20 blooming years of Global Generation
February 15, 2024
The King’s Cross educational charity just keeps on growing
In this extract from his new book, Chalk Farm Railway Lands: A Guided Tour 1830-2030, local historian Peter Darley reveals the social changes to the area that the arrival of thousands of hard-living men brought with them, including colourful accounts of wild revelry and shocking gritty living.
Up to 12,000 men were engaged in construction of the London & Birmingham Railway (L&BR) at its peak. Many of these were skilled or semi-skilled men from the building trades but large numbers were labourers or muck-shifters, excavating the cuttings and tunnels by hand. Of these, some were locally based, living in nearby lodgings but many were itinerant, either living in lodgings or more often in rudimentary shacks thrown up by the contractors. They detested the name ‘navvies’.
The greater proportion were English, but typically some 30% were Irish. There was always a strong tribal element to gangs of navvies and tensions arose spontaneously with little pretext, for example if the Irish were suspected of driving down wage rates. Conventionally, the navvie was as free with his fists as he was thirsty for beer and this convention was amply confirmed in the account of navvies working on the L&BR in District No. 1, described below.
The distinctive dress of navvies, their many strange dialects and colourful nicknames, and their general irreverence heightened the alarm of the local population when the railway approached a settled community and its relief when the work passed on.
Yet the navvies could be highly disciplined and relished the challenge of hard and difficult work. Drunk or sober, the work was dangerous and injuries and fatalities were accepted as inevitable. Every mile of the L&BR cost an average of three lives, with a far higher toll in tunnels and cuttings. The Primrose Hill Tunnel and its eastern approach cutting were among the first to start construction, before the treacherous nature of the ground had been fully appreciated. Although there are no figures available, there were many fatalities. The Chalk Farm Tavern was usually the first resting place of navvies killed in this section of the works.
Off duty, navvies would spend their wages freely on beer, much of it sold in ‘tommy shops’ run by the contractor. Chalk Farm Tavern was much frequented by the navvies on the Primrose Hill contract, which must have changed the tone of the establishment. Over their beer, their singing at night could be heard far away.
There is a full description of navvies on the L&BR in Household Words (1856), one of the journals that Charles Dickens edited. As a young man, H. J. Brown, after finishing schooling at 16, where he was fascinated by the railway construction works nearby in Harrow, left home in March 1835, over his guardian’s objections, resolved to become an engineer.
He found accommodation in lodgings locally and worked initially as a driver on the Boxmoor embankment until he drove the loaded horse van over the tip-head. He then worked at a gin on the Watford Tunnel, steering buckets down into the shaft, before joining a typical gang of about 40 navvies working in the Tunnel. He describes his experiences vividly, from teaching an illiterate gang member to read and write (who later became a sub-contractor); receiving his protection in return; the shanty accommodation and the old crone that ran the ‘tommy shop’ that fleeced the navvies; the vicious battle with a new gang of Irish and the torching of their shanty; the collapse of the Tunnel, burying 30 men and the unremitting day and night efforts over 21 days to recover the last body; and the extraordinary irreverence of the navvies at a funeral.
There is space here to mention just one incident described by Brown that captures some of the navvies’ behaviour that so alarmed the general public.
Shortly after Christmas, when another man was killed, his ganger proposed to raffle the body. The idea took immensely, and was actually carried out. Nearly three hundred men joined in the scheme. The raffle money, sixpence a member, was to go towards a drinking bout at the funeral, the whole expense of which was to be borne jointly by those throwing the highest and lowest numbers. The raffle took place, and so did the revel; but the funeral, after a fortnight’s delay, was performed by the parish.
His account ends by describing the gradual improvements introduced by enlightened contractors such as Thomas Brassey and the rather less successful efforts of missionaries.
Chalk Farm Railway Lands: A Guided Tour 1830-2030 is out now, £25.
Buy the book from Camdenist and support the work of the Camden Heritage Railway Trust, including a personal dedication of your choice from Peter in every signed copy.
The King’s Cross educational charity just keeps on growing
As a new range of tees and merch celebrates the iconic label
Lust after the luxury flats or envy the industrial chic offices
Why does this building get people so passionate?
© Copyright 2023 The Local Content Company Ltd. All rights Reserved.
Regulated by IMRESS, the Independent Monitor for the Press CIC. For more info on our complaints policy, or to make a complaint, please see FAQ