66 66 66 300,000 officials. 9,000,000 66 68 Killed from Defective Management. England, person out of 852,000 1 46 66 3,465,996 66 1,690,764 12,254,858 The safety of railway travelling in Germany, as shown in the above table, is very remarkable, and to us inexplicable; nor is the great loss of life on English railway's less unaccountable; for it is four and one quarter times The greatest RAILWAY SPEED that has yet Killed and Wounded from Misconduct. been accomplished, was displayed by the England, 1 official out of Courier, in travelling from Didcot to Pad- France, 1 16 dington, on the 26th August, 1848, with the Belgium, 1 twelve o'clock express train from Exeter. Germany, 1 This engine is one of the eight wheel class, with eight feet driving wheels, a cylinder of eighteen inches, and a stroke of twenty-four feet. From a state of rest at Didcot to the time when the train entered the station at Paddington, only forty-nine minutes and thirteen seconds elapsed; that is, at the average rate of sixty-seven miles an hour, including the time lost in getting up speed when leaving Didcot, and in reducing speed when approach ing Paddington. Exclusive, however, of these losses, exactly, in travelling from the forty-greater than in France, two times greater than seventh mile-post, which the train passed at 346' 40" to the fourth mile post, which it reached at 4b 23' 26", forty-three miles were performed in thirty-six minutes and forty seconds, or an average speed accomplished of upward of seventy miles per hour! While the train is thus almost on the wing, beating the eagle in its flight, the passengers are reclin ing in their easy chairs, thinking or sleeping, reading or writing, as if they were in their own happy homes-safer, indeed, than there, for thieves cannot rob them by day, nor burglars alarm them by night. The steam-horse starts naither at the roar of the thunderstorm nor the flash of its fire. Draughts of a purer air expel the marsh poison from its seat before it has begun its work of death; and, surrounded by conductors, the delicate and timid traveller looks without dismay on the forked messengers of destruction, twisting the spire or rending the oak, or raging above the fear-stricken dwellings of man. in Belgium, for passengers, and nearly fifteen times greater than in Germany. If these rethe hope that all nations may now rival the sults are correct, they inspire us at least with Germans in the safety with which they conduct their railway operations. That railway travelling in England is approaching rapidly to that in Germany, in respect to the safety documents that cannot be questioned. We of travellers, we shall be able to show from have now before us the returns to Parliament of all the accidents which have taken place for the years 1847 and 1848, and from them on the railways of Great Britain and Ireland we obtain the following important results: In a former article we had occasion to mention the increasing safety of steam navigation, as exhibited in the voyages of steamers connected with the state of New-York. In the five years ending with 1824, one life was lost out of every 126,211 passengers; in the same period, ending with 1833, one life was lost in 211 killed. every 151,931 passengers; and in the same period, ending with 1838, only one life was lost out of 1,985,787, the safety of the passengers having increased sixteen and one half times. The same result has been obtained in railway travelling. According to the calculations of Baron von Reden, the following were the casualties which took place on the railways of England, France, Belgium and Germany, between the 1st of August, 1840, 13 servants killed, and July, 1845: If we now take the number of passengers killed from causes beyond their own control, we shall obtain the following results: 1847, 1848, Passengers 19, or 1 out of 2,887,053 psssengers 66 additional to the 10,898 now known to be in progress, will be put under contract during 1852. There never existed greater activity in the making of railroads in the United States than at the present time. Many of the lines projected have taken the place of plans for the construction of canals and turnpike roads. AcHence the risk of being killed was nearly cordingly, these works of public improvement two and one half times less in 1848 than in are not prosecuted with the same ardor and 1847, and nearly eight times less than it was energy as formerly, although much activity in the years 1846 and 1845, according to Baron exists in the construction of plank-roads. The von Reden's calculations. The comparatively labor and capital which they would require great loss of life to passengers in 1847 was are absorbed in the numerous and almost cooccasioned by the accident at Wolverton, on lossal railroads building. Since 1848, the exthe 5th of November, when seven passengers tent of railroad opened for travel and transwere killed by the passenger trains running portation has nearly doubled, and there is reainto a sliding, and coming into collision with son to believe that the increase in the length a coal train, in consequence of the negligence of road brought into use will not be less rapid of the policeman; and also to the death of during the next period of four years. By the three passengers on the 