The Sun.
London, England, 1845-08-28 00:00:00

CA I.M; RTISE MENT.
laitECT LONDON and MANCHES-
TER RAILWAY.
TO THE EUITOIt OF THE SUN.
SIR.—Mr. Remington has repl4 d to my letter. He
is li:nd enon.:ll to say, in the opening, that if any ex-
p-essions ..melemnatory of the course taken by me have
befn used by *thy parties, they have not been published
by him or with his privity or consent.
I was compelled to vindicate myself against a charge
at ab.nrd as it is untrue. To repel a charge of stealing
Mr. Ilt.mington's line, I was obliged to use arguments to
show the absence of all inducement to do it ; and for that
pnrrse I was obliged to show that Mr. Remington had
a-Iced the several sums of two, three, four, and five
millions of money to make his line.
That he had varied that line.
That he had subsequently started a London and Mall-
che,t,r and York line, asking seven millions to make the

That he might as well have charged the London and
York (.3oinpany with having stolen their line, as charge
m with stealing a line to Manchester.
Mr. Remington does not deny asking for the various
sums of money which I have mentioned, to accomplish
the same line.
Either his judgment was unsound, or he varied what
he calls his line as often as he asked different sums.
I hive fouridel my statement on documents issued by
Mr. Rern;ngton says—l quote his own words :
" In 1840 it was proposed to carry out the scheme
al me between London and Manchester, for which I
thought then, and think now, four millions sufficient."
If he thinks so nay, how can he reconcile with that
ofizirn his prospectus, to which I refer him, in the
Morning Heald of the 23d of May last, asking for
tw indlions o ,ly, in forty thousand shares of fifty
p oOds each
How dos ne reconcile with this his improved judg-
ment, a...king three millions ?
Or his sounder judgment, asking four ?
With h:s present opinion that four millions are
ehoirrl,, why does he ask five ?
I have publish.. .d no names in support of the line to
-a hid' I have been :Appointed solicitor, but such as were
given :o :no in or subsequent to June in this year.
It is tt sufficient answer to the statement about my
nos joining the Company of 1844 to say that which
Mr' R min:. on has said for me—that I was unwilling.
2 proceed to ow, from Mr. Remington's answer, the
absi:rdi iy of hi:- calumny that I have stolen his line.
Sla,alc.ng of a ime, he says, " Where two pro-
je.•ted lines start from the same termini, go near the
s• me towns, ever the same route from beginniag to
(211,1, it becomes a mater of grave consideration which of
th- two competitors have the priority of conception."
Now this will be seen by any one who will pause to
ealsi •,'r it, to he nothing but a verbose mode of claim-
th- conception of a straight line
L is Mr. Itmington's mode of cheating himself into
the idea that he h id made a discovery, and the man who
can flatter himself with such a bubble, is just the man
to ,'es.roy himself by raising the foolish cry that another
ha ; rubbed him of his novelty, and attracting men's
a, t,rition vi its airy nothingness.
M Rerninvon says he concedes that no vested inte-
rst exist in a line drawn on a map between two
t: rmini, biti that he has yet to learn that the pencil and
I.he map are the only requ,sites in the formation of u
railway. Tnis is an admission of the question, for he
ha I.uo otht,r claim.
lie admits he had not surveyed the line from Leicester
to M anchester, and he told me that he had examined the
seer ons d,-posited by other engineers.
His imputvion induced me to make inquiry who had,
as 11.• had not. surveyed the country, and I now give him
an extract frail a letter written by an engineer who did
survey it, anti deposited the plans and sections of the
greatest p fttion of the country:—
" Birmingham, Aug. 22, 1845.
" D Sir.—Just as I was leaving Manchester to-day
N ;,u inqiiir.,d of we when it was that I first made a sur

(;!iurnet Vailcy. I told you, as I had tha
s.!ctions in my portmanteau, I would, as soon
I tin-ivekl rt.fer to them, ant send you my answer
by p :at. I have done so; and I find, in the year 1837,
ty, the r. quest of the then. styled 'Manchester, Cheshire,
Sato Railway Company,' I took plans and sec-
t.,m • in al no.t eery part of the country between the
tir:na Ju r tiorm Railway and the Staffordshire Potte-
r•ei; wail a; ro NlAcclestielrl and Congleton, and also
he Po :e. i r,t olte and Lane End across the
v.. the vvi,-yi of die Tean and the Blythe to
xo:cr, retba,-y, !hut n-up n-Trent, and Welling-
tol. I also, in the year 1839, made a survey from
Sto..ltoort. by way of Mieclesfield, the Rhudya Reser-
virif-, down the Churnet Valley to Uttoxeter, Tutbury,
urid ; it shit Derby Railway at Wellington.
"•-" Aril in the year 1840 I was employed by Mr.
Macd.uley, on behalf of the Midland Counties Railway,
to set out a hue fro:] St,•ckport to Macclesfield and to
Le..k, down the Churnet Valley and the Valley of the
Dove, to join the Midland Counties Railway at Derby.
the plans nail sections Eve regularly deposited with
the el,•rks of :he P ace.

