Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad
Overview | |
---|---|
Headquarters | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
Locale | Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland |
Dates of operation | 1836–1902 (purchased 1880 by Pennsylvania Railroad) |
Predecessor |
|
Successor | standard gauge |
Length | 669 mi (1,077 km)[1] |
The Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad (PW&B) was an American railroad that operated independently from 1836 to 1881. Headquartered in Philadelphia, it was greatly enlarged in 1838 by the merger of four state-chartered railroads in three Mid-Atlantic states to create a single line between Philadelphia and Baltimore.
In 1881, the PW&B was purchased by the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR), which was at the time the nation's largest railroad. In 1902, the PRR merged it into its Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington Railroad.
The right-of-way laid down by the PW&B line is still in use today as part of
History
19th century
On April 2, 1831, the General Assembly of Pennsylvania, seeking to improve transportation between Philadelphia and points south along the Atlantic coast and Eastern seaboard, chartered the Philadelphia and Delaware County Rail-Road Company. The legislature allotted $200,000 to build a rail line from America's largest city to the Delaware state line. In July 1835, surveyors began to look at possible routes, and in October, they reported that the best option, a 17-mile line, would cost $233,000 to build.
Further south, across the Mason–Dixon line, the Delaware and Maryland legislatures, were doing their part to create a rail link to Wilmington and Baltimore. On January 18, 1832, the State of Delaware chartered the Wilmington and Susquehanna Rail Road Company (W&S, $400,000) to build from Wilmington to the Maryland state line. On March 5, the State of Maryland chartered the Baltimore and Port Deposite Rail Road Company (B&PD) (with $1,000,000) to build from Baltimore northeast to the western bank of the Susquehanna River.[3] On March 12, the Delaware and Maryland Rail Road Company (D&M) was chartered for $3,000,000 to build from Port Deposit or any other point on the Susquehanna's eastern river bank north to the Delaware line.[4][5]
In 1835, the W&S hired architect/surveyor
In 1836, P&DC opened its first segment of track; saw its allowable expenditures upped by the State to $400,000; and changed its name, on March 14, to The Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad Company.[4][9] On July 4, the PW&B began building its bridge over the Schuylkill River, the most significant obstacle on its part of the route. The bridge would cross at Gray's Ferry Bridge, south of the city.[10] Meanwhile, on April 18, the D&M merged with the W&S, forming the Wilmington and Susquehanna Railroad Company.
Work also proceeded in Delaware and Maryland. By July 1837, there was continuous track from Baltimore to Wilmington, broken only by the wide Susquehanna River, which trains crossed by steam-powered ferryboats at Havre de Grace to Perryville.[10] That year, the railroad ordered seven 4-2-0 steam locomotives from Norris Locomotive Works; it ordered two more in or about 1840.[11]
On January 15, 1838, the PW&B opened service from Wilmington to Gray's Ferry, then a few miles south of Philadelphia's city limits. Passengers debarking at Gray's Ferry were taken by omnibus into the city.[12]
The disadvantages of tripartite ownership of the Philadelphia-Baltimore line became obvious, and the three remaining state-chartered railroads merged on February 12, 1838, to form the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad Company.[1] (The new company's name differed from its predecessor's in that "The" at the beginning of the titled name was not part of its formal incorporated name.[9])
Among the passengers that year was Frederick Douglass, a slave who escaped his Baltimore owner by boarding a PB&W train, perhaps at Canton or somewhere east of where the President Street Station would be built in 1849, and riding it northeast to Philadelphia. To avoid detention, Douglass, a future world-famous abolitionist, statesman, Federal official, orator and publisher, borrowed a "seaman's protection", a document obtained by his future wife, a free black woman, which was normally carried by free black sailors, of which there were many in the merchant fleets and the navy.[13] Later, the railroad would require black passengers to have "a responsible white person" sign a bond at the ticket office before allowing them to board.[14]
In December, the PB&W completed its
The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O) began using the tracks that same year to offer service northeast of Baltimore to Philadelphia.[15]
In Baltimore, the PW&B's terminus and business office sat at the southwest corner of President and Fleet Streets, east of the Jones Falls, the eventual future site of the President Street Station. The line ran east along Fleet Street, turned southeast onto Boston Street and ran along the waterfront past Canton before turning northeast and leaving the city limits, heading east, then northeast towards the Susquehanna.[13]
In
In 1839, the railroad's ticket agents advertised daily mail-and-passenger trains that left Baltimore's old original Pratt Street station at South Charles Street of the B&O (before 1857-65 construction of the now-famous Camden Street Station) at 9:30 a.m., stopped for lunch in Wilmington, Delaware, and reached the Market Street depot in Philadelphia at 4 p.m.[16]
In 1842, Newkirk resigned as PW&B president. He was replaced by Matthew Brooke Buckley (1794-1856),[17] who had become a PW&B board member on Jan. 10, 1842, and one week later had taken over leadership of one of the railroad's three executive committees, the Northern one.[18] As president, Buckley helped create the first telegraph line.
