George Overton – The Melting Pot

Merthyr Tydfil to Aber Cynon Tramroad – part 1

by Gwilym and John Griffiths

Some sources have recorded that this tramroad (then called a dram road) was started around 1800 by agreement between William Taitt of Dowlais, Samuel Homfray of Pen y Darren and Richard Hill of Plymouth. They added that the construction, under the supervision of George Overton, was allegedly started in 1799 and finished in 1802. Yet see under Leases 1800 for a few of the early leases in summary. It seems that Richard Fothergill was much involved in setting up these leases. In addition, the route was always described as being from Morlais Castle to Navigation House. The route was from Pen y Darren to Aber Cynon, 9½ miles, a fall of 341 feet. Brief details were recorded in The Pen y Darren Locomotive by Stuart Owen-Jones.

The tramroad was used briefly (three times or numerous times, see below) with a trial of Trevithick’s steam engine on Tuesday 21 Feb 1804, returning to Pen y Darren the following day, but shortly thereafter the tramroad reverted to horse power for many further years. The weight of the steam-engine apparently damaged the rails. However, Charles Wilkins, ‘The History of Merthyr Tydfil’, page 252, thought that the engine, ‘after serving a long time on the tramway, was removed to a pit called Winch Fawr (in the hamlet of Heol Wermwd not the one in the hamlet of Gelli Deg), and finally taken to the top of the incline owned by the Pen y Darren Company at Cwm Bargod.’ We are not so sure. Richard Trevithick himself recorded the event from which the following summary is appropriate:

On Saturday 11 Feb 1804, the fire was lit in the ‘Tram Waggon’ and Richard Trevithick worked it without the wheels to try the engine.
On Monday 13 Feb 1804, they put the waggon on the ‘Tram Road’. It worked very well and ran up hill and down with great ease and was very manageable. There was plenty of power.
Between 13 Feb and 20 Feb 1804 the ‘Tram Waggon’ had been worked several times. They had tried loads of up to ten tons, and it worked easily. He was sure it could cope with forty tons. Richard Trevithick intended making a smaller engine for the tram road as the first one had too much power, and would be used instead to work a hammer.
On Tuesday 21 Feb 1804 they made the journey with the engine. They carried ten tons, presumably of iron, in five waggons, with seventy men riding on them for the whole of the journey. He recorded, very clearly, that it took four hours and five minutes to cover the nine miles because they had to cut down some trees and remove some large rocks out of the tram road. No mention of the stack being knocked down by a bridge or any problem with the ‘tunnel’ by Plymouth Works. They returned, but a broken bolt released the water, and the engine did not arrive back at Pen y Darren Works until the evening of Wednesday 22 Feb 1804. No mention of broken tramway plates or of having to be hauled back to Pen y Darren by horse.
Later they tried the carriage with twenty-five tons of iron, and found the engine was more than a match for that weight. The steam was delivered into the chimney above the damper. It made the draught much stronger by going up the chimney. Trevithick’s locomotive was the first to employ this very important principle of turning the exhaust steam up the chimney, so producing a draft which drew the hot gases from the fire more powerfully through the boiler.

In May 1854, some forty years later, Thomas Ellis, an engineer from Tredegar, wrote a letter describing the first journey the Pen y Darren locomotive took in February, 1804. His father was at Pen y Darren when the engine was made and tried. Samuel Homfray, proprietor of the Pen y Darren Works, Merthyr Tydfil, made a bet of 1,000 guineas with Richard Crawshay, of the Cyfarthfa Works, that Trevithick’s steam-engine could convey a load of iron from his works to the Navigation House, nine miles distant.

To be continued……

George Overton, Engineer

I’m sure we’ve all heard of Overton Street in Dowlais, but do we know about the person it was named after? George Overton, engineer, is a person who figures prominently in Merthyr’s History, but about whom very little is known.

Information about George Overton’s early life is very scanty, and sources differ as to his date of birth. Some sources state that he was born on 16 January 1775 at Cleobury Mortimer in Herefordshire (others say he was born in 1774), and the next 20 or so years remain a mystery. In his 1825 publication, A Description of the Faults or Dykes of the Mineral Basin of South Wales (right), however, he would describe himself as a practical man who had made and used tramroads “… during the greater part of the last thirty years … having surveyed and constructed roads of some hundred miles’ extent in different parts of the kingdom …”

By the turn of the 19^th Century, he had moved to Merthyr, and worked on the Dowlais Tramroad, connecting the Dowlais Ironworks to the Glamorganshire Canal in about 1791-3. This new 4ft 2in gauge tramroad costing £3,000, allowed horse-drawn wagons moving coal and iron – his scheme enabling each horse to pull 9-10 tonnes going downhill.

