Dandy Waggon - Horse Dandies

Horse Dandies

George Stephenson is credited for having proposed a solution: build special cars for the horses to ride in on the way down for use on the Stockton & Darlington Railway which was opened in 1825. With improvements in the track, the horses were becoming increasingly hard-pressed. By 1827 the Stockton and Darlington Railway was in difficulties with its unreliable steam locomotives, and was on the point of giving them up. They returned to using horse-drawn vehicles operated by independent contractors. Each horse was expected to haul some twelve-and-a-half tons of coal, making three round trips in six days. The work was exhausting for them and they soon became lame.

George Stephenson introduced the dandy wagon in 1828, which was simply a four-wheeled cart supplied with hay, attached to the rear of a four-chaldron train in which the horse could rest on the downhill sections. It was said that if the dandy wagon was missing the horse would try to jump onto the rearmost chaldron.

On the FR this gave the horses a chance to eat and rest on the way down, and after the slate cars were unloaded refreshed horses were available to haul the cars back to the top. On other railways the downhill horse haulage was generally shorter, occurring only along some areas of the track, but still allowed the horses a rest before going back to work.

According to the Traveller's Guide (Blue Cover) Wagon number 50, a 4- wheel Iron Horse Dandy, built at Boston Lodge c.1861 was still in existence and stored at the Ffestiniog Railway museum as of April 1992.

Other names for horse carrying cars are “dandy cart” and “dandy truck” they all refer to a vehicle on a horse worked railway that a horse pulls to the top of the hill and a horse rides down the hill in. The term “dandy cart” is also used to refer to horse drawn passenger trains on occasion.