From nothing to everything: the development of the career railway worker

It has been proclaimed in many places, at many times that before 1914 a job on the railway was a job for life.  Railway workers' careers apparently followed a set course: starting out in their teenage years, employees would undergo some form of apprenticeship, gradually move up through the ranks of their department, and would eventually retire at the age of 60 or 65. Throughout, in return for diligent and obedient service – a form of supplication to the law of the railway - employees received a high degree of job security, the opportunity to rise into positions of authority and, at the end of their careers, that rarity of the Victorian world: a pension.^[1]

But these patterns of employment had to have been instituted by company managers and directors at some point. The idea of a career railway worker would have been an alien concept to all railway staff in 1840, perhaps even as late as the 1850s. Yet by the 1890s, if you wanted it, obeyed the rules and did not find better employment (or for that matter were killed when doing your duties – a sadly not uncommon occurrence), the railway could easily be your home for life.

Pinpointing when the ‘career’ railway employee came into existence is not easy. Amongst a multitude of small railway companies, by the 1860s Victorian Britain was the possessor twelve large ones, each of which instituted different employment policies at different points. To add to the melee of confusion, railway workers were divided amongst themselves with regard to pay, working conditions and status. The status and pay of a platelayer, fixing and maintaining the track day in day out, was far lower that the engineman driving the train past him. The clerical staff – who were the only staff  in Traffic Departments who had any realistic chance of entering management if they had the talent and ambition – likely looked down on the porters, pushing suitcases and boxes around station all day. This staff separatism, which management frequently encouraged to keep the staff divided, lest they undertake some collective action over wages or working conditions, meant that industry decision-makers usually determined recruitment and employment policies on a grade-by-grade basis. Standardisation within a company was definitely not the norm.

Nonetheless, despite these issues, general conclusions about when the career railway worker emerged onto the industrial landscape are possible. As early as the 1850s the career railway clerk started appearing. Before then clerical work on the railways was not acknowledged as being particularly unique – the industry being very young – and so the companies recruited the talented, of any age, from wherever they could. For example, on joining the London and South Western Railway^[2] as a clerk at the age of thirty-five in 1835, no doubt after being in some other clerical position, William Mears would likely never have entertained the idea that he would retire in 1881.

Yet, very gradually, from the 1840s onwards, the railways established regulations for the recruitment and employment of clerks. In 1846 the London and North Western Railway (LNWR) laid down regulations for incremental pay and promotion amongst clerks, a preference for filling vacancies internally and a set age range for new apprentice clerks – fourteen to sixteen. ^[4] Other railways did the same around this time; the LSWR brought in some rules around 1843;^[5] although rigid formalisation of its promotional and pay procedures was not deemed necessary until the early-1850s.^[6]

For the rest of the staff – known as the ‘wages grades’ - the structured railway career started much later. The 1870s saw the Great Western Railway (GWR) progressively specify the route careers should take, when staff should be promoted and their pay each step of the way.^[7] Similar rules for new police and porters on the LNWR, as well as a minimum height of 5ft 7in (although this likely came into force earlier), were formalised in 1860. Such regulations, which governed recruitment and the notion of career on the railways into the twentieth century, had become the norm throughout the industry by the 1870s. ^[8]

Despite the institution of these rules, they did not immediately give birth to a culture where railway employment was automatically considered a lifelong vocation. Did the teenager joining the railway as a junior clerk, lad porter or engine cleaner in the 1870s think they would be with the company until retirement? It is improbable they could be sure of this. Surrounding new recruits were old hands. These older men may have believed in the security railway work provided, they may even have realised the jobs they were doing were their last, but they would have understood that not everyone stayed with the railway until the end of their working lives. They had been losing colleagues to pastures new (or destitution) for decades – a fact they would undoubtedly have imparted this fact to newcomers. In the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway’s case, sixteen per cent of all employees resigned or were dismissed in 1865-69.^[9]

The understanding that working on the railways was a lifelong vocation only emerged around 1880s and 1890s, when almost all staff had been with the industry from their teens. Within the Great Eastern Railway, for example, the recognisable facets of railway employment – recruitment at an early age, clearly defined career paths and vacancies being filled by individuals on a lower rung of a promotional ladder – became embedded between 1875 and 1905, with the decisive years being between 1885 and 1895.

