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In 1840, one man transformed travel in the British Isles. | 0:00:05 | 0:00:10 | |
His name was George Bradshaw | 0:00:10 | 0:00:12 | |
and his railway guides inspired the Victorians to take to the tracks. | 0:00:12 | 0:00:16 | |
Stop by stop, he told them where to travel, | 0:00:18 | 0:00:21 | |
what to see and where to stay. | 0:00:21 | 0:00:23 | |
Now 170 years later, I'm making a series of journeys across the length | 0:00:25 | 0:00:30 | |
and breadth of these isles to see what of Bradshaw's Britain remains. | 0:00:30 | 0:00:34 | |
I'm now completing my journey from London to Newton Abbot | 0:01:00 | 0:01:03 | |
and I've arrived alongside the coastal beauty of what Bradshaw's | 0:01:03 | 0:01:07 | |
would call South Devonshire. | 0:01:07 | 0:01:09 | |
This was the scene of some of Isambard Kingdom Brunel's | 0:01:09 | 0:01:12 | |
greatest railway engineering successes and worst failures. | 0:01:12 | 0:01:17 | |
And both his triumphs and his disasters proved his genius. | 0:01:17 | 0:01:20 | |
Today I'll take to the sea with the heroes of the RNLI. | 0:01:22 | 0:01:25 | |
Couple of big waves coming now... | 0:01:25 | 0:01:28 | |
Here we go! Woo! | 0:01:28 | 0:01:30 | |
At the moment it feels a little bit like, I imagine, a jockey | 0:01:30 | 0:01:33 | |
in the Grand National, we're going up and down and over the fences. | 0:01:33 | 0:01:37 | |
'I'll visit a stormy coastal railway...' | 0:01:37 | 0:01:40 | |
When the waves hit this section, the plumes of water go right over | 0:01:40 | 0:01:44 | |
the top of the footbridge at the station. | 0:01:44 | 0:01:46 | |
'..and have a close, personal encounter with a boyhood hero.' | 0:01:48 | 0:01:52 | |
This is exciting, is this genuinely a section of Brunel's pipe? | 0:01:52 | 0:01:56 | |
It is indeed, yes. | 0:01:56 | 0:01:58 | |
Using my Bradshaw's Guide, I'm following the tracks | 0:01:58 | 0:02:01 | |
of Isambard Kingdom Brunel, | 0:02:01 | 0:02:03 | |
master engineer of the Great Western Railway. | 0:02:03 | 0:02:06 | |
I started at Paddington station, a monumental success, | 0:02:06 | 0:02:10 | |
and I'll finish in Newton Abbot in Devon, the scene of one of his | 0:02:10 | 0:02:13 | |
biggest disappointments. | 0:02:13 | 0:02:16 | |
The last leg of my journey begins in Exmouth, detours to Sidmouth, | 0:02:16 | 0:02:19 | |
then crosses the Exe estuary to Starcross, on to Dawlish | 0:02:19 | 0:02:24 | |
and finally, Newton Abbot. | 0:02:24 | 0:02:25 | |
My Bradshaw's says, "We have all have the romantic allurements | 0:02:33 | 0:02:36 | |
"of the watering places of the West, where we may find a fund of illimitable | 0:02:36 | 0:02:42 | |
"enjoyment in the rich bouquet that nature has spread before us | 0:02:42 | 0:02:46 | |
"on the freshening shores of Devon." | 0:02:46 | 0:02:50 | |
The Victorians could be pompous and verbose | 0:02:50 | 0:02:53 | |
but their appreciation of the beauties of Devon was sincere. | 0:02:53 | 0:02:57 | |
I'm on a line known locally as The Avocet, where a locomotive | 0:03:00 | 0:03:04 | |
first steamed the ten miles from Exeter to my first destination, | 0:03:04 | 0:03:07 | |
Exmouth, in 1861. | 0:03:07 | 0:03:09 | |
Once a small fishing village, Exmouth grew into an important port, | 0:03:11 | 0:03:15 | |
from which Sir Walter Raleigh launched many of his voyages. | 0:03:15 | 0:03:19 | |
The town became a very popular tourist destination | 0:03:20 | 0:03:23 | |
during the Georgian period and its two-mile long | 0:03:23 | 0:03:26 | |
promenade shows that it has remained so ever since. | 0:03:26 | 0:03:29 | |
# Oh, I do love to be beside the seaside... # | 0:03:31 | 0:03:34 | |
Already intoxicated by sea air! | 0:03:35 | 0:03:38 | |
Bradshaw's tells me that Exmouth has, "in its immediate | 0:03:40 | 0:03:43 | |
"neighbourhood a valley, sheltered on all sides from the winds, | 0:03:43 | 0:03:46 | |
"and capable of affording a genial retreat. Exmouth is | 0:03:46 | 0:03:50 | |
"a decidedly healthy place," | 0:03:50 | 0:03:52 | |
but the sea also brings its dangers | 0:03:52 | 0:03:56 | |
and Exmouth has had a lifeboat station for more than 200 years. | 0:03:56 | 0:04:00 | |
Over the course of two centuries, lifeboats have saved | 0:04:02 | 0:04:06 | |
the lives of over 139,000 people off the coasts of Britain. | 0:04:06 | 0:04:11 | |