24th of May, by the year 1860, we may expect that the territory fall of part of the railway bridge over the of the United States will be traversed by at river Dee, when part of the train was pre-least 30,000 miles of railroad. cipitated into the water. Such disasters will, It is very difficult to form an estimate of in all probability, never again occur. They have, at least, not occurred in 1848 and 1849; and we can therefore say to our timid and over-sensitive friends, who refuse to travel on railways, that in the year 1848 only one passenger was killed out of six and a half millions of passengers who travelled by railway; and that no safer travelling than this is to be found, or can be conceived. RAILROADS IN THE UNITED STATES-The superintendent of the census, J. C. G. Kennedy, Esq.,having, at the request of the French Department of Public Works, and at very considerable labor, prepared the sub joined able and comprehensive statistical view of the extent of American railroads, as well those in course of construction as those contemplated and in operation, he has kindly permitted us to take a copy of it for publication: CENSUS OFFICE, In compliance with your request, I proceed to answer your inquiries concerning railroads in the United States. the average expense per mile of building railroads in the United States. In fact, no average can be assumed as applicable to the whole country. The cost of the roads in New-England is about $45,000 per mile; in New-York, Pennsylvania and Maryland, about $40,000. But in the interior of these states the surface of the country is broken, rendering the cost of grading very heavy; and nearer the sea, wide and deep streams interrupt the lines of travel, and make the expense of bridging a serious item. In New-England, and the more densely inhabited parts of the old states, from the Atlantic, as in all European countries, the extinguishment of private titles to the real estate required for railroads frequently forms a large part of the expenses included in the item of construction. In the southern states, and the valley of the Mississippi, $20,000 per mile is considered a safe estimate. There, in most cases, all the lands necessary for the purposes of the companies are given to them in consideration of the advantages which private proprietors expect from the location of the roads in the vicinity of their estates. In many of the western states, the cost of grading a long line of road does not exceed $1,000 per mile, the cost of the timber amounting to nothing more than the expense of clearing it from the tract. For these reasons the expense of building railroads in the southern and western states is now much less than it will be when the country becomes as densely settled as the older states of the Union. The number of miles of railroads in operation in the United States, January 1st, 1852, was, as nearly as can be ascertained, 10,8144. At the same time there was in course of construction an extent of railroad amounting, according to the most reliable estimates, to 10,898 miles. By far the greater portion of the lines commenced, but now incomplete, will be finished within the ensuing five years. The length of railroad brought into operation since The Central Railroad of Illinois is an enterJanuary 1, 1848, is 5,224 miles. Within the prise which furnishes a remarkable example of last year, 2,153 miles have been finished. the energy.and spirit of improvement in the Nearly all the lines in progress have been new states. Illinois was admitted into the commenced since 1848. It is supposed that confederation as a state in 1818, with 30,000 rom one thousand to fifteen hundred miles, inhabitants. It has 55,405 square miles of from territory, and a population, according to the census of 1850, of 851,470. The Central Railroad is to extend from its southwestern extremity, at the confluence of the Mississippi and Ohio rivers, to the north line of the state, with two diverging branches. The total length of this road, including the main stem and branches, is to be six hundred and eighty miles. The cost is estimated at $20,000 per mile, or $10,000,000 for the entire work, without equipments for operating it. This is the longest continuous line of road now in contemplation in the United States, of which there is any probability of speedy completion. It has been commenced with such facilities for executing the plans of its projectors, that there is no reasonable doubt that it will be finished within a few years. Mr. Asa Whitney proposes to construct a railroad from St. Louis, or some other place on the Mississippi river, to the Pacific ocean, terminating either at San Francisco, in California, or at the mouth of the Columbia river, in Oregon. He solicits the patronage of the national government for this prodigious work, and petitions for the grant of land equal in extent to sixty miles in width to two thousand miles in length. His plans were first laid before Congress in 1842, and he has since been continually occupied in recommending them to the favorable attention of the government and the people with great ability and zeal; but with what success remains yet to be seen. Without expressing any view with reference thereto, it may be said that his project is generally considered