In 1844,
On January 12, 1846, Buckley was replaced by Edward C. Dale,[20] a grandson of Richard Dale, one of the U.S. Navy's first commodores.[21]
Between 1846 and 1849, the railroad ordered five more locomotives, likely 4-4-0s, from the Norris Works.[11]
In February 1850, the PW&B improved its Baltimore terminus by completing erection of a new
From 1863 to 1865, the railroad ordered ten 4-4-0 locomotives from the Norris Works.[11]
The PB&W also extended its reach into Delaware – on March 15, 1839, it bought the
In November 1866, the Susquehanna River was bridged at last by the PW&B Bridge, a 3,269-foot (996 m) wooden truss, finally creating a continuous rail connection between Philadelphia and Baltimore.
To avoid swampy areas and serve more populated ones, the PW&B built the Darby Improvement, which diverged from its existing main line just south of the
The PW&B, which had competed so fiercely with the Pennsylvania, began to see their interests align. In 1873, the PRR opened the
On May 15, 1877, the PW&B formally absorbed the New Castle and Frenchtown and New Castle and Wilmington railroads, forming a branch line from Wilmington to Rodney. On May 21, 1877, it then absorbed the Southwark railroad, extending its main line to the Delaware River waterfront.
In 1880, a conflict began between the PRR and the B&O, both of which operated over the PW&B. The B&O was working to reduce its reliance on PRR tracks; it had recently arranged to switch its Philadelphia-New York trains to the new
The irate
A number of branches were built, bought and sold from 1881 to 1891, as described below. In 1895, the main line was realigned and straightened at
The PRR's Baltimore and Potomac Rail Road was formally leased to the PW&B on November 1, 1891.
The Elkton and Middletown Railroad, opened in 1895, was planned as a cutoff between the main line at Elkton, Maryland, and the Delaware Railroad at Middletown, Delaware. However, only a short piece of track, serving industries in Elkton, was ever constructed. It was consolidated into the Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington Railroad on September 15, 1916.
An 1895 historian of the PRR had this to say about the significance of the PW&B, which it had acquired and gained control of fourteen years before:
An important constituent of a great North and South line of transportation, it challenges ocean competition and carries on its rails not only statesmen and tourists but a valuable interchange of products between different lines of latitude. As a military highway, it is of the greatest strategic importance to the national, industrial, and commercial capitals – Washington, Philadelphia and New York. It presents some of the very best transportation facilities to the commerce of the cities after which it is named and could not be obliterated from the railroad map of the United States without materially disturbing its harmony.[28]
20th century
The PW&B merged with the Baltimore and Potomac on November 1, 1902, to form the Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington Railroad.
Branches
- Southwark
- Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Hog Island, Pennsylvania.
- South Chester
- Edgemoor
- Augustine Mill: Also called the Brandywine Branch, it was built in 1882 from Brandywine Creekto reach the Augustine Mills of the Jessup & Moore Paper Company, and was later extended further north to serve the Kentmere and Rockford Mills of Joseph Bancroft & Sons.
- street runningon the main line through Wilmington.
- Delaware Branch: Formed from the old New Castle & Frenchtown and New Castle & Wilmington trackage between Wilmington and Rodney, via New Castle. It was sold to the Delaware Railroad in 1891.
- New Castle Cut-off: Built in 1888 from a point on the Shellpot Branch just across the Christina River from Cherry Island, south to New Castle and a connection with the Delaware Branch. It was sold with the Delaware Branch to the Delaware Railroad in 1891.
- Delaware City: Sold by the Newark and Delaware City Railroad to the PW&B in 1881. It ran south and east from the main line at Newark to Delaware City.
- Port Deposit: Built in 1866 up the Columbia and Port Deposit Railway, also PRR-controlled, which connected with it at Port Deposit.
- Baltimore Union
See also
- Baltimore and Philadelphia Railroad
- History of rail transport in Philadelphia
- Newkirk Viaduct Monument
- Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad Freight Shed
References
- ^ a b Poor's Manual of the Railroads of the United States. Vol. 33. New York: H.V. & H.W. Poor. 1900. p. 703.
- ^ "On the Road: Sprouts Farmers Market, Philadelphia". 14 April 2019. Archived from the original on 3 January 2022. Retrieved 3 January 2022.
- ^ Maryland General Assembly. Chapter 188 of the 1831 Session Laws of Maryland.
- ^ a b c Dare, Charles P. (1856). Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad Guide: Containing a Description of the Scenery, Rivers, Towns, Villages, and Objects of Interest Along the Line of Road : Including Historical Sketches, Legends, &c. Philadelphia: Fitzgibbon & Van Ness. pp. 142.