They first patrolled the waters around South Shields in 1790. | 0:04:11 | 0:04:15 | |
Exmouth has had one since 1803 and half a century later, | 0:04:15 | 0:04:19 | |
the station joined The Royal National Lifeboat Institution. | 0:04:19 | 0:04:23 | |
Tim Mock is a full time mechanic and coxswain. | 0:04:23 | 0:04:27 | |
Tim, you've had a lifeboat at Exmouth | 0:04:27 | 0:04:29 | |
going all the way back to 1803. | 0:04:29 | 0:04:31 | |
Yes, that's correct, yes. A privately run life boat in those days. | 0:04:31 | 0:04:34 | |
And those lifeboats in those days - how would they have been powered? | 0:04:34 | 0:04:38 | |
Well, that was pulling and sailing boats, that's rowing and sails only. | 0:04:38 | 0:04:43 | |
What do you think of that? | 0:04:43 | 0:04:44 | |
Very hard work, I had a go at it in one of the old boats | 0:04:44 | 0:04:49 | |
and just found it impossible. | 0:04:49 | 0:04:51 | |
How they ever managed to | 0:04:51 | 0:04:52 | |
row for hours and hours on end, I really admire them for that. | 0:04:52 | 0:04:55 | |
Standing on the former slipway here is a reminder that, actually, | 0:04:55 | 0:04:58 | |
you could be called out at any time today. | 0:04:58 | 0:05:00 | |
That's a possibility, yes, | 0:05:00 | 0:05:02 | |
south-easterly winds here means the sea is quite rough - although | 0:05:02 | 0:05:07 | |
it's a nice sunny day, small boats can get in trouble at any time. | 0:05:07 | 0:05:10 | |
Do the people of Exmouth feel a strong connection with their lifeboat? | 0:05:10 | 0:05:13 | |
-Oh, definitely, yes. -Are they supportive? | 0:05:13 | 0:05:15 | |
Very much so, the lifeboat's always been a big part of the community | 0:05:15 | 0:05:19 | |
and for our side of things we need the community to operate | 0:05:19 | 0:05:22 | |
the service and, of course, going back to Victorian times, the bigger | 0:05:22 | 0:05:25 | |
boats were launched by hand only, so you'd need 40 or 50 men and | 0:05:25 | 0:05:29 | |
women to pull the boat down here out into the water. | 0:05:29 | 0:05:33 | |
I see your present station is 1903, so you're just post-Victorian. | 0:05:33 | 0:05:37 | |
A connection between lifeboats and railways? | 0:05:37 | 0:05:39 | |
Most definitely, boats would have been | 0:05:39 | 0:05:41 | |
delivered by the railways, spare parts... | 0:05:41 | 0:05:45 | |
and in latter years, tractors | 0:05:45 | 0:05:47 | |
and heavier bits of equipment would have all come by rail. | 0:05:47 | 0:05:51 | |
Sir William Hillary founded the National Institution | 0:05:51 | 0:05:54 | |
for the Preservation of Life from Shipwreck, in 1824. | 0:05:54 | 0:05:59 | |
Today almost 5,000 volunteers crew lifeboats, | 0:05:59 | 0:06:02 | |
and I've been invited aboard the Exmouth all-weather lifeboat | 0:06:02 | 0:06:06 | |
for a scheduled training exercise. | 0:06:06 | 0:06:08 | |
Luckily, the Royal National Lifeboat Institution | 0:06:08 | 0:06:11 | |
shares my taste in bright-coloured clothes. | 0:06:11 | 0:06:13 | |
Well, I have once before been out with the RNLI, | 0:06:19 | 0:06:22 | |
but that was in a small inflatable, this is a completely different | 0:06:22 | 0:06:25 | |
kettle of fish, this is a very substantial boat. | 0:06:25 | 0:06:28 | |
At the helm today is former Royal Marine, deputy coxswain Scott Ranft. | 0:06:42 | 0:06:48 | |
Well, it's quite surprising that on a warm | 0:06:48 | 0:06:50 | |
and sunny day there's quite a swell out here. | 0:06:50 | 0:06:53 | |
We've got a force five wind heading from an easterly direction | 0:06:53 | 0:06:57 | |
so it does pick up, especially in this channel as we come out | 0:06:57 | 0:07:00 | |
through, it specifically picks up because it's quite shallow. | 0:07:00 | 0:07:03 | |
There's a couple of big waves coming now... | 0:07:03 | 0:07:05 | |
There we go...whoa... | 0:07:05 | 0:07:07 | |
At the moment it feels a little bit like, I imagine, a jockey | 0:07:07 | 0:07:10 | |
in the Grand National, we're going up and down and over the fences. | 0:07:10 | 0:07:15 | |
That's right. | 0:07:15 | 0:07:17 | |
Roger Jackson, a crew member for the last 14 years, has taken the helm. | 0:07:21 | 0:07:25 | |
I've heard he was recently honoured for leading a particularly | 0:07:25 | 0:07:30 | |
hazardous rescue, manoeuvring the station's in-shore lifeboat | 0:07:30 | 0:07:33 | |
to retrieve four young men from very rough seas. | 0:07:33 | 0:07:37 | |