C ,L 1 i

•• I aiso survey- d a line for a railway from Stoke, in
th,3 Poveries, to join the last-mentioned line at Leek,
w!iich Was al.no deposi red with the Clerks of the Peace.
, •• ugh the plans were, as I have stated, rega-
l:a.), deposited with the Clerks of the Peace, no further
proce-dings ever took place upon them. I believe this
is ail the information you asked of me.
" I am, dear Sir, yours truly,
• " JOHN M. RASTRICK.
" 3.; r 3. AM ast and S.,n, at the Royal Hotel,
Ma.,c!e.st:3;."
.Itis n f •i• Mr. it •mington, who did not survey the
coon ry, to shots the superiority of his claim against
Eie who did.

M.. Remington s-tys that he examined the valleys of
th, I) ~wear, the Wye, the Dove, and the Tean, and
•:yistied himself that any direct route from London to
Alariehest,-r must pass by one or other or both of the
latter valleys.

Now, if :qr. Remington were to tell us that he had
examined the Channel between Dover and Calais, and
had himself tiiat the man who wished to go di-
rectly from the one plAce to the other must pass that
Cha:ni, I. he would give just as much information on the
c.ne as he gives on the other, and would have
ju,t a, mach reason for calling it an original conception,
aari to cry " stop thief !" after every steamer that he
did not pilot. Why, there is not an engineer of any
name in practice who has not " examined" those valleys.
Tney are traversed, or proposed to be traversed, by a
variety of companies, against whom and their respective
engineers Mr. Remington, upon his own tactics, ought
to shout " stop thief !"

Th> plan h'e published, and to which he refers, in-
-sNad of going through those valleys, ran away to
Derby, and this he called a direct line from London to
Mancheiter.

He claims to have published a direct route from Lon.
don o Manchester in 1840.

That ran to Derby and the hills by the Midland Coun-
ties Railway; the present one goes no nearer Derby
than Leicester, and this deviation, he says, is easily
explains-d, for that he found that by carrying the line
ever Charawoo•-1 Forust, north or south of Barden
m .urit, his line was rendered more perfect and direct,
inciep-nt;lent ~f the Midland Counties Railway, and con-
sid.Tably shorter in distance.

Aod this deviation, he says, he made in compliance
with public °pint
;mark, an engineer, who on such a subject is to
guid, the public, says he beads the straight line to suit
the phlic taite ; and, though not born on the other side
of die Cnannel, adds, that he found by deviating some
twenty tlle, that he made his direct line considerably
shorter in d!•.tance ; Ois is another original conception.
Fie [LIS!, take care that Mr. Babbage, or some other
eirenentmathematician, does not filch it.

_ .„.
Mr. It ,ieing,ton talks of meetings to support his line ;
there eas but one meeting., that was at Bedford, got up
b►•.. himself to aid his project to got, York and Man-
'l'„e people of Bedford were only anxious about a line
no or t rough their own town.
They we. know that he had not surveyed it below
• ester, nor was it in the order of things for them to
or they th.aig.ht, as was natural, of the import-
fined of g tting a railroad, not of getting an engineer.
lie e:iose to attend, and a then active patron of his took
the initiative of the business, and praised his " original
corweptioa" most enormously. The result of conceiving
to much was a miscarriage. It never entered into any-
ly head hut Mr. ftemington's that because a
rx ting at B-dforcl passed resolutions in favour of a
to York an I Nlanchester through their town, that
he therte-iy acquired a fee simple in a line to Manchester,
• h had not surveyed it.
[,awe shown that other engineers had surveyed the
.-;oaa!ry ar:d d,,p'•sited sections.
it,m7ngton has shown that he made no survey,
• that he published a map and a line notwithstanding.
j .ilon't say he, filched it, but he says he did not survey
it, 4 h, dubliihed it as his own.
H. tuns exliibits an engineer hoisting himself with
his peta-(1. " W. IL ASHURST.
28, 1845.

Iu the City article of the Times yesterday, it was said
that s rumour had got about 'Change that the London
and Yorit,ltud London and Manchester Direct (Rastrick's)
Line had coalesced, with the intention of being better
at*!e to cope with the Birmingham Company, and this
rep ,ni to have sent up the Manchester Direct
6aar,s, bdt we tind to-day that no such arrangement
.ba. taken plaice between these Companies.