- ^ Maryland General Assembly. Chapter 296 of the 1831 Session Laws of Maryland.
- ^ a b "1835 (June 2004 Edition)" (PDF). PRR CHRONOLOGY. The Pennsylvania Railroad Technical & Historical Society. June 2004. Archived (PDF) from the original on 14 February 2012. Retrieved 23 July 2013.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-8047-2629-0.
- ^ "The Railroads: 1883 account of he PW&B and monument". St. Louis Globe-Democrat. 1883-12-03. p. 6. Archived from the original on 2022-04-30. Retrieved 2022-04-30.
- ^ a b c Netzlof, Robert T. (7 March 2001). "Corporate Genealogy Philadelphia, Baltimore & Washington". Robert T. Netzlof. Archived from the original on 22 July 2012. Retrieved 7 October 2019.
- ^ ISBN 9780812243482.
- ^ from the original on 2021-10-20. Retrieved 2021-10-20.
- from the original on 2021-10-20. Retrieved 2021-10-20.
- ^ a b Chalkley, Tom (March 15, 2000). "NATIVE SON: On the Trail of Frederick Douglass in Baltimore". Baltimore City Paper. Archived from the original on June 6, 2014. Retrieved October 8, 2013.
- ^ "Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad. Notice to Colored people". New York Public Library Digital Collections. Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. August 22, 2005. Retrieved October 8, 2013.
- ^ a b Harwood, Herbert H. Jr. (2005). "Philadelphia, Wilmington & Baltimore Railroad". Maryland Online Encyclopedia. Maryland Historical Society. Archived from the original on 2008-07-20.
- ^ Crawford, A. (Feb 9, 1839). "Railroad to Philadelphia". American & Commercial Daily Advertiser. p. 4. Retrieved September 30, 2013.
- ISBN 9780806352398.
- ^ "1842 (May 2004 Edition)" (PDF). PRR CHRONOLOGY. The Pennsylvania Railroad Technical & Historical Society. May 2004. Archived (PDF) from the original on 14 October 2013. Retrieved 13 September 2013.
- ISBN 9780549924975. Retrieved September 13, 2013.
- ^ "1846 (April 2005 Edition)" (PDF). PRR CHRONOLOGY. The Pennsylvania Railroad Technical & Historical Society. April 2005. Archived (PDF) from the original on 14 October 2013. Retrieved 13 September 2013.
- ^ "Guide to the Dale Family Papers, 1749-1937". Naval Academy Library. Archived from the original on September 27, 2012. Retrieved September 13, 2013.
- ISBN 0-934118-22-1.
- ^ Baer, Christopher (March 2005). "1853 (March 2005 edition)" (PDF). PRR CHRONOLOGY. Philadelphia Chapter Pennsylvania Railroad Technical & Historical Society. Archived (PDF) from the original on October 14, 2013. Retrieved October 24, 2013.
- ^ "1839 (June 2004 Edition)" (PDF). PRR CHRONOLOGY. The Pennsylvania Railroad Technical & Historical Society. June 2004. Archived (PDF) from the original on 3 November 2004. Retrieved 23 August 2013.
- ^ Broomall, John M. (1872). "History of Chester, PA." Archived 2005-09-06 at the Wayback Machine Delaware River and West Jersey Railroad Commercial Directory. pp. 93-96.
- ^ Morlok, Edward K., University of Pennsylvania (2005). "First Permanent Railroad in the U.S. and Its Connection to the University of Pennsylvania." Archived 2005-04-02 at the Wayback Machine Transportation Data. Accessed 2013-04-23.
- ^ The Railway World, Volume 6 (1880)
- ^ Wilson, William Bender (1895). History of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company with Plan of Organization, Portraits of Officials and Biographical Sketches. Vol. 1. Philadelphia: Henry T. Coates & Company. Retrieved November 25, 2012.
External links
- Christopher Baer's PRR Chronology, hosted by The Pennsylvania Railroad Technical & Historical Society
- Railroad History Database
- PRR Corporate History
- Data visualization of 1857 passenger traffic from various PW&B stations
- 1949 map of PB&W lines in 1881
- William Strickland's 1835 report on the feasibility of the Wilmington & Susquehanna route
- Photo of late-1800s PW&B baggage tag
Annual reports
- First Annual Report of the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Rail Road Company ...: 1838-1840:Google, Hathitrust
- Organization of the United Companies Under the Name of Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Rail Road Company with Articles of Union
- The Sixth Annual Report of the Philadelphia, Wilmington & Baltimore Railroad Company (1844)
- 35th through 48th Annual Report of the President and Directors of the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Rail Road Company (1872–85)
- Fifty-Sixth Annual Report Of The Philadelphia Wilmington And Baltimore Railroad Company (1893)