The developing idea that railway staff were in a lifelong career manifest itself in other ways in this period. The first railway staff magazines, the South Western Gazette and Great Western Railway Magazine (and Temperance Union Record), appeared in 1881 and 1888 respectively. The magazines’ content of news, reports and informative articles about the railways’ activities reflected employees’ deep connection with the railway and its family of staff, which in part were bound together by their common state: a railway employee for life. Railway employment as a lifelong pursuit was also a factor in the rise of the railway labour movement after 1870. The Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants started in 1871, the General Railway Workers Railway Union established itself in 1889 and the Associated Society of Locomotive Engineers and Firemen came into existence in 1880. ^[10] Railway workers took pride in their work, looked out for each other and, thus, fought hard as a group for the improved pay and working conditions they deserved. Had railway workers believed their time on the railway was limited, fleeting even, the establishment of such movements would have been unlikely: the fight would have been a redundant enterprise.

There was no such thing as a lifelong railway worker in 1840. This idea, which constitutes a fundamental part of the popular conception of the railway history, developed slowly over many decades, at different speeds in different places. There was an evolution; in the early years of the industry men (and some women) just happened to work on the railway, by the 1890s they proudly called themselves ‘railwaymen’ (and railwaywomen).

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[1] Peter Howlett, ‘The Internal Labour Dynamics of the Great Eastern Railway Company, 1870-1913', Economic History Review, 57, 2 (2004): 404

[2] Then named the London and Southampton Railway.

[3] The National Archives [TNA], RAIL 411/492, Clerical staff character book No. 2, 414

[4] TNA, RAIL 410/1876, London and North Western Railway Company: Records. STAFF RECORDS. Salaries alteration book, 1-3

[5] TNA, RAIL 411/1, Court of Directors Minute Book, 11 August 1843

[6] TNA, RAIL 411/216, Special Committee Minute Book, ? January 1859

[7] Mike Savage, ‘Discipline, Surveillance and the “Career”: employment on the Great Western Railway 1833-1914’, in Foucault, Management and Organisational Theory, ed. Alan McKinlay and Ken Starkey, (London: Sage, 1998), 81-82

[8] TNA, RAIL 410/1829, Conditions of service; retiring allowances; scales of pay and other general staff matters: papers, Regulations as to Appointments, Extracts from the Minutes of the Board of Directors, 10 March 1860

[9] P.W. Kingsford, Victorian Railwaymen, (Frank Cass & Co., 1970), 42

[10] David Howell, Respectable Radicals: Studies in the politics of railway trade unionism, (Aldershot: Ashgate, 1999), 6

'Pretty Festoons of Holly Leaves Are Displayed' - The Decoration of Railway Stations Before 1900

In the late nineteenth century most railway employees would find themselves at work over the Christmas period, even on Christmas Day itself. Therefore, it is unsurprising that many felt the need to adorn their places of work so that the spirit of Christmas would remain with them while on duty. The decoration of stations was seemingly a collective effort by station staff, and it was reported by the Reading Mercury in January 1887 that at Sunningdale station on the London and South Western Railway (LSWR) ‘all the men have worked at the decorations during their “off time” under the supervision of the station master.^[1]

This decking out of stations at Christmas allowed travellers to pass a wealth of colour while on their journeys. In 1884 the London and South Western Railway’s (LSWR) staff magazine, the South Western Gazette, reported that the standard of decorations at suburban stations was ‘quite up to the standard of past years’.^[2] The Whitstable Times and Hearne Bay Herald stated in 1881 that the London, Chatham and Dover Railway’s (LCDR) station at Canterbury ‘looked exceedingly pretty’ and that ‘there had been no stint in the quality of decorative material, and it had been put up in a manner that evinced care and taste on the part of the decorators.’^[3] Furthermore, in 1887 the adornments at the LSWR’s Totton, Redbridge and Lyndhurst Road Stations were described by the Hampshire Advertiser as being ‘very effective, reflecting credit on those who carried out the work.’^[4]