We had to get them one by one, climb and climb and climb, | 0:07:37 | 0:07:40 | |
dumping surf over the top, go back round and go in again, | 0:07:40 | 0:07:42 | |
and go in again four times. | 0:07:42 | 0:07:44 | |
What state were they in? | 0:07:44 | 0:07:46 | |
Absolutely hypothermic, really cold, really, really shocked, | 0:07:46 | 0:07:49 | |
and extremely pleased to see us. They were very lucky lads. | 0:07:49 | 0:07:53 | |
And you were given the Bronze Medal for Gallantry? | 0:07:53 | 0:07:56 | |
That's right, yes. Last week I actually went to London | 0:07:56 | 0:07:59 | |
and the Duke of Gloucester awarded it to me. | 0:07:59 | 0:08:02 | |
It was a very proud moment for myself, of course, | 0:08:02 | 0:08:04 | |
but also for Exmouth lifeboat station, as well. | 0:08:04 | 0:08:07 | |
I'd love to see it. | 0:08:07 | 0:08:09 | |
That is the actual medal there. | 0:08:09 | 0:08:12 | |
As you can see, that's Sir William Hillary, the founder of the RNLI. | 0:08:12 | 0:08:16 | |
How wonderful. | 0:08:16 | 0:08:18 | |
Would you like to have a drive? | 0:08:18 | 0:08:19 | |
I'd love to have a drive, thank you very much indeed. | 0:08:19 | 0:08:22 | |
If you want to come through... | 0:08:22 | 0:08:24 | |
OK. I've quite often been asked to take control of a steam engine. | 0:08:24 | 0:08:28 | |
I think I feel more control of this than I do when it's a locomotive. | 0:08:28 | 0:08:33 | |
How's that, Michael? | 0:08:33 | 0:08:34 | |
Well, it's just a great honour to be steering this vessel | 0:08:34 | 0:08:37 | |
standing next to a hero. | 0:08:37 | 0:08:38 | |
I don't know about that. | 0:08:39 | 0:08:42 | |
I'm travelling by road to my next destination. | 0:08:45 | 0:08:49 | |
Sidmouth didn't have a railway when my guide was written and the | 0:08:49 | 0:08:52 | |
line that opened in the 1870s fell to the Beeching cuts of the 1960s. | 0:08:52 | 0:08:57 | |
I'm intrigued to know why railway-less Sidmouth, | 0:09:01 | 0:09:04 | |
which my Bradshaw's describes as, "Nestled at the bottom | 0:09:04 | 0:09:07 | |
"of a valley between lofty hills, 500 feet high," | 0:09:07 | 0:09:11 | |
was deemed important enough for an entry covering almost a whole page. | 0:09:11 | 0:09:15 | |
This range of cliffs, according to my guidebook has been | 0:09:21 | 0:09:24 | |
"the theatre of convulsions or landslips. | 0:09:24 | 0:09:28 | |
"One commencing on Christmas Day, 1839, whereby 45 acres of arable | 0:09:28 | 0:09:33 | |
"land were lost." | 0:09:33 | 0:09:36 | |
The beach is now fenced to the public, | 0:09:36 | 0:09:39 | |
so landslips are not a thing of the past, and this | 0:09:39 | 0:09:41 | |
so-called Jurassic Coast is of interest to geologists today. | 0:09:41 | 0:09:45 | |
Sidmouth's cliffs are particularly | 0:09:48 | 0:09:51 | |
important because they occasionally yield fossils of rare | 0:09:51 | 0:09:54 | |
pre-historic amphibians and reptiles. | 0:09:54 | 0:09:57 | |
Earth Science manager, Richard Edmonds, is | 0:09:57 | 0:10:00 | |
responsible for protecting this world heritage site. | 0:10:00 | 0:10:04 | |
-Richard, hello. -Hello, Michael, nice to meet you. | 0:10:04 | 0:10:06 | |
Apparently, for centuries, these cliffs have been tumbling down? | 0:10:06 | 0:10:09 | |
Well, that's right ,they're actually 230 million years old, | 0:10:09 | 0:10:13 | |
but the natural recession rate is about five metres a century. | 0:10:13 | 0:10:18 | |
But my Bradshaw's tells me that on one occasion there was a landslip | 0:10:18 | 0:10:21 | |
where 45 acres of farming land were lost, | 0:10:21 | 0:10:24 | |
so that has been going on a long time. | 0:10:24 | 0:10:25 | |
Yes, but landslides are a different process. | 0:10:25 | 0:10:27 | |
Landslides tend to be an enormous great, sort of, rending of the earth. | 0:10:27 | 0:10:31 | |
What we're seeing here is more cliff fall caused by the sea | 0:10:31 | 0:10:35 | |
undercutting the base of the cliffs. | 0:10:35 | 0:10:36 | |
In the 19th century did they take steps to slow down the erosion? | 0:10:36 | 0:10:40 | |
Well, to start with, Sidmouth was | 0:10:40 | 0:10:42 | |
built on the back of a vast shingle spit, | 0:10:42 | 0:10:45 | |
so it was a very healthy beach, | 0:10:45 | 0:10:46 | |
the waves could hit the beach and be soaked up, the energy, | 0:10:46 | 0:10:49 | |
but in the 1830s, after big storms, they started to construct | 0:10:49 | 0:10:54 | |