impracticable, from the fact that of the two thousand miles of territory which his route across the country must traverse, a large portion consists of desert or of sterile and very elevated mountain districts, in which can be found no materials of construction, and which would afford no business for the support of the road, were the difficulties of building it overcome. Many intelligent men, however, are convinced of its practicability and expediency. The railroad system of the United States may be considered to have commenced in 1830. The first one put in operation was a short road, built for transportation of ice from a small lake to the sea, in the state of Massachusetts. The length of this work was four miles. It was finished in 1830. In the same year the state of South Carolina caused to be commenced a railroad from Charleston, its principal port, to Augusta, in Georgia. The distance is 135 miles. The work was finished in 1833, at the very remarkably small cost of $1,335,615, which sum included also the expenses of furnishing the road with engines and passenger and freight cars, and all other necessary equipments. This was the first road of any considerable length constructed in the United States, and it is believed to have been the cheapest and one of the most successful. The longest continuous line of railroad in the world, and that in the construction of which the greatest natural obstacles have been overcome, is that which extends from the Hudson river, through the southern counties of NewYork, to Lake Erie. Its length is four hundred and sixty-nine miles, and it has branches of an aggregate additional length of sixty-eight miles. Nearly its whole course is through a region of mountains. The bridges by which it is carried over the Delaware and Susquehanna rivers and other streams, and the viaducts upon which it crosses the valleys that intercept its route, are among the noblest monuments of power and skill to be found in our country. The most of these works are of heavy masonry, but one of them is a wooden bridge, one hundred and eighty-four feet in height, and having but one arch, the span of which is two hundred and seventy-five feet. One of the viaducts is 1,200 feet long, and 110 feet high. The aggregate cost of this important work was $23,580,000, and the expense of construction was $48,393 per mile. The road was originally suggested in 1829; a company was organized in 1832; surveys were made in the same year, and operations were begun by grading a part of the route in 1833. It was finished in May, 1851, and opened with great ceremony for travel and transportation in that month. The state advanced six millions of dollars towards the work, and afterwards released the company from the obligation to pay the loan. It will thus be seen that the execution of this great improvement was pursued through nineteen years, and it was not accomplished without calling into requisition both the resources of the state and the means of her citizens. In the infancy of the American railroad system, and for ten years thereafter, it was the rule to extend to every important enterprise of that character the assistance of the state in which it was to be built. Pennsylvania, Michigan, Illinois, Mississippi, and some other states, adopted extensive systems of improvements, consisting of railroads and canals, which they pursued until their credit failed; an event which happened in most cases before any of the works had been completed and brought into profitable use. But the general practice was to charter companies, each of which was charged with the execution of some particular work, and to aid them by loans of state stocks. Although this practice has fallen into so much disfavor in some of the states that the citizens have incorporated in their constitutions articles prohibiting advances by their legislatures for such purposes, it is yet continued by others, and Virginia, Tennessee, and other states are now prosecuting expensive works, considered essential to their prosperity, by means of advances from their respective treasuries. In the year 1850, Congress passed an act, States with Rail roads in opera- after a very protracted discussion, granting to |plications have been made from all the new the state of Illinois about 2,700,000 acres of states for cessions of land for railroad purpublic lands to aid in the construction of the poses. Whether such further aid shall be exCentral Railroad, to which allusion has been tended, is now a much agitated question in before made. This magnificent donation is American politics. Bills are pending in Conreckoned by the company to which Illinois has gress, proposing to cede for these purposes confided the building of the road, to be worth about 20,000,000 acres. $18,000,000. This was the first instance in which the aid of the national government had been extended to a railroad project. But since the above grant, innumerable ap The following table presents, in a convenient form, some of the principal facts connected with railroads in the United States on the 1st of January, 1852: 19.44 489 47 9,280 317,964 34.26 380 59 10.312 314,120 30.76 7,800 994,499 127.49 Nearly parallel to the Atlantic coast of the United States, from Maine to Alabama, runs the range of mountains known