Decorations were usually a mix of local plants, particularly evergreens, with other items added. In 1888 the booking office and waiting room at Purley on the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway (LBSCR) was decorated ‘effectively and prettily’ with holly and ivy.^[5] Furthermore, the copious adornments at the LSWR’s Sunningdale Station in 1886 were described in full, as follows:

‘The evergreens, relieved by numerous flags, and mottoes have a very pretty effect. The pillars are entwined with Turkey red, above which is a diamond shaped wreath, with Chrysanthemums, yellow, white and pink bronze at each point. The booking office is adorned with great taste, and a number of pretty festoons of holly leaves are displayed.’^[6]

Additionally, the Gazette recorded that the parcels office staff at Richmond station in 1887 had…:

“…vied with their parcel brethren at other stations in the way in which they have recognised this season of the year by wreathing and other decorations on the walls and around the windows of their office; the result has been very successful…a considerable quantity of evergreen has been expended in all decorations of this Richmond parcels office. We hear it is as well as any in the vicinity.’^[7]

Staff at Norbiton in 1884 and Camberley in 1885^[8] did things a little differently; lighting their booking offices and waiting rooms with Chinese lanterns. The Gazette recorded how at Norbiton ‘The effect at night is exceedingly pretty, and reflects great credit upon the designers.’^[9]

It is unknown when stations were decorated by their staff. However, only one article I have found reports a station's adornments before 25 December, suggesting that most stations were decked out shortly before Christmas Day.^[10] As for when they were taken down, this is again a bit of a mystery. Yet, clearly some stations were a bit lazy in doing so. At Saxmundham Station on the Great Eastern Railway in 1875, decorations were noted to be still up in the waiting room at a staff supper on the 12 January.^[11]

I have always felt that the Victorian railway community’s decoration of stations is akin to what many of us do at our own places of work; we decorate to help us remain festive while grafting. Consequently, our festooning of desks and walls follow in a long tradition of work-place festivities.

MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL MY READERS 

My other Christmas posts are as follows:

"Christmas fare from the provinces" - Euston Station and the Distribution of Festive Goods in the 1840s

"An EXTRA TRAIN will leave Shoreditch" - Trains on Christmas Day before 1900

A Victorian 'Railway' Christmas - Parcels, Pastimes, Profit and Poetry

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[1] Reading Mercury, Saturday 01 January 1887

[2] The South Western Gazette, January 1888, p.8

[3] Whitstable Times and Herne Bay Herald, Saturday 01 January 1881

[4] Hampshire Advertiser, Saturday 31 December 1887

[5] Surrey Mirror, Saturday 22 December 1888

[6] Reading Mercury, Saturday 01 January 1887

[7] The South Western Gazette, January 1888, p.11

[8] Reading Mercury, Saturday 02 January 1886

[9] The South Western Gazette, January 1884, p.2

[10] Surrey Mirror, Saturday 22 December 1888

[11] The Ipswich Journal, Saturday 16 January 1875

Did the Management Ever Control Britain's 19th Century Railways?

Alfred Chandler

The rise of what Alfred Chandler called the ‘visible hand’ of management has dominated the business history literature for forty years. Simply put, Chandler argued that managers came to dominate American business in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. As technology was introduced to companies and markets expanded, their processes of distribution and then coordination became more complex as they increased in size. Consequently, this generated a need for better administrative control of the organisations’ activities, leading to the rise of the ‘visible hand’ of management. Indeed, as managers grew in number within firms, they increasingly steered their destinies, wrestling control of corporate strategy from companies’ shareholders, financiers and directors. Chandler called this ‘managerial capitalism.’[1]