sea defences and those have just become bigger and bigger and bigger. | 0:10:54 | 0:10:59 | |
In the 1920s, a great gale breached the sea wall | 0:10:59 | 0:11:03 | |
and wrought havoc along much of Sidmouth's esplanade, | 0:11:03 | 0:11:06 | |
so the town built a new, higher wall at the then hefty cost of £100,000. | 0:11:06 | 0:11:12 | |
But in Bradshaw's day, | 0:11:12 | 0:11:13 | |
railway builders weren't put off by high seas and eroding cliffs. | 0:11:13 | 0:11:19 | |
I believe the Victorians tried to put a railway in here? | 0:11:19 | 0:11:21 | |
Yes, that's right, the plan was to build a harbour on the western | 0:11:21 | 0:11:24 | |
side of Sidmouth at Ship Rocks and use Salcombe stone which | 0:11:24 | 0:11:28 | |
comes from a village just a couple of miles this way. | 0:11:28 | 0:11:31 | |
The plan was apparently to quarry the stone and then transport | 0:11:31 | 0:11:34 | |
it in a railway in a tunnel running parallel to the back of the cliff. | 0:11:34 | 0:11:37 | |
And what happened to that plan? | 0:11:37 | 0:11:39 | |
The railway engine they bought didn't fit in the tunnel | 0:11:39 | 0:11:41 | |
and the company went bust. | 0:11:41 | 0:11:43 | |
-That can't be true, can it? -It is. | 0:11:43 | 0:11:44 | |
So, they at least got as far as making the tunnel? | 0:11:44 | 0:11:46 | |
That's right, you can still see the tunnel sticking out of the cliff, | 0:11:46 | 0:11:49 | |
but what's happened since then is the erosion has come through | 0:11:49 | 0:11:52 | |
and actually eaten away and destroyed the tunnel. | 0:11:52 | 0:11:54 | |
The entrance was literally just here at Pennington Point and in | 0:11:54 | 0:11:57 | |
the last 20 years the cliffs have receded and it's been lost. | 0:11:57 | 0:12:00 | |
So the tunnel added to the difficulties of the cliff? | 0:12:00 | 0:12:02 | |
Well, it's done its damage, yes, the cliff has got to the point | 0:12:02 | 0:12:05 | |
where it reached the tunnel, | 0:12:05 | 0:12:07 | |
and suddenly there's this increase in erosion. | 0:12:07 | 0:12:09 | |
That's likely to be one of the reasons why we've had this very | 0:12:09 | 0:12:12 | |
marked increase in erosion over the last years. | 0:12:12 | 0:12:15 | |
Hopefully now the tunnel's gone | 0:12:15 | 0:12:17 | |
and the sea is coming back into the solid geology, | 0:12:17 | 0:12:19 | |
we should see it slow down. | 0:12:19 | 0:12:21 | |
Richard, thank you very much, I must slip away. Bye-bye. | 0:12:21 | 0:12:24 | |
Back to Exmouth now to take not a train, but a short boat ride, | 0:12:29 | 0:12:33 | |
that will deliver me to the exact spot I'm aiming for. | 0:12:33 | 0:12:38 | |
PA ANNOUNCEMENT: "...on the ferry to Starcross. | 0:12:38 | 0:12:41 | |
I'm on the ferry crossing the mouth of the River Exe to Starcross, | 0:12:48 | 0:12:52 | |
a small place with a big chunk of railway history. | 0:12:52 | 0:12:56 | |
And I think I can see a relic of it coming into view now. | 0:12:56 | 0:12:59 | |
The final three destinations of my journey all played a pivotal | 0:13:02 | 0:13:06 | |
role in Isambard Kingdom Brunel's greatest railway failure - | 0:13:06 | 0:13:10 | |
his atmospheric railway, | 0:13:10 | 0:13:12 | |
where trains were not hauled by steam locomotive but forced | 0:13:12 | 0:13:16 | |
forward by atmospheric pressure, running through a pipe on the track. | 0:13:16 | 0:13:20 | |
Starcross is first. | 0:13:21 | 0:13:22 | |
This is a pumping station that was used on Brunel's atmospheric | 0:13:23 | 0:13:27 | |
railway, there's a pub dedicated to the history of that line | 0:13:27 | 0:13:31 | |
and after a long day I've earned myself a drink there. | 0:13:31 | 0:13:34 | |
-Good evening. -Good evening. | 0:13:43 | 0:13:46 | |
-Could I have a half a lager, please? -You sure can. | 0:13:46 | 0:13:48 | |
I see you're called The Atmospheric Railway, | 0:13:48 | 0:13:50 | |
are you quite an admirer of Brunel, are you? | 0:13:50 | 0:13:52 | |
I sure am, I think he's one of the greatest engineers we've ever had. | 0:13:52 | 0:13:55 | |
Why are you such an admirer? | 0:13:55 | 0:13:57 | |
Well, he just wasn't one particular item, was it, I mean | 0:13:57 | 0:14:02 | |
he built bridges, tunnels, boats, he was just an all-round great engineer. | 0:14:02 | 0:14:08 | |
Well, then, the toast is - Isambard Kingdom Brunel. | 0:14:08 | 0:14:12 | |
