Wollaton Hall near the Southern terminus of the Wollaton Wagonway
The Wollaton Wagonway (or Waggonway), built between October 1603 and 1604 in the East Midlands of England by Huntingdon Beaumont in partnership with Sir Percival Willoughby,[1] has sometimes been credited as the world's first overground wagonway and therefore regarded as a significant step in the development of railways. Its primacy has been recently questioned because of a wagonway built at Prescot, near Liverpool, sometime around 1600 and possibly as early as 1594. Owned by Philip Layton, this line carried coal from a pit near Prescot Hall to a terminus about half a mile away.[2] Also, a wagonway at Broseley in Shropshire was probably earlier.[3]
The wagonway was the earliest form of railway. Although modern historians are uncertain as to whether it evolved gradually or was invented at a particular time, it is known that, between the Autumn of 1603 and 1 October 1604, a wagonway had been built near Nottingham, by Huntingdon Beaumont who was the partner of Sir Percival Willoughby, the local land-owner and owner of Wollaton Hall. It ran for approximately two miles (3 km) from Strelley to Wollaton to assist the haulage of coal. The actual track gauge is unknown but some websites state it was 4 ft 6 in (1,372 mm).[4] No documentary evidence exists to support such statements although Lewis' work (1970) on early wooden railways, and the practicalities of horse haulage, suggest a gauge close to that dimension is plausible.
alonge the passage now laide with railes, and with suche or the lyke Carriages as are now in use for the purpose.
The above is from Sir Percival Willoughby's agreement with Huntingdon Beaumont dated 1 October 1604. Sir Percival was Lord of the Manor of Wollaton and Huntingdon Beaumont was the lessee of the Strelley coal pits. They worked the Strelley mines in an equal partnership.
Comparatively little is known of the wagonway. It cost £172 (equivalent to £51,299 in 2023),[5] and ended at Wollaton Lane End, from where most of the coal was taken onwards by road to Trent Bridge and then downstream on the River Trent by barge. The wagons or carriages were drawn by horses on wooden rails. The Strelley mines were worked only until about 1620, by which time all readily recoverable coal had probably been mined. The wagonway was presumably then abandoned.
The success of the Wollaton Wagonway led to Huntingdon Beaumont building other wagonways for his other mining leases near Blyth in Northumberland. A continuous evolution of railways can be traced back to the Wollaton Wagonway.
^Hylton, Stuart (2007). The Grand Experiment: the Birth of the Railway Age 1820-1845. Ian Allan Publishing. ISBN 0-7110-3172-X.
^Jones, Mark (2012). Lancashire Railways – The History of Steam. Newbury: Countryside Books. p. 5. ISBN 978 1 84674 298 9.
^P. King, 'The First Shropshire Railways' in G. Boyes (ed.), Early Railways 4: Papers from the fourth early railways conference (Six Martlets, Sudbury 2010), pp. 70-84.
^"Huntingdon Beaumont's Wollaton to Strelley Waggonway". Nottingham Hidden History. Retrieved 23 August 2017.
^UK Retail Price Index inflation figures are based on data from Clark, Gregory (2017). "The Annual RPI and Average Earnings for Britain, 1209 to Present (New Series)". MeasuringWorth. Retrieved 7 May 2024.
The WollatonWagonway (or Waggonway), built between October 1603 and 1604 in the East Midlands of England by Huntingdon Beaumont in partnership with Sir...
completed the WollatonWagonway, built to transport coal from the mines at Strelley to Wollaton Lane End, just west of Nottingham, England. Wagonways have been...
hill. Wollaton is also noted for the existence of one of the earliest recorded railway lines in the world, the WollatonWagonway. The wagonway ran between...
landowner Sir Percival Willoughby, built the WollatonWagonway, running from mines at Strelley to Wollaton in Nottinghamshire. It was approximately two...
first experimental waggonways in the world; an example of this is the Wollatonwagonway of 1603–1616, which transported minerals from bell pitt mining areas...
solidorum libri tres, in Rome. 1 October – The WollatonWagonway, from Strelley, Nottingham, to Wollaton in England, is known to have been completed by...
the Wollaton Manor, Beaumont constructed the WollatonWagonway. 21st century research has established that this is not the world's first wagonway with...
Severn to be loaded onto barges and carried to riverside towns. The WollatonWagonway, completed in 1604 by Huntingdon Beaumont, has sometimes erroneously...
oceans. 1604 – The world's first recorded overland wagonway, the 2-mile (3.2 km) WollatonWagonway, is built by Huntingdon Beaumont in Nottingham, England...
partner, Huntingdon Beaumont, was responsible for constructing the WollatonWagonway. Willoughby was drawn into the Newfoundland Company venture by John...
from steel. The first railway in Britain was the WollatonWagonway, built in 1603 between Wollaton and Strelley in Nottinghamshire. It used wooden rails...
Severn to be loaded onto barges and carried to riverside towns. The WollatonWagonway, completed in 1604 by Huntingdon Beaumont, has sometimes erroneously...
the WollatonWagonway, built to transport coal from the mines at Strelley to Wollaton just west of Nottingham, England, the world's oldest wagonway with...
plane, had existed 'long before' 1605. This probably preceded the WollatonWagonway of 1604, which has hitherto been regarded as the first. In Shropshire...
least 650 years. By comparison, the world's first overland wagonway, the WollatonWagonway of 1604, ran for c. 3 km. The largest post and lintel roof...
preceded the WollatonWagonway, completed in 1604, hitherto regarded as the earliest British installation. This ran from Strelley to Wollaton near Nottingham...
termed a wagonway) from his coal mines to the river at Jackfield. It has recently been suggested that this is older than the WollatonWagonway which is...
as a wagonway and it was completed during 1604. It was built by Huntingdon Beaumont working in partnership with the second occupier of Wollaton Hall,...
James Green and William King as resident engineers: Green, who was from Wollaton, was appointed engineer for the section of canal from the Trent to the...
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