Soon after this, Overton was working on the Merthyr Tramroad. Commissioned by the owners of the Dowlais, Penydarren and Plymouth Works to counter the control that Richard Crawshay of Cyfarthfa Ironworks held over use of the canal, the 4ft 2in gauge tramroad was nearly 16km long and ran between Merthyr Tydfil and Abercynon. The tramroad secured its place in history when Richard Trevithick’s steam test took place here in 1804, two years after Overton completed his supervision.

From 1803, Overton had an interest in Hirwaun Ironworks in the Cynon Valley, as a partner in Bowzer, Overton & Oliver. He constructed a tramroad from Hirwaun to Abernant (1806-8), followed by work on the Llwydcoed Tramroad for the Aberdare Canal Company, and Brinore Tramroad.

In 1805 Overton married Mary, and they would go on to have six children.

In 1818 he was consulted by mine owners in County Durham, beginning his involvement in the development of what became the Stockton & Darlington Railway. Two canal schemes had failed to materialise and Overton recommended a horse-drawn tramway. His survey detailed an 82km route that he costed at £124,000, and was the first ever survey for a railway. After difficulties with landowners and re-surveys in 1819 and 1820 to shorten the route, his work was taken forward to Parliament but on the passing of the Bill, steam railway pioneer George Stephenson (1781-1848) took over. Stephenson’s team undertook a new survey and the rest, as they say, is history.

Overton had very definite ideas about tramroads and railways and how to construct them. His design for wooden trams (wagons) was adopted across most of South Wales. His expertise in this field seems to have prevented him from fully appreciating the advantages of steam locomotion “… except in particular instances, and in peculiar situations.” His last project was Rumney Railway, a plateway from Rhymney Ironworks to the Monmouthshire Canal Tramroad near Newport. It opened a year after the Stockton & Darlington Railway.

In 1815 Overton and his family moved to Llandetty near Talybont-on Usk where he died on 2 February 1827.

Llandetty Hall – George Overton’s last home.

Fatal Accident at Penydarren

From the Merthyr Telegraph 150 years ago today….

Here is a report of the inquest from the next issue of the Merthyr Telegraph…

Many thanks to Michael Donovan for researching these sad yet fascinating articles.

Memories of Old Merthyr

We continue our serialisation of the memories of Merthyr in the 1830’s by an un-named correspondent to the Merthyr Express, courtesy of Michael Donovan.

A small greengrocer’s shop followed, and then came a china and glass one, kept by a Miss Dyke, then a public house (the Globe) followed by the confectionery shop of Mrs Williams. Her daughters, I believe, Misses Jones, carried on dressmaking etc. One of these young ladies married Mr John Martin, doctor of the Penydarren Works; another Mr Edward Thomas of the Plymouth Works (uncle of the present Mr William Thomas of Oakfield, Aberdare).

Te area of the High Street in question (in the early 1900s). The Globe Inn can be seen at the far right. Photo courtesy of http://www.alangeorge.co.uk/index.htm

The late Mr D C Gunn first opened a business a few doors above. There were some I cannot recall, but not many doors above was the furniture shop of Mr J Davies, one of whose sons carries it on to this day. Dr John Martin resided close here. Then comes the Bush Hotel.

The Bush Hotel. Photo courtesy of http://www.alangeorge.co.uk/index.htm

The Bush Hotel was, as regards its frontage, then as now. Mr Thomas Davies was the host and Mrs Davies the hostess. Many a time Mr Davies could be seen resting or semi-sitting on one of the window sills. He had a pleasant, cheerful face, and a genial smile for everybody. His family consisted of two sons and three daughters, about whom I may possibly say more in another epistle. Next above the Bush was a china and ware shop opened by Mr Daniel Asprey, who afterwards moved higher up; then the Bristol and West of England Bank, of which Mr Walter Thompson was the manager for many years.

Next above was a ready made boot and shoe shop kept by Mrs Goodman. It was at this house Mr Steele, the first agent of the Marquis of Bute, who resided in Merthyr, lodged. A Mr Beaumont was probably the head mineral agent of the Marquis, but he resided about Llandaff somewhere. Mr W S Clark succeeded Mr Steele, and, to the best of my knowledge, Mr Beaumont gave up.

I cannot recall for what purpose the premises where the Merthyr Telegraph was printed were used, but I think they were occupied by a printer and bookbinder named David Jones. Mr Asprey moved into the adjoining shop, and some few doors above was Atkin Brother’s boot and shoe shop. It was here the late Mr George Overton (the coroner afterwards), practised as a solicitor, but this must have been in the forties.

Mr William Todd, who was for a long time cashier at the Hirwaun Works, and who opened a wine and spirit business at Bryant’s Old Brewery in Pontstorehouse, built a premises and carried on the business just here. Close to was Mr John James’s drapery establishment and Mr William Stephens’s druggist shop. There was a public house and then a chapel belonging to the Welsh Wesleyans, which was taken down to form an entrance into the railway station. I cannot recall the name of the public house nor that of one lower down near the Merthyr Telegraph premises, which I have not referred to.

To be continued at a later date….