Isambard Kingdom Brunel. | 0:14:12 | 0:14:14 | |
-Cheers. -Cheers. | 0:14:14 | 0:14:16 | |
After a day's travelling, it's a night cap and early to bed for me. | 0:14:16 | 0:14:20 | |
As a boy, I marvelled at the life of Brunel. | 0:14:25 | 0:14:28 | |
Even though the atmospheric railway was ultimately a failure, | 0:14:28 | 0:14:31 | |
I'm keen to find out more about it. | 0:14:31 | 0:14:34 | |
At my next destination, Dawlish, the line had a station. | 0:14:34 | 0:14:37 | |
I'm on the Exeter to Paignton branch line this morning. | 0:14:43 | 0:14:47 | |
Before trains reached the south Devon coast, Brunel's | 0:14:47 | 0:14:50 | |
challenge was to lay track over very hilly and sharply curving terrain. | 0:14:50 | 0:14:55 | |
The trains are now powered by diesel, | 0:14:55 | 0:14:57 | |
but the route is almost the same as in Bradshaw's day. | 0:14:57 | 0:15:01 | |
The result is one of the most thrilling | 0:15:01 | 0:15:03 | |
stretches of track in England. | 0:15:03 | 0:15:05 | |
My Bradshaw's is understandably excited about this | 0:15:07 | 0:15:10 | |
part of the journey. | 0:15:10 | 0:15:11 | |
"The magnificent scenery which opens on each side as we proceed. | 0:15:11 | 0:15:16 | |
"There is scarcely a mile traversed which does not unfold some | 0:15:16 | 0:15:19 | |
"peculiar picturesque charm, or new feature of its own to make | 0:15:19 | 0:15:23 | |
"the eye dazzled and drunk with beauty," | 0:15:23 | 0:15:27 | |
and for me there's the additional interest that we're travelling | 0:15:27 | 0:15:30 | |
on tracks that were once part of Brunel's doomed atmospheric railway. | 0:15:30 | 0:15:34 | |
In 1044, King Edward the Confessor, | 0:15:49 | 0:15:51 | |
granted the parish of Dawlish to | 0:15:51 | 0:15:54 | |
his chancellor and chaplain, Leofric. | 0:15:54 | 0:15:57 | |
Salt-making, fishing and agriculture were the town's mainstay, | 0:15:57 | 0:16:03 | |
until the 18th century penchant for taking the sea air | 0:16:03 | 0:16:06 | |
and bathing, attracted the aristocratic set. | 0:16:06 | 0:16:08 | |
But when the South Devon Railway arrived in the 1840s, the town | 0:16:14 | 0:16:16 | |
was opened to everyone. | 0:16:16 | 0:16:19 | |
Here at Dawlish, the station is built between the beach and the | 0:16:21 | 0:16:26 | |
town, making this one of the most dramatic stretches of railway in | 0:16:26 | 0:16:30 | |
England, and that's not just because of the views from the trains. | 0:16:30 | 0:16:34 | |
In 1844, Brunel started building a sea wall to protect the line | 0:16:37 | 0:16:42 | |
standing just a few yards from the foaming brine, | 0:16:42 | 0:16:45 | |
but the elements were unkind to his coastal railway. | 0:16:45 | 0:16:49 | |
Heavy rain would cause rock falls, breaching its defences, | 0:16:49 | 0:16:52 | |
and even now the salty sea spray that billows up | 0:16:52 | 0:16:56 | |
and over on rough days can affect the operation of the railway. | 0:16:56 | 0:17:00 | |
John Wilkinson has lived here all his life. | 0:17:00 | 0:17:03 | |
John... | 0:17:03 | 0:17:04 | |
-hello. -Morning, Michael. | 0:17:04 | 0:17:07 | |
There's a bit of spray coming over the wall this morning, but I've | 0:17:07 | 0:17:09 | |
been on trains and seen it far worse than this, how bad does it get? | 0:17:09 | 0:17:13 | |
It gets very bad, on a bad day you wouldn't possibly be able to | 0:17:13 | 0:17:16 | |
walk along this wall, when the waves hit this section the plumes of water | 0:17:16 | 0:17:20 | |
go high in the air and actually get blown over onto Marine Parade, | 0:17:20 | 0:17:24 | |
and just to give you some idea of the height, the actual plumes | 0:17:24 | 0:17:27 | |
of water go right over the top of the footbridge at the station. | 0:17:27 | 0:17:30 | |
And what effect does that have on the functioning of the railway? | 0:17:30 | 0:17:33 | |
It does have effect on some of the train services, | 0:17:33 | 0:17:36 | |
because when the plumes of water go high in the air it actually | 0:17:36 | 0:17:40 | |
lands on the top of the trains and gets into the exhaust | 0:17:40 | 0:17:44 | |
and into the electronic systems on the top. | 0:17:44 | 0:17:46 | |
And historically it's interrupted services from time to time. | 0:17:46 | 0:17:49 | |
It has... indeed, but when you consider the length of time | 0:17:49 | 0:17:53 | |
it's been here I think the interruptions are not too serious, | 0:17:53 | 0:17:57 | |
