Cornwall Railway - Floating The Company

Floating The Company

In the first half of the nineteenth century, Falmouth was an important landing station for shipping, and a number of schemes were developed for a railway connection from the town to London. These did not gain the financial support necessary to make progress, and in 1843 local businessmen W Tweedy and W H Bond approached the Great Western Railway (GWR) to try to induce them to fund an extension of the South Devon Railway (SDR), then only a planned railway, into Cornwall.

Direct assistance was refused, but they were encouraged to promote an independent scheme, and in the autumn of 1844 the prospectus of the Cornwall Railway was produced.

The line was to run from Plymouth crossing the Hamoaze near Torpoint, and within three-quarters of a mile of St Germans, and then via Liskeard, near Bodmin and Lostwithiel, then Par and St Austell to Truro and Falmouth. No reference was made to the means of crossing the Hamoaze, which is about 800 yards wide at that point

The company's capital was to be £900,000, of which the Great Western Railway, Bristol and Exeter Railway, Bristol and Gloucester Railway and South Devon Railway were to subscribe £250,000 together. Captain Moorsom was the Engineer.

The crossing of the Hamoaze was apparently to be by train ferry. There are references in the documentation of the time to a bridge, but this is evidently metaphorical as the Treasurer of the Torpoint Steam Ferry Company certified that "the present bridge has been in operation for ten years and has never on any occasion experienced interruption from the weather".

However when this proposal was put to Parliament, the House of Lords rejected it, and recommended that a more carefully planned scheme should be prepared, if possible avoiding the ferry across the Hamoaze.

Brunel was brought in as engineer, and he proposed a line with a bridge crossing the River Tamar about two miles above Torpoint, and with some slightly eased gradients in Cornwall, but otherwise generally following the same route. This new proposal got the Royal Assent on 3rd August 1846. The company was to have a capital of £1,600,000 of which about 15% was subscribed by the GWR, B&ER and SDR. It was to leave a junction with the South Devon company near its Plymouth station, to Falmouth, and it was to be of the broad gauge. It was to include a number of branches.