In the United States this process occurred first in the railroads. When faced with challenges such as safety concerns, then the increasing volume, speed and complexity of traffic on the line, companies quickly developed hierarchies of railway managers to coordinate their activities, leading to the rise of the ‘visible hand.’ Ward argued that a situation had developed on the Pennsylvania Railroad by 1873 where ‘paramount executive authority had emerged’, directors were by then ‘pliant acceders,’ and shareholders were virtually impotent.[2] Indeed, there is no doubt that Chandler admired railroads, such as the Pennsylvania, where managers had seized control of the organisation, arguing they were the best managed and innovative. They adopted high-level strategic direction, with considerable authority delegated to operating units and complex administrative practices were developed.[3] Indeed, Zunz also argued similar of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, which he considered an exemplar of good management practice because it was controlled by the company’s management class.[4]

The question, therefore, is to what extent this process was replicated in the British context? How much control did British railway managers have over their companies’ directors and shareholders in the nineteenth century, and, ultimately, their destinies? Chandler argued that because of the nation’s smaller size British railway managers were challenged less than their American counterparts to develop new and innovative management techniques.[5] Therefore, this possibly implies that British railway managers did not secure the same level of control as some American managers. However, Channon countered this by arguing that British railway managers were challenged in different ways because of the country’s high-density, expensive and intensive network, which was, unlike in the United States, complete in its operating and physical details in a much shorter time period after the industry’s establishment.[6] Therefore, while not ruling out a rise of the ‘visible hand’ of management, this may suggest that a different pattern of managerial development occurred within British railways. Nevertheless, neither of these perspectives really answered the question of whether there was a rise in the ‘visible hand’ of management in the British railway industry in the nineteenth century.

No comprehensive history of British railway management before 1914 has been written. Therefore, I have had to compile what I know about the rise of the ‘visible hand’ from case studies. However, some historians have broadly attempted to assess when the railways’ management class, particularly within larger companies, came to dominate the industry’s direction. Cain argued that General Managers, who were usually at the top of railway companies’ hierarchies, were the most important decision-makers in the industry by 1870.[7]  Channon made a similar claim, stating that before 1870 managerial ascendency ‘cannot be assumed.’[8] I believe both were wrong, and using a number of case studies I will suggest that management cannot be said to have ascended into a position of control before the 1900s.

Richard Moon

Terry Gourvish’s book on Mark Huish, the London and North Western Railway’s General Manager between the company’s formation in 1846 and 1858, is an enthralling text. It relates the story of a railway manager who during his administration and after his death was considered ‘unscrupulous, dictatorial and Machiavellian’; controlling the companies' policies. At face value this would suggest he was the first ‘managerial capitalist’ in Britain’s railway industry. Yet, Gourvish’s research showed the reverse. He argued that while Huish had more control of the company’s policies than his contemporaries, he did not possess the ‘dictatorial’ influence in decision-making often ascribed to him.’ Indeed, his resignation was forced on him 1858 as he did not satisfy the board’s requirements regarding inter-company diplomacy.[9]

Archibald Scott

Indeed, it was the career of the man who instigated  Huish’s resignation, LNWR director Richard Moon, that truly shows that the ‘visible hand’ of management did not really control policy on the British railway network until long after it had on many American railroads. Moon was appointed chairman of the company in 1861 and stayed in the post for thirty years. Before his ascendency becoming chairman, he had a reputation for taking a highly detailed interest in most of the company’s operational affairs, even when they were beyond his remit. Indeed, most railways’ boards met twice monthly, with directors meeting in committees the day before. Yet, Moon would be active in the company’s affairs every day of the week. Thus, when made chairman his controlling instincts were let loose. His biographer, Peter Braine, described him as being ‘not only a managing director, but also effectively his own General Manager,’ throughout his chairmanship. [10] Indeed, the company’s General Manager between 1858 and 1875, William Cawkwell, was very much under his and the board’s control.[11]

But directors having control of companies’ strategic direction was not unusual in the period. Lord Salisbury, chairman of the Great Eastern Railway between 1868 and 1871, looms large in the company’s history. On his appointment the GER was in chancery. Yet, he successfully turned it around and it began paying dividends again in the 1870s.[12] On the London and South Western Railway, as I will explain in my thesis, policy was dominated by directors until the 1881 when they gave the General Manager, Archibald Scott, more ‘general control’ over the concern’s affairs.[13] However, even then he was still under their control and did not have a decisive role in corporate decision-making. Lastly, on the Great Northern Railway in the 1850s, 60s and 70s it had directors who ‘thought they knew more about the business than the company’s senior officers.’[14] Therefore, this would suggest that the dominance of company boards was still present in the industry as late as the 1870s.

