarked October 1907. The viewl' is looking down Furness (later Wylam) Avenue with the main administrative building in the centre and the works just evident to the right. (.JC Dean Collection)

James Armstrong and Kenneth L, Watson. E.A. Phillipson's Steam locomotive design: data and formulae. 115-19
Forms foundation for Phillipson page: the book was seen during the compilation of Steam locomotive development and has been encountered in the many articles in the Locomotive Mag, project: as the authors of the artcle state "it is not an easy read".

James Rogers. Ripon: the viaduct and passenger reaction to the DMUs. 120
In August 1955 there was concern that boys who swam in the River Ure might be injured by nails on wooden beams at the bottomof the River near the railway viaduct. A. Baggs, a reserch advisor for the Ministry of Works was asked to investigate. He postulated the remains of a Medieval bridge, but found to be the remains of the initial railway crossing between 1848 and 1867. The comments on the DMUs concerned vibration and gear changing which may be expienced on the North Norfolk Railway if it ever operates again.