and any form of transport is subject to adverse weather. | 0:17:57 | 0:18:01 | |
It's one of the great rides in England, isn't it? | 0:18:01 | 0:18:03 | |
I think so, yes. It's got to be in the top ten, if not... | 0:18:03 | 0:18:06 | |
A green tea, please. | 0:18:12 | 0:18:13 | |
So where would you rank this amongst English train journeys? | 0:18:13 | 0:18:16 | |
Number one! | 0:18:16 | 0:18:18 | |
It's a beautiful piece of coastline, isn't it? | 0:18:18 | 0:18:20 | |
It's a gorgeous piece of coastline, yes. | 0:18:20 | 0:18:22 | |
Certainly the most picturesque, most exciting railway line in the country. | 0:18:22 | 0:18:25 | |
You've got one of the best views of a railway | 0:18:25 | 0:18:27 | |
anywhere in Britain, I should think. | 0:18:27 | 0:18:29 | |
Do you like watching trains go by? | 0:18:29 | 0:18:30 | |
We do, yeah. | 0:18:30 | 0:18:32 | |
-Hello. -Hello. | 0:18:37 | 0:18:39 | |
Have you been here before? | 0:18:39 | 0:18:40 | |
Yes, I used to come down here when I was a baby. | 0:18:40 | 0:18:43 | |
Did you come on the train? | 0:18:43 | 0:18:45 | |
No, not on the train... | 0:18:45 | 0:18:46 | |
Ha-ha, that's a pity. | 0:18:46 | 0:18:48 | |
We used to wave at the trains! | 0:18:48 | 0:18:50 | |
So, you've brought your kids here now? | 0:18:50 | 0:18:51 | |
My kids are here now. | 0:18:51 | 0:18:52 | |
Are they waving at the trains? | 0:18:52 | 0:18:54 | |
Yes, they love seeing the trains go past. | 0:18:54 | 0:18:56 | |
Do you know who built this railway line? | 0:18:56 | 0:18:58 | |
I don't know who built this railway line, actually, no. | 0:18:58 | 0:19:01 | |
Isambard... | 0:19:01 | 0:19:02 | |
Kingdom Brunel... | 0:19:02 | 0:19:04 | |
and my son is named Noah Isambard after Brunel. | 0:19:04 | 0:19:10 | |
Wow, you are admirers of Brunel. | 0:19:10 | 0:19:13 | |
Yes, I'm an engineer, I think his work is fantastic. | 0:19:13 | 0:19:17 | |
-Such a pleasure to talk to you, thank you very much. -Thank you. | 0:19:17 | 0:19:19 | |
Bye-bye, enjoy your day. | 0:19:19 | 0:19:22 | |
With its track skirting the shore and with the sea pounding its | 0:19:30 | 0:19:33 | |
platforms and its footbridge, | 0:19:33 | 0:19:35 | |
there's no doubt that Dawlish is Brunellish. | 0:19:35 | 0:19:39 | |
The last nine miles of my current journey is an exciting | 0:19:44 | 0:19:48 | |
quarter-of-an-hour ride along the coastal line that Brunel | 0:19:48 | 0:19:51 | |
built for his hapless atmospheric railway, because even though | 0:19:51 | 0:19:55 | |
the technology failed, the route has remained in use for over 150 years. | 0:19:55 | 0:20:01 | |
In the past, my Bradshaw's guide has directed me to places described as | 0:20:03 | 0:20:07 | |
the Switzerland or the Athens or the Paris of the British Isles. | 0:20:07 | 0:20:13 | |
Now I'm headed for Newton Abbot, | 0:20:13 | 0:20:15 | |
dubbed The Swindon of the South West. | 0:20:15 | 0:20:18 | |
In Bradshaw's day, the station was called Newton Junction. | 0:20:25 | 0:20:29 | |
What became the South-West's Victorian rail hub was, | 0:20:29 | 0:20:33 | |
in the 17th century, the small market town of Newton Abbots, | 0:20:33 | 0:20:37 | |
an unlikely spot to shape the history of Britain. | 0:20:37 | 0:20:40 | |
Felicity Cole is the town museum's curator. | 0:20:40 | 0:20:43 | |
I think we've come across something else mentioned in my Bradshaw's, | 0:20:43 | 0:20:46 | |
regarding the declaration that was made | 0:20:46 | 0:20:48 | |
when William of Orange landed in Britain in 1688. | 0:20:48 | 0:20:52 | |
Tell me about that. | 0:20:52 | 0:20:53 | |
Well, William of Orange made his declaration, or his intent to | 0:20:53 | 0:20:58 | |
become king of England in 1688, | 0:20:58 | 0:21:02 | |
so a very politically-charged moment. | 0:21:02 | 0:21:05 | |
There were 30,000 troops that | 0:21:05 | 0:21:07 | |
came through the town that day, | 0:21:07 | 0:21:09 | |
and an extraordinary scene of things like Finlanders dressed | 0:21:09 | 0:21:14 | |
in bearskins, Spanish mercenaries with damseamed armour, but hundreds | 0:21:14 | 0:21:18 | |
of them processing through the town, so presumably anybody who had | 0:21:18 | 0:21:22 | |
said, "Well, we don't want that," would have got fairly well squashed | 0:21:22 | 0:21:25 | |
by the army. | 0:21:25 | 0:21:27 | |
Fundamentally, this was a Protestant rebellion | 0:21:27 | 0:21:29 | |
