CHAPTER 1:
CONCEPTION
Brighton’s rise to prominence is a long and fascinating tale of social and
political influences and necessities. From the town’s humble start as a small
seaside fishing village to the enormous, internationally renown, twin centred
city it has become; Brighton has always held favour and interest for any visitor. There is
something for everyone here, from the austere to the extrovert, from laid-back
to laid bare, Brighton has it all.
Two
key events helped put Brighton (or Brighthelmstone as it was known
originally) on the map. The first of these was that a certain Dr. Richard
Russell set up his practice in the town in 1754 and extolled the virtues of the
seawater as having great medicinal properties, which popularised bathing and
therefore greatly increased tourism to the town.
The
second was that the Prince Regent (later George IV) heard of Dr. Russell’s work
and was recommended to “partake of the benefits of salt water bathing”. He quickly
fell in love with the town and commissioned the building of his grand home, The
Royal Pavilion, at the Old Steine in the town centre. That the town had gained
royal patronage was certainly a boost to the town and increased its status.
As
a highly fashionable and bohemian place to be seen, Brighton would have to adapt quickly
and proficiently to a huge increase in popularity over the next 250 years, but
could never have forseen the changes that would come about if the town was to
become more and more accessible to the curious traveller.
Back
in 1847, it would have taken 7 hours on a stagecoach from London to Brighton and many of the coach
companies competed for speed and custom. Many offered refunds if punctuality
was not achieved. As a result of this fierce competition, 15 horses employed on
a particular coach run died as a result of their exertions in the course of a
week and caused the authorities to step in.
By
1822 there were 60 stagecoaches a day between London and Brighton and the journey time had
decreased to between 5 and 6 hours. New roads en-route had straightened the
route and thus shortened the distance.
As
the town grew in both size and popularity, a regular ferry service was
established to Dieppe and was facilitated by the building of a large jetty or
“Pier“ into the sea to a sufficient depth for the steamer to dock. Until the
construction of the first of these, The Chain Pier, intending passengers were
transferred to the steamer by rowing boats.
It is suprising to note that plans were
actually inaugurated to construct a small harbour area to the east of the Chain
Pier with the harbour’s eastern arm attached to the pier itself. John Harman,
the then chairman of the LBSCR proposed that the board of directors assign 300
pounds to the project. This paid for 3 sections of the breakwater to be moored
to the pier. Sadly, the plan never took off. The 3 segments were towed to
Shoreham harbour, one section breaking away and ending up washed up on the
beach at Hove. In Later years when the Newhaven Railway was established, Newhaven
was developed as a main route to France. Sadly, Brighton would not have a harbour
until the construction of the Brighton Marina in 1978.
AS
the popularity of sea travel to France and beyond increased, so
did proposals for a rail link with London. The port of Shoreham some 6 miles west of Brighton was a natural harbour and
had established itself as a thriving ship-building centre. As a shingle bank
encompassed the port of Shoreham, there was an ever-present
problem with the build-up of silt and this caused the harbour to become totally
unusable for shipping.
Therefore,
in 1816, the harbour was improved and modified and also lead to proposals for a
rail link between the new facilities and Brighton.
In
1823 one William James made a very early proposal for a railway between London and the Sussex Coast. His idea was to connect London with the port at Shoreham, Rochester and Portsmouth. According to his
proposals, the Sussex branch would have
terminated just east of Shoreham (approximately at Southwick in modern times)
which would have been the eastern most end of the harbour at that time. Sadly,
Mr. James’s idea never came to fruition.
Two
years after Mr. James, a company under the heading of the Sussex, Surrey, Hants, Wilts and Somerset
Railway Company commissioned Mr. John Rennie to research and survey routes from
London to Brighton as part of the ambitious plans portrayed by
its title! The company did not survive but if it had, would surely have given
rise to a supreme rail network. It is interesting to note that one of the
routes proposed by Mr. Rennie was actually accepted as the preferred route of
the London to Brighton Railway.
By
1833, no less than 6 projects for the London to Brighton route were being considered
by Parliament. On 27th July 1835 the Brighton Vestry (the
town council of the time) resolved that the establishment of the London to Brighton route was of the utmost
importance and appointed a local committee to study the various proposals being
perused by parliament.
A
line proposed by Robert Stevenson, which ran via Henfield and Horsham, found
considerable favour at first, but was opposed by the powerful aristocratic
residents of Brunswick Square who objected on the grounds that the terminus
would have been too close to their homes. This is because Stevenson proposed to
build the terminus on Western Road, just opposite Waterloo Street and using the Brunswick area as a short
thoroughfare to the seafront. It is interesting to see that the phenomenon of
"NIMBY" existed even then. In present times, the Regency Association
has stalled more building projects than I would care to mention.
By
1836 favour had veered towards Mr. Rennie’s line as being the most direct
route. It would have terminated at a site near Park Crescent (The Level in modern
times). However, the Government was still heavily in favour of Stevenson’s
route and at a public meeting held on 18th June of that year to
petition Parliament to reconsider Rennie’s route before a Bill was passed. This
was largely due to Mr. Rennie’s scheme having made provision for branches to
Shoreham, Lewes and Newhaven whereas Stevenson’s scheme did not, as he
considered that such branches would fail to pay for the cost
of their operation. By now local opinion was starting to consider any station
at Brighton to be a railway centre
rather than merely a Terminus.
Arguments
for and against the 5 schemes and their various merits and pitfalls continued
for another 12 fruitless months. Back in Brighton things were
remarkably confused and the general consensus was that any line to London would be better than none
at all.
Eventually
a compromise was met and the Brighton Vestry proposed a plan, which adopted
Stevenson’s approach via Henfield but took the line through to Rennie’s site
for the terminus.
However,
while Brighton had appeared to make a
decision, Parliament had decided that all these arguments couldn’t continue
indefinitely and had appointed an engineer from the Ordinance Department to
produce a definitive report on the matter. The Vestry was alarmed by the
prospect of yet more delay but the Government engineer acted swiftly and to the
great relief of Brighton residents, gave his casting vote in favour of the “direct line”.
The
Direct line had more in depth civil engineering and constructional problems to
overcome than Mr. Stevenson’s route but provided better opportunities for the
provision of branch lines at convenient points, which would radiate east and
west into the majority of Sussex.
Finally,
to everyone’s great relief, the Engineer’s report was published in June 1837
and on 15th July of the same year, the Bill for the London &
Brighton Railway Company received Royal Assent.
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