Indeed, from the 1860s there also appeared controlling positions within companies which would now be described as managing directorships. In most cases the individuals taking these positions were ex-managers, who on retirement became controlling directors. The most prominent examples of this were Edward Watkin and James Staats Forbes. They were fierce rivals, with Watkin chairing the Manchester Sheffield and Lincolnshire (1864-1894), South Eastern (1866-1894) and Metropolitan Railways (1872-1894); while Forbes was chairman of the London, Chatham and Dover (1873-1898) and Metropolitan District Railways (1872-1901). Both men had served as railwaymen and then had moved onto railways’ boards where they dominated policy.[15] The other example of this was the managing directorship of the Daniel Gooch on the Great Western Railway. Gooch had been the company’s Locomotive Superintendent between 1837 and 1864, and when he resigned took up a position on the board. He then became the company’s chairman, and had a position akin to a managing director between 1865 and his death in 1889.[16] Furthermore, James Ramsden on the Furness railway also was in such a position between 1866 and 1883.[17]

Myles Fenton

But by the late 1880s the dominant power of railway managers was coming through more widely within the British Railway industry. Between 1885 and 1897, as my thesis will show, Charles Scotter was the dominant General Manager of the London and South Western Railway, controlling almost all aspects of policy, large and small. Cornelius Lundie, General Manager and Superintendent of the Line of the Rhymney Railway between 1858 and 1904, ran the railway as he wished with little or no reference to the board’s interests.[18] Even Watkin  relied on the General Managers at each of his companies for their safe and efficient operation. They were the SER’s Myles Fenton, William Pollitt at the MSLR and John Bell at the Metropolitan.[19] Indeed, Hodgkins argued that because Pollitt and Bell were rivals a proposed link between the MSLR and Metropolitan in the 1890s would have been difficult to arrange. Therefore, this suggests that despite Watkin’s domineering chairmanship of his companies, his chief executives still heavily influenced their railways’ policies.[20]

George Gibb

These cases were, however, only the start of a shift of towards the absolute control of the ‘visible hand’ of management within Britain’s railways. In 1891 George Gibb was appointed General Manager of the North Eastern Railway. Gibb reformed the company’s operations and, through dominating the company’s board and staff, dragged it into a position where experts acknowledged it was a model of good management practice.[21] But Gibb was just the first of a new breed of railway executives. Indeed, as a crisis hit the industry around 1900, as passenger, goods and revenue growth stalled, the cost of fuel and materials increased, and railway securities became less favoured as investment opportunities, the role of reversing  the industry’s financial situation fell onto the shoulders of executives.

After 1900 a raft of new and innovative managers came to the fore within British railways. Sam Fay, an ex-LSWR employee, became the Great Central Railway’s General Manager in 1902, and through his dynamic leadership transformed it from being a poorly performing to concern into one that, while never rich, made great advances and innovations in operational practice.[22] On the Midland Railway Cecil Paget, the company’s Chief Operating Officer, devised a whole new method of train control that added greatly to the company’s operating efficiency,[23] reducing delays to freight trains from 21,869 hours in 1907 to 7,749 hours in 1913.[24] Lastly, in 1912 Herbert Walker became the LSWR’s General Manager. Through dominating the company’s directorate he reformed its management and introduced electric traction onto its ailing suburban network.[25]

Of course, not all railways had General Managers that were as dynamic as these three. However, generally by the early twentieth century executives controlled the strategic direction of most of the largest companies within the British railway industry. Furthermore, the process of the rise of the ‘visible hand’ was also helped, as my thesis will relate and as Channon discussed,[26] by directors having less time to dedicate to the companies they served. Before 1900 the many took an active interest in their railway companies as they had little else to occupy their time. However, from around 1900, as the British corporate economy grew, they took on other external responsibilities, such other directorships. Thus, large numbers of directors were occupied by these activities, leaving vacuum of control into which railway executives could step.