as the Alleghany or Appalachian chain. The eastern bases of these mountains are not distant from the seaboard more than a hundred miles, and they form a very formidable obstacle to the construction of railroads between the great eastern cities and the interior. In nearly all the great enterprises which have been undertaken with the view to effect such connection, great additional expense has been incurred to overcome or to penetrate this mountain bar rier. In the plan first adopted for the general system of state improvements in Pennsylvania, it was proposed to effect the crossing of the 10,898 Alleghanies by means of inclined planes, with powerful stationary engines at their summits. The planes were built, and have been used for several years, until experience proved their operation was too slow and too expensive to maintain a successful competition with other methods of conveyance, and other improvements have since been furnished designed to supersede them. The railroad from Baltimore to the Ohio river is carried over a passage in these mountains where the elevation is upwards of three thousand feet, and a part of that height is overcome by tunnels, varying in length from one sixteenth to four fifths of a mile. The road from New-York to Albany, along the banks of the Hudson, has three tun nels. The greatest work of this kind yet proposed in the United States is the tunnel through the Hoosick mountain, which, if executed, will be four miles in length, and fifteen hundred feet below the summit of the ascent. The cost is estimated at $2,000,000. On the road from New-York to Lake Erie, tunnels have been avoided by expensive works, which overcome ascents of 1,400 feet. in length, and the fare will be $13; that is, two cents per mile.. Believing that the history of the origin, condition, and extent of the railroads in the United States form one of the most important subjects of statistical investigation, and one not generally understood, I have devoted a portion of my time to the preparation of a complete history and detailed statement reNo authentic statement has ever been given specting each of the railroads in the United of the capital invested in the railroads of the States, to accompany the other statistics to be United States, but we have the means of embraced within the seventh census; but, as forming an estimate upon which much reli- Congress may exercise their right of abridg ance may be placed. The railroads in opera-ing the work on this and other subjects, it is tion at the beginning of the present year may impossible, in advance, to say what the census, be assumed to have cost $348,000,000. The when published, will contain. amount invested in the lines under construction, it is impossible to estimate, with even an approximation to correctness. Their cost, when completed, will be considerably less than that of an equal length of road now in operation; for the reason that the greater number of new or unfinished lines are in the west or south, where, as has been shown, the cost of construction is far below what it is in the northern and eastern states. The management of the American railroads is entirely distinct from the administration of government. Their concerns are managed by corporations, which consist of a president, secretary, and directors. Each of the directors must own a certain amount of stock. They are chosen by the body of stockholders, who have votes in proportion to the number of shares they hold. The directors choose one of their body president, and appoint the secretary. The president and secretary have generally liberal salaries, but the services of the directors are gratuitous. The rate of the speed on our railroads is not so great as on those of England. The ordinary velocity of a passenger train is twenty miles an hour, but on some routes it is as high as twenty-eight and thirty miles. Express trains, on such occasions as the conveyance of the President's message, frequently maintain for a long distance as high a speed as fortyfive miles an hour. And on one road, that between New-York and Albany, forty-five miles per hour is the regular rate for all trains. passenger I inclose to you herewith a copy of the census of Maryland, prepared in advance, for reasons which will appear in its " preface." RAILROADS IN THE UNITED STATES ON THE 1ST JANUARY, 1852.* NAMES OF RAILWAYS. MAINE. Great Falls and Conway... Portsmouth and Concord.. Sullivan. VERMONT. The fares or rates of passage are not uniform. In New-England, the average price per mile for the conveyance of passengers is under two cents; from New-York to Boston, it is two and four tenths; from New-York to Philadelphia, three and four tenths; from Philadelphia to Baltimore, three and one Bennington Branch...... tenth. From New-York to Cincinnati the dis- Connecticut and Passumpsic. tance is 857 miles by the northern route, of Rutland and Burlington.... which 143 miles is travelled by steamboat. Rutland and Washington.. The price of passage for the whole distance Troy and Rutland... is $15 50, being slightly under two cents per Vermont and Canada................. mile. The lines between Baltimore and Ĉincinnati, soon to be opened, will be 650 miles Miles in operation Miles in 10 6 9 36 33 52 119 12 55 38 • Western Journal, |