against a Catholic King which is why it says here, William III, | 0:21:29 | 0:21:33 | |
Prince of Orange, the glorious defender of the Protestant religion. | 0:21:33 | 0:21:36 | |
Indeed. | 0:21:36 | 0:21:37 | |
I've really come in pursuit of the town's railway history, | 0:21:37 | 0:21:40 | |
may we have a look at that, please? | 0:21:40 | 0:21:42 | |
Absolutely. | 0:21:42 | 0:21:43 | |
In 1892, The Great Western Railway built a new engine shed, workshops, | 0:21:45 | 0:21:50 | |
locomotive bays and a factory fashioned on their Swindon works. | 0:21:50 | 0:21:55 | |
The expansion in Newton Abbot meant that workers needed to be | 0:21:55 | 0:21:58 | |
housed, and whole streets were built for the purpose. | 0:21:58 | 0:22:02 | |
Here we are in a street that is really full of railway houses, | 0:22:02 | 0:22:07 | |
and where the railwaymen would have lived, and here is | 0:22:07 | 0:22:09 | |
David Grills who is one of those railwaymen that lived in the area. | 0:22:09 | 0:22:12 | |
-Hello, David. -Pleased to meet you. | 0:22:12 | 0:22:14 | |
Were these all occupied by railwaymen in your day? | 0:22:14 | 0:22:17 | |
More or less, yes. | 0:22:17 | 0:22:18 | |
There were at one time 49 railwaymen in this one street, | 0:22:18 | 0:22:22 | |
and that ranged from wheel tappers to guards, goods guards, | 0:22:22 | 0:22:28 | |
passenger guards, enginemen, boilermen | 0:22:28 | 0:22:32 | |
and people who worked in the factory, so there was quite an extensive | 0:22:32 | 0:22:35 | |
mix right the way throughout all these terraces. | 0:22:35 | 0:22:39 | |
Did Newton Abbot deserve the title of the Swindon of the South West? | 0:22:39 | 0:22:42 | |
It indeed did, it was little Swindon, without a doubt. | 0:22:42 | 0:22:47 | |
At times, I can remember when I started as a young lad, | 0:22:47 | 0:22:52 | |
there were at least somewhere in the region of a thousand plus men | 0:22:52 | 0:22:56 | |
employed at Newton Abbot. We boasted at one time nine | 0:22:56 | 0:23:00 | |
working platforms, and the main platform was at least | 0:23:00 | 0:23:04 | |
a quarter of a mile long, and during the busy season we would entertain | 0:23:04 | 0:23:10 | |
something in the region of 350 trains in one weekend. | 0:23:10 | 0:23:14 | |
What was your job with the railways? | 0:23:14 | 0:23:16 | |
I was a passenger coach shunter, rather a dirty job, wet, | 0:23:16 | 0:23:19 | |
miserable and if you notice on most coaching stock, all the drain pipes | 0:23:19 | 0:23:24 | |
run down onto the back of the poor shunter who | 0:23:24 | 0:23:26 | |
is in the middle, coupling coaches up, so I used to get very wet, | 0:23:26 | 0:23:30 | |
but very dirty, but the money was good | 0:23:30 | 0:23:33 | |
They sound like good old days. | 0:23:33 | 0:23:35 | |
They were indeed good old days. I confess to going to | 0:23:35 | 0:23:37 | |
work as a small lad where I wore a peaked hat, | 0:23:37 | 0:23:42 | |
I polished the peak and I also polished the buttons | 0:23:42 | 0:23:45 | |
on the front of my jacket, I was so proud to be a railman. | 0:23:45 | 0:23:50 | |
GWR - God's Wonderful Railway. | 0:23:50 | 0:23:53 | |
-I'm very proud to have met you, David... -And you, too. | 0:23:53 | 0:23:57 | |
Thank you, sir, very much indeed. | 0:23:57 | 0:23:58 | |
All the best, bye-bye. | 0:23:58 | 0:24:01 | |
It was Brunel's atmospheric railway that first ran to Newton Abbot. | 0:24:01 | 0:24:06 | |
Patented in 1839 by Samuel Clegg and the Samuda Brothers, | 0:24:06 | 0:24:11 | |
the system that ran on atmospheric pressure was | 0:24:11 | 0:24:13 | |
first employed on a Dublin line in 1844, where Brunel investigated it | 0:24:13 | 0:24:19 | |
and became convinced it was viable, and even preferable to steam power. | 0:24:19 | 0:24:23 | |
I'm hoping to find out more at Felicity's museum. | 0:24:25 | 0:24:28 | |
So, Felicity, can you explain to me how the atmospheric railway worked? | 0:24:30 | 0:24:34 | |
Well, the first question I could ask you is - | 0:24:34 | 0:24:37 | |
what do you notice about looking at this model? | 0:24:37 | 0:24:40 | |
No locomotive, and obviously a large | 0:24:40 | 0:24:42 | |
pipe running down the centre of the railway track. | 0:24:42 | 0:24:45 | |
And we've also got a pumping house or engine house here, | 0:24:45 | 0:24:48 | |
so what the pumping station is actually doing is evacuating | 0:24:48 | 0:24:51 | |