Herbert Walker

Therefore, it is not surprising that on the formation in 1912 of the Railway Executive Committee, established to organise Britain’s railways in wartime, all its members were General Managers of the country’s largest companies. Indeed, the diminished role of the railway directors in the administration of the industry by that time was reflected by the fact that not one was present on the REC. Consequently, Britain’s railways in World War One was completely managed by the ‘visible hand’ of management,[27] the final proof that it had secured strategic control of the industry by 1914.

Overall, this survey [tentatively] disproves Channon and Cain’s claims that railway managers were universally important to British railways’ policies by 1870, and there was much variance in who controlled their direction. Overall, in the contrast with experience of the American railroads, the rise of the ‘Visible Hand’ of management occurred relatively late in the British context; only truly emerging after 1900. But why this was so?

I think that Chandler was correct to some extent in arguing that British railway managers were challenged less than their American counterparts because of the country’s smaller size. Despite the dramatic traffic growth throughout the century, the smaller size of British railway companies meant that there was never a point until after the 1890s when the internal administrative control required by them was beyond the ability of one director or their boards to organise. Indeed, the highly centralised management structures of British railway companies throughout the period, where decisions could be made by a small group of directors or managers at the top of the hierarchy,[28]  meant that dynamic and knowledgeable individuals, irrespective of whether they were directors or a managers, had the possibility of controlling their railways. Thus, this is why it is unclear before 1900 if management had 'ascended' within the industry. Indeed, one factor in an individual controlling a railway in the period was his personality; and all of the men mentioned were certainly characters. 

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[1] Channon, Geoffrey, Railways in Britain and the United States, 1830-1940: Studies in Economic and Business History, (Aldershot, 2001), p.5

[2] Ward, James A., ‘Power and Accountability on the Pennsylvania Railroad, 1846-1878’, Business History Review, XLIX (1975), p.58

[3] Channon, Railways in Britain and the United States, 1830-1940, p.5

[4] Zunz, Oliver, Making America Corporate: 1870-1920, (Chicago, 1990), p.47

[5] Chandler, Alfred D., Scale and Scope: the Dynamics of Industrial Capitalism, (London, 1990) p.253

[6] Channon, Railways in Britain and the United States, 1830-1940, p.29

[7] Cain, P.J., ‘Railways 1870-1914: the maturity of the private system,’ in Freeman, Michael J. and Aldcroft, Derek H. (eds.) Transport in Victorian Britain, (Manchester, 1988), p.112

[8] Channon, Railways in Britain and the United States, 1830-1940, p.44

[9] Gourvish, T.R. Mark Huish and the London & North Western Railway, (Leicester, 1972), p.167-182

[10] Braine, Peter, The Railway Moon – A Man and His Railway: Sir Richard Moon and the L&NWR, (Taunton, 2012), p.477

[11] Channon, Railways in Britain and the United States, 1830-1940, p.44

[12] Barker, T.C., 'Lord Salisbury, Chairman of the Great Eastern Railway 1868-1872' in Marriner, S., Business and Businessmen: Studies in Business, Economic and Accounting History, (Liverpool, 1972)

[13] The South Western Gazette, December 1881, p.2

[14] Simmons, Jack, The Railway in England and Wales 1830-1914, (Leicester, 1978), p.247

[15] Gourvish, T.R., ‘The Performance of British Railway Management after 1860: The Railways of Watkin and Forbes’, Business History, 20 (1978), p.198

[16] Cain, P.J., ‘Railways 1870-1914: The maturity of the private system’, in Freeman, Michael J. and Aldcroft, Derek H. (eds.) Transport in Victorian Britain (Manchester, 1988), p.113

