Eastern Counties Railway

The Eastern Counties Railway (ECR) was an English railway company incorporated in 1836 intended to link London with Ipswich via Colchester, and then extend to Norwich and Yarmouth.

Construction began in 1837 on the first at the London end. Construction was beset by engineering and other problems, leading to severe financial difficulties. As a result, the project was truncated at Colchester in 1843 but through a series of acquisitions (including the Eastern Union Railway who completed the link between Colchester and Norwich) and opening of other lines, the ECR became the largest of the East Anglian railways.

In 1862 ECR was merged with a number of other companies to form the Great Eastern Railway.

Opening In 1835, a surveyor called Henry Sayer presented a plan for a new railway from London to York via Cambridge to London solicitors Dimes & Boyman. Together with John Clinton Robertson who was to become the first secretary of the ECR and engineers John Braithwaite it was concluded that this scheme was too optimistic and a scheme from London to Norwich via Colchester and Ipswich would be more viable.

A tour of the key towns on the route followed where considerable opposition from landowners, from sections of the press and members of the public was encountered. Despite this the prospectus of the Grand Eastern Counties Railway was first prepared in 1834 by John Braithwaite. The bill was introduced into the House of Commons on 19 February 1836, and after a stormy passage (two rival schemes had also surfaced in the interim as well as continuing opposition from land owners), it was authorised by an act of Parliament, the (6 & 7 Will. 4. c. cvi) on 4 July 1836.

Construction of the line began in late March 1837 and progress east of Stratford was relatively easy as the land was largely arable. Indeed, a good number of windmills had to be demolished in order to get the railway built. West of Stratford the line had to cross the unstable Bow Marshes and after that, the built-up nature of the area meant that the railway had to be built on expensive viaducts.

The two-track railway opened on 20 June 1839 from a temporary terminus at in Mile End, Middlesex, as far as in Essex. On opening day, two trains topped and tailed by locomotives proceeded along the line watched by crowds of people. Guests of the company enjoyed a sumptuous banquet at Romford enlivened by the sound of cannon and the band of the Coldstream Guards. The strain of building the initial line and continuing disputes with landowners continued to take its toll on the company's finances. ECR backers in Norfolk and Suffolk were demanding work start in their area and the company was forced to go to Parliament to increase its capital, although this move was rejected. Later in 1839 shareholders decided a call for £3 per share should be made (in effect an additional payment by them) although this was reduced to £2 per share in January 1840 which released enough money for the ECR to continue construction.

On 1 July 1840, the ECR opened an extension at the London end to its permanent terminus at Shoreditch (renamed Bishopsgate in 1846) and at the country end to . The line between Stratford and Shoreditch was, from 15 September 1840, used by trains of the Northern and Eastern Railway (N&ER) whose line to Broxbourne opened, although at first the trains were not permitted to call at Stratford.

By 1840, it was clear that additional money would be required to complete the ECR line to Colchester. This stretch included 64 bridges or viaducts in addition to numerous culverts, embankments and cuttings. A successful application for more capital was made to Parliament and work continued. The winter of 1841 proved very wet and delayed work even further.

Finally on 25 February 1843, a special inspection train left Shoreditch for Colchester. However, the train was stopped at Brentwood as a timber viaduct at Mountnessing had subsided and it was unsafe to continue. On 7 March 1843, goods trains started operation followed by the commencement of passenger services on 29 March.

The costs were as follows:

{| class="wikitable" |- ! Item !! Cost |- | Construction ||style="text-align: right;"| £1,631,330 |- | Rolling stock ||style="text-align: right;"| £97,000 |- | Land, compensation, solicitors and surveyors fees. ||style="text-align: right;"| £370,550

The line ran to , a distance of to Shoreditch station; the route is now part of the Great Eastern Main Line.

Development

In 1843, the directors were approached with a proposal to build a line from Stratford to the River Thames with the intention of sending out agricultural produce by rail with coal forming the bulk of the traffic the other way. A bill came before Parliament sponsored by the Eastern Counties, Stratford and Thames Junction Railway Company and it was the that built the line through to opening on 14 June 1847.

As mentioned, the had built a line from Stratford – Broxbourne and shared the Shoreditch terminus. This railway had extended to in 1842 and in 1843 and was in the process of extending its line towards . Following on from negotiations in 1843, the took over operation of the from 1 January 1844 paying rent and dividing the profits until this railway was finally acquired by the Great Eastern Railway in 1902.

Following the acquisition of the the concentrated on building the line towards Newport (Essex) and on 4 July 1844, Parliament passed the (7 & 8 Vict. c. lxii) authorising the to extend to Cambridge and Brandon in Norfolk where an end on connection with the Norfolk Railway would offer a through route to . This route opened on 29 July 1845.

In 1845, the was surveying towards Ardleigh with the intention of extending to Harwich although this scheme failed to get parliamentary backing.