the air in front of the carriage in the pipe, | 0:24:51 | 0:24:55 | |
and then pressure is building up in the pipe behind the carriage | 0:24:55 | 0:24:58 | |
which pushes the whole thing along. | 0:24:58 | 0:25:01 | |
So you have a train that doesn't produce any smoke or any steam, | 0:25:01 | 0:25:05 | |
not very much noise, I imagine. It's extraordinary... | 0:25:05 | 0:25:09 | |
In fact, the passengers that travelled on it loved it, | 0:25:09 | 0:25:11 | |
and used to comment that it was swift, silent and smokeless, | 0:25:11 | 0:25:16 | |
and so despite all the things that did go wrong with it... | 0:25:16 | 0:25:20 | |
erm, people were very sad when it went. | 0:25:20 | 0:25:23 | |
The atmospheric railway caused great controversy. | 0:25:24 | 0:25:28 | |
Brunel's rival, Robert Stevenson, | 0:25:28 | 0:25:31 | |
claimed the atmospheric system would be expensive and less | 0:25:31 | 0:25:34 | |
reliable, compared to the steam locomotive he'd helped to invent. | 0:25:34 | 0:25:39 | |
Brunel refused to heed Stevenson's prophetic warning. | 0:25:39 | 0:25:43 | |
This is exciting. Is this genuinely a section of Brunel's pipe? | 0:25:45 | 0:25:48 | |
It is indeed, yes. | 0:25:48 | 0:25:50 | |
The piston would be travelling along inside this pipe, | 0:25:50 | 0:25:53 | |
which had been evacuated of air by the pumping house and as a | 0:25:53 | 0:25:58 | |
leather flap attached here was raised, | 0:25:58 | 0:26:02 | |
the air would come in behind the piston, | 0:26:02 | 0:26:06 | |
and creating the atmospheric pressure | 0:26:06 | 0:26:08 | |
to push the carriage forward, but then the problem would be the | 0:26:08 | 0:26:11 | |
flap had to return to its place and make a seal, | 0:26:11 | 0:26:15 | |
ready for the next train. | 0:26:15 | 0:26:18 | |
Although the technology had advantages, | 0:26:18 | 0:26:21 | |
it faced two major problems. | 0:26:21 | 0:26:23 | |
Its air pipes corroded in the salty sea air | 0:26:23 | 0:26:26 | |
and animal fat had to be manually applied to stop the leather seals from cracking. | 0:26:26 | 0:26:31 | |
Local legend has it that rats ate through the seals | 0:26:31 | 0:26:35 | |
and caused the line's closure, but it was the cost of upkeep which, | 0:26:35 | 0:26:39 | |
after eight months, finally did for it. | 0:26:39 | 0:26:42 | |
Undaunted, Brunel went on to engineer the ship, SS Great Eastern, | 0:26:43 | 0:26:48 | |
Paddington Station and the | 0:26:48 | 0:26:50 | |
magnificent Royal Albert Bridge in Cornwall | 0:26:50 | 0:26:52 | |
before he died at the age of just 53. | 0:26:52 | 0:26:55 | |
Well, his qualities certainly made him my boyhood hero, | 0:26:57 | 0:27:01 | |
and he's the hero of many people still living today who remember | 0:27:01 | 0:27:04 | |
the fantastic achievements of Isambard Kingdom Brunel. | 0:27:04 | 0:27:07 | |
Indeed. | 0:27:07 | 0:27:09 | |
My railway journey from London Paddington to Newton Abbot | 0:27:14 | 0:27:18 | |
has taken me past some of southern England's most beautiful buildings | 0:27:18 | 0:27:22 | |
and finest views. | 0:27:22 | 0:27:23 | |
My guidebook has opened my eyes to key events | 0:27:23 | 0:27:27 | |
and sights in our island history. | 0:27:27 | 0:27:29 | |
Where George Bradshaw has guided my tracks, | 0:27:29 | 0:27:32 | |
Isambard Kingdom Brunel built the tracks. | 0:27:32 | 0:27:35 | |
Standing here above his Great Western Railway, | 0:27:35 | 0:27:38 | |
I seriously doubt whether a finer civil engineer ever existed. | 0:27:38 | 0:27:43 | |
On my next journey, my Bradshaw's will lead me | 0:27:53 | 0:27:56 | |
across the Irish Sea, tracing 19th century tracks from Kerry | 0:27:56 | 0:27:59 | |
to Galway, landscapes shot to fame by Queen Victoria. | 0:27:59 | 0:28:05 | |
-If it was good enough for the Royal Family, it was good enough for everyone? -Correct. | 0:28:05 | 0:28:08 | |
'I'll visit the Irish National Stud, | 0:28:08 | 0:28:11 | |
and find myself bucked....' | 0:28:11 | 0:28:12 | |
Oh, the horse is going very fast now. | 0:28:12 | 0:28:14 | |
Absolutely exhausting! | 0:28:14 | 0:28:17 | |
'..and hear Irish history, preserved in song.' | 0:28:17 | 0:28:20 | |
# Oh, there is a land... | 0:28:20 | 0:28:22 | |
# far away. # | 0:28:22 | 0:28:26 | |
Well done, Michael. | 0:28:26 | 0:28:28 | |
Ooooooh! | 0:28:28 | 0:28:30 | |
Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd | 0:28:51 | 0:28:54 |