[17] Simmons, The Railway in England and Wales 1830-1914, p.247

[18] Simmons, The Railway in England and Wales 1830-1914, p.247

[19] Gourvish, ‘The performance of British railway management after 1860’, p.188-191

[20] Hodgkins, David, The Second Railway King: The Life and Times of Sir Edward Watkin, (Melton Priory, 2002), p.609

[21] Irving , R.J., The North Eastern Railway Company: An Economic History, 1870-1914,  (Leicester, 1976)  p.261-264

[22] Dow, Andrew, ‘Great Central Railway,’ The Oxford Companion to British Railway History, (1997, Oxford), p.191-192

[23] Burtt, Philip, Control on the Railways, (London, 1926), p.144-151

[24] Edwards, Roy, ‘Divisional train control and the emergence of dynamic capabilities: The experience of the London, Midland and Scottish Railway, c.1923-c.1939, Management and Organisational History, 6 (2011), p.398

[25] Klapper, C.F., Sir Herbert Walker’s Southern Railway, (London, 1973), p.33-76

[26] Channon, Railways in Britain and the United States, 1830-1940, p.187-188

[27] Pratt, Edwin A., British Railways and the Great War: Organisation, Efforts, Difficulties and Achievements – Vol. 1, (London, 1921), p.40-50

[28] Bonavia, The Organisation of British Railways, p.17-18

"A Typical Hotspur Crowd" - The Great Eastern Railway's Football Arrangements - 1912

In my work on the London and South Western Railway I frequently come across references to how it managed the movement of thousands of passengers to race courses such as Kempton, Hurst Park and Sandown. However, I have never encountered anything related to the transportation of football fans, presumably as this was only a small proportion of its traffic. While having a leisurely comb through the pages of The Great Eastern Railway Magazine (GERM) from 1912, I found an article that detailed how that company moved fans to and from league games.

The Great Eastern Railway’s (GER) territory was not small. Its trains ran out of Liverpool Street Station to most of East Anglia and it also served the north east London suburban district. However, because of emergent nature of the football league it only served a handful of major clubs. These were Tottenham Hotspur, Clapton Orient, which is now known as Leyton Orient, Woolwich Arsenal, well, I’ll let you guess their current name, Leyton, West Ham, Southend and Norwich City. Of these clubs it was Tottenham that drew the biggest crowds, and the article suggested that for first fixture of the season, ‘with, say, Newcastle United, or the North Londoner’s neighbours and keen rivals, Woolwich Arsenal’ the number of passengers attending would be around 40,000. On cup-tie days this number was exceeded. Thus, the majority of the article focussed on the movement of fans to and from White Hart Lane.

Being the only form of mass-transportation in Britain, the conveyance of away fans to the ground was a huge logistical effort. Thus, the company had to lay-on “special trains” to accommodate them. Railway managers not only had to take into account the extra locomotives and carriages required, but also had to operate these services around the regularly scheduled ones. The process of arranging these trains began when GER managers met with club officials a few weeks before match. By using figures from previous games they ‘computed’ how many fans could be expected at the game and by what routes they would travel. Subsequently, the number of special trains required would be worked out.

The next stage was for the company’s Chief Rolling Stock inspector to be consulted. He would arrange for the required carriages ‘that were lying idle at one or other of the suburban sidings’ to be placed at the disposal of the running department who would make them up into trains. A close inspection of the working time table was then undertaken and the arrival and departure times from Liverpool Street Station, and the paths the trains would take, were then worked out. All the company’s staff along the route of these trains, the stationmasters, guards and signalmen, were then appraised of the trains’ times. Lastly, at the station extra inspectors, ticket collectors and police were employed on the day to handle the swathes of fans.

