360Trevithick's engine makes the first railway locomotive journey
On 21 February 1804, a steam engine built by the Cornish engineer Richard Trevithick hauled 10 tons of iron, five wagons and about 70 men along a tramway at the Penydarren ironworks in Wales. It was the first journey by a steam locomotive on rails, covering almost 16 km in about four hours.
At the start of the 19th century, wagons on Britain's tramways were pulled by horses. Richard Trevithick, an engineer from Cornwall, believed steam could do the job.
He had already built a steam road carriage in 1801. In 1803 and 1804 he built an engine for the Penydarren ironworks, near Merthyr Tydfil in south Wales, using high-pressure steam, which made engines smaller and lighter than older designs.
On 21 February 1804, the locomotive hauled 10 tons of iron, five wagons and about 70 men along the tramway to Abercynon, a distance of almost 16 km, in about four hours. The ironmaster had bet that it could be done, and he won.
The heavy engine broke many of the brittle cast-iron rails, and it was soon used as a stationary engine instead. But it proved that a steam locomotive could pull loads on rails.
Two decades later, George Stephenson's engines and the opening of the Stockton and Darlington Railway in 1825 turned the idea into the railway age.
- 1801
- Trevithick's steam road carriage runs in Cornwall
- 21 February 1804
- The Penydarren locomotive makes its journey
- 1808
- Trevithick runs 'Catch Me Who Can' in London
- 1825
- The Stockton and Darlington Railway opens
Sources: Science Museum Group · National Museum Wales · Britannica.