Late in 1845, George Hudson was invited by the shareholders to become chairman and an upswing in the lines finances resulted. Hudson then proposed various schemes designed to take the towards York and Lincoln joining up with his North Midland Railway at South Milford. One scheme that came to fruition was the line from Peterborough via March to Ely which opened on 14 January 1847. Increasing passenger numbers at Bishopsgate (renamed from Shoreditch in 1846) saw that station extended in the same year.

The refusal of the to extend northwards towards Ipswich led to the formation of the Eastern Union Railway, who opened their line between Colchester and Ipswich in 1846.

Other openings in 1847 included to Wisbech East on 3 May and on 17 August, Cambridge to St Ives where a junction with the East Anglian Railways' (EAR) St Ives to Huntingdon line was created. In fact the operated the to line on behalf of the , but it proved so unprofitable that they threatened to withdraw from the arrangement in October 1849. In the end operation by the restarted with them paying the 25 shillings per day to do so.

The financial depression of 1847–48 saw the rein back some of its ambitions although the loop line from St Ives to was opened on 1 February 1848 and the took over the working of the Norfolk Railway on 2 May which extended the empire to Fakenham, Lowestoft and Great Yarmouth. Construction also started on a branch to in March 1847 and the first goods trains ran in August 1848 followed by the opening to passenger trains on 2 October of the same year.

By 1849, things were going poorly for chairman George Hudson, and following his non-attendance at the AGM the shareholders, who had received a very small dividend, set up a committee to look into his financial management of the company.

A short branch to Enfield was opened on 1 March 1849. This linked to station (then called Edmonton). Later the same month the to Fakenham line, the building of which had been started by the Norfolk Railway, was opened by the on 20 March 1849.

The did not enjoy good relations with the London and Blackwall Railway (L&BR). They had built the London and Blackwall Extension Railway from Stepney East which was supposed to have a junction with the at Bow Junction. This was not connected and an ill-served interchange station called Victoria Park & Bow lasted until 1850. Both the and the had been promoting railways to Tilbury and it was in September 1851 that the directors asked George Parker Bidder to approach the with regard to a joint bill.

There were no additions to the network in 1850, and in 1851 a short branch from what is now Shepreth Branch Junction near Shelford to Shepreth was built. Back in 1848 Parliament granted authority to the Royston and Hitchin Railway to extend their line from Royston. Although Cambridge was its goal, Parliament sanctioned only an extension as far as Shepreth (as the Eastern Counties Railway had opposed the extension to Cambridge). The line was completed in 1851 and initially the Great Northern Railway (GNR), who had leased the Royston and Hitchin Railway in the interim, ran a connecting horse-drawn omnibus service. This proved unsuccessful so the new line and the line to Hitchin were leased to the Eastern Counties Railway for 14 years, with a connection at Shepreth to enable the to run trains from Cambridge to Hitchin.

In 1852, the took over operation of the East Anglian Railways (EAR). The company's property had been taken over by the receiver in June 1850 and the was leased to the GNR. The had running powers over the line between Peterborough, March and Wisbech (opened 1847). Unfortunately, they had not applied for running rights over the line that linked the and stations at Wisbech and the refused access so that the passengers had to change stations by omnibus. However, shareholder opposition within the and were the real reason why the withdrew from the arrangement allowing the to take over operation of the .

In 1853, the Eastern Union Railway (EUR) was in serious financial trouble having built lines to Norwich, Bury St Edmunds (as the Ipswich and Bury Railway), Sudbury and had a branch to Harwich under construction. Negotiations began between the and and on 1 January 1854 the took over the working of the although this was not formally ratified until the Eastern Counties and the Norfolk and Eastern Union, the East Anglian, and the Newmarket Railways Act 1854 (17 & 18 Vict. c. ccxx) of 7 August 1854. The two companies did not formally merge until they amalgamated with other railways to form the Great Eastern Railway in 1862.

The Harwich branch whilst built by the was opened by the , the following week on 15 August.

The also took over the Newmarket Railway in 1854 which linked Cambridge with Ipswich Bury St Edmunds.

In 1854, the / owned London Tilbury and Southend Railway started operating over the Forest Gate Junction to Bow Junction and onto . Early trains split at Stratford with a portion of the train to Bishopsgate station. A third line between Stratford and Bow Junction was built to help accommodate this traffic and services had running rights into Fenchurch Street via the London and Blackwall Railway extension route.

A line was also provided linking Victoria Park station on the North London Railway with Stratford Low Level and Stratford Market stations which was primarily for goods traffic. The Loughton branch of the was opened on 22 August 1856 with a junction just north of Stratford on the Cambridge line.

In 1859, the East Suffolk Railway (ESR) finished building a series of lines in Suffolk and south east Norfolk. These were all taken over by the on opening day 1 June 1859. The line from Ipswich (East Suffolk Junction) to Woodbridge (at the south end of the ) also opened on this day giving a through route between Ipswich, Lowestoft and Great Yarmouth (South Town).

The final railway opened by the before the incorporation of the Great Eastern Railway (GER) in 1862 took place on 12 April 1860, when the Leiston branch in East Suffolk was extended to Aldeburgh.

Operations

Accidents and incidents