Ticketing for these matches also took on a ‘special’ character. In the case of Tottenham games, cheap tickets were issued to what the GERM referred to as ‘Park’ Station, which I now suspect is ‘White Hart Lane Station.’ These tickets were issued on match days from Hertford, Ware, St Margarets, Ryde House and ‘all points between Ponder’s end and Broxbourne.’ In the Magazine’s opinion the availability of cheap tickets was ‘entirely justified’ as it drew crowds to the football from far and wide. However, it wasn’t just cheap tickets that were used to entice fans to the games, and the advertising department was also ‘rendered busy’ producing ‘placards, handbills and booklets etc.’ Indeed, special tickets were offered for Leyton and Norwich games also. In the latter case, the club also cooperated with the railway company to offer reduced-rate fares from surrounding stations. The large number of people patronising the trains was evidence that the ‘“sons of the soil” appreciate and support high class football with enthusiasm only equalled by their town-bred brethren.’

It was after all these plans were put in place that the real action began, and the second half of the GERM gives a rather poetic account of the melee that occurred on a Tottenham match day. On the platform at Liverpool Street Station the fans crowded waiting for the “White Hart Lane Special.” Even before the train came to a standstill they crowded in with ‘a little horseplay – a little pushing perhaps – but more from sheer exuberance of spirits than necessity,’ filling the trains beyond capacity and converting every compartment ‘pro tem into a smoker.’ Some trains went direct from Liverpool Street to White Hart Lane. However, some were dispatched half full, picking up fans on the way.

The activities of the fans on the trains would not seem a million miles away from the antics of today’s supporters; ‘a snatch of a song…a comic chorus, intermingle with the loud jests and banter of the noisy contingent.’ Yet, not everyone was as loud and ‘with difficulty’ the quieter element settled down to ‘talk football.’ Indeed, the topics of conversation are more than familiar to us today; ‘the chances of rival teams are carefully weighed, individual players criticized or praised’ and the prices of the latest editions to the transfer list were ‘debated as eagerly as stockbrokers might discuss the variation in “home rails”’

After a journey of half an hour the extra staff at White Hart Lane Station was ready. The trains pulled up and the passengers alighted, ‘each individual anxious to be the first to gain some coveted point of vantage on the stands or terraces.’ Hurriedly, they travelled downstairs where their tickets were collected from them in an expeditious manner and the platform was cleared in the ‘space of about two minutes.’ The now empty train steamed on, with another coming up behind it. The last special trains arrived just before kick-off.

‘It has been asserted by close observers’ the article went on ‘that the fortunes of the home team can be gauged by the demeanour of the crowd upon its return.’ With the final whistle blown the first arrivals from the ground began to appear at the station. Before entering they were taken in hand by ‘mounted patrols of the Metropolitan Police’ who lined them up in a queue at the entrance. They were let into the station, as one “Geordie Tripper” described it, “like t’animals into t’ark – two by two.” If one of the ordinary trains was not due a waiting ‘special’ would be brought into the platform. As soon as enough passengers to fill the train had passed through the gates they were shut, and those left outside had to await the next train. The virtue of this arrangement, which the GERM stated was unique, was that in the entire time that it had been in operation there had not been a single accident.

It seems that the GER particularly impressed observers with the speed with which they dispatched the fans after the games. Amongst the regularly scheduled services, the special trains were brought in at five minute intervals. Should a train not be available the stationmaster would message Enfield Station who would send another empty one from Liverpool Street. The result of so many trains arriving in a short space of time was that the company could clear crowds of seven or eight thousand in 35 minutes. Should the match be a cup-tie, between fifteen to seventeen thousand fans were apparently transported from White Hart Lane in just under an hour, a fact made even more impressive as this was from only one platform.

Indeed, this arrangement was not limited to the Tottenham crowds, and at Woolwich Arsenal, West Ham, Clapton Orient and Leyton, the same arrangements were operated. Overall, it seems that by 1912 the GER had honed their skills of organisation, advertising and ticketing to get the maximum return out of the football fans, but at limited cost to the company.

All information Taken from: The National Archives [TNA], ZPER 16/2, Great Eastern Railway Magazine, March 1912, p.73-74, Original article written by George A. Fisher, Secretary's Department.