The Sun.
London, England, 1863-09-19 00:00:00

GREAT WESTERN.

The half-yearly meeting of the amalgamated
coinpanies was held yesterday at the Paddington
Station ; Mr. R. Potter, the chairman, presided.
Mr. C. A. Saunders, the Secretary, having read
the notice convening the meeting, the report was
taken as read.
The CHAIRMAN, in moving the adoption of the
report, said he was happy on that occasion to meet
so full an assembly of shareholders. This was the
first meeting of the company since the passing of
the Amalgamation Act of last session, an act which
had absorbed the two separate companies—the West
Midland and the South Wales. The ordinary capi-
tal of the Great Western Railway Company now
exceeded £41,000,000, and the amount of line in
operation was 1,100 miles. The first act was passed
for making a railway from Bristol to join the Lon-
don and Birmingham Railway near London in the
year 1835, with a share capital of £2,500,000, and
a debenture capital of £835,000, making a total
capital of £3,300,000. The line was opened in the
year 1840, and in the course of two or three years
became, like all the other great railway trunk con-
cerns io this country, a decided success. Dividends
were paid in this company of 8 per cent., and in
other companies of 10, 12, and even 14 per cent.
The consequence of that was a great rush of capital
into the construction of new railways. In the ses-
sions of 1845 and 1846 there was a general attempt
all over England enormously to extend the railway
communication of the country. It would have been
quite impossible for the directors of any of the large
undertakings at that time to act upon the policy
which they were now prepared to act—a policy of
rest, because, if they had so acted, he had no doubt
that in the case of the Great Western system of rail-
ways there would have been two or three distinct
trunk lines promoted between the West of England
and London, and. in all probability they would have
been made. At that time he was a shareholder in
this company, and if they referred to a railway
map of the autumn of 1846 they would find that
the Great Western Railway Company as it cane
out of Parliament in that year was very much the
same concern as it was that day. The Oxford,
'rorcester, and Wolverhamton Railway Act had
een passed in the previous session. The South
Wales Railway Act had been passed in the pre-
-vicus session in a more extended form even than it
now assumed, because there was a large branch of
that railway from Newport to Hereford which very
much corresponded with the present Newport sec-
tion of the West Midland Railway. And, with the
exception of the Shrewsbury lines and one or two
small branches, the Great Western of 1846 was, to
all intents and purposes, the identical
,concern
.that
it now was in September, 1863. During .h. e period
.
that had elapsed from 1846 to 1863, a period
.of 1/
years, t' growth of the Great Western Railway
fll3
had been solid, but somewhat. over rapid; and it
was, in mint of fact, the rapidity with which these
extensions had been made which was at the bot-
tom of the depreciation of their ordinary stock. The
present year was a period of consolidation and rest.
Ile believed the word " rest" originated with his
friend Mr. Brown, but it would have been impos-
sible to act upon it had it rot been for the amalga-
mation which had been consummated in this ses-
sion. It was the amalgamation especially with
the West Midland Railway Company, which
enabled them to form agreements with the London
and North Western and the Midland, which made
the policy of rest safe and solid for the future. They
did not mean by "rest" stagnation, but they meant
that the great railway companies of this country
would no longer allow themselves to be played one
against the other, in making lines which in them-
selves were not remunerative, and floating those
lines on the railway companies whose district they
intersected, There was ample rcom for legitimate
railway construction in this country, but they wore
all agreed upon this, that the ordinary shareholders
in such railway must b.; paid at the risk of those
capitalists who associated themselves together,
and not at the cost of established companies. (Hear,
hear.) The policy of rest upon which they were act-
ing was a policy eminently beneficial to the public,
because those agreements would give to the public a
complete interchangeofpassengersandgoods through
trUMC. 0-.cr 1,11 11.4 c. no rauca rrLirlr 11Acj utiliaca rva law
public benefit, and when they brought icto full ope-
ration the agreements which they had formed with
their neighbours the public would admit that great
convenience had resulted from that policy. The
board of the Great Western Railway was a recon-
structed board, and consisted of 28 members, to be
reduced ultimately to 24. Of the present directors
of the Great Western Railway there was only one
gentleman who was a director in the session of 1815
and 1846 ; there were only two gentlemen who were
directors in 1849, the period at which the first mis-
fortunes fell upon the ordinary shareholders of the
company, and when they first began to realise the
results of the over-excitement of 1845 and 1846 ; and
there were out of the 28 present directors, including
many recent additions to the board, only 12 of those
who bad sat even for two or three years. The re

mainder of the directors had either been recently sen

to the board by the shareholders, or been added to
the boird by the amalgamation. There was an ab•

soluteidentity of interest between the ordinary share-
holders of the Great Western Railway and the ordi-

nary shareholders of the South \Vales and the Wes

Midland. The proprietor of 1.:5,000 or £lO,OOO of the

ordinary stock of the West Midland was to all intents
and purposes as much interested in the (raffle of the

whole concern as the ordinary proprietor of Great
"Western stock. It was very important that they
should all feel that they had an absolute identity of
interest ; the result of the amalgamation being that
out of the £41,000,000 of the capital of the Great
'Western Company the proprietors held upwards of

£12,500,000 of ordinary stock, the rest being,
in some form or other, preferential and debenture

stock. With a newly-constructed board, consisting
of so large a number as 28, they all felt that they

must to some extent divide the labour among them.

selves without dividing the responsibility; and
therefore they had already divided the board into

.. ..
committees so as to supervise and superintend the
departments of the company, so as to bring the per-
sonal supervision of each individual director on the
whole of the concern. They were enabled to make
these arrangements owing to the intended resigna-
tion of M. Saunders, their secretary and general
superintendent of the concern from the first forma-
tion and opening of the railway. When the Great
Western Railway consisted of one main trunk line
running from Briatol to London, without compli-
cated arrangements with other companies, it was not
an unreasonable thing that Mr. Saunders should
have been appointed by the directors of those days
secretary and general superintendent as well. But
as Mr. Saunders was now about to retire, they did
again to fill up the
not intend place of general su-
perintendent.year.) They
intended to keep the
offices of secretary and general superintendent of
h
as
they ougt to be
traffic distinct,in all large com-
panies. The board bad come to the unanimous re-
solution that it was for the interests of the company,
and that it would promote the economy and effi_
ciency of the administration if they would grant the
retiring pension of £1,250 a-year. (Hear, and Ne.)
In doing this they did not commit themselves, Or .

commit the proprietors, to the principle of any re-
tiring pensions to their servants. They wished it

to be understood by all the officers and servants of
this company that they did not consider there Was

any legal or moral obligation on their part to make
them a retiring allowance or pension. In 1856,
he retired from the direction of the Great

Western Railway Company, and published an
address which might be read in the public
journals of the time; and he retired because he

thought the position of ore officer occupying the
offices of general superintendent and secretary was
anomalous. '1:,43 question was formally brought
before the shareholders, and they formally, and by
an overwhelming majority, decided that Mr. Saun-
ders should continue in that position. Now that
was a position of great authority, giving Mr. Saun-
ders, or giving any man who occupied it—even a
man whose intellectual Power was less than that of
Mr. Saunders—a thorough and complete insight
into all the transactions of the company, and it was
of the greatest importance to their interests that
they should for the next two or three years have