Passenger service

“I have been passed a copy of a recent article about public railways,” emails Hamish Carmichael of Kippen, Stirling.

“I can respond to the last paragraph about the veteran steam locomotives – the Earl of Airlie and the Lord Wharncliffe were built by James Carmichael, the senior partner in the firm of J&C Carmichael of Ward Foundry, Dundee.

“James was my great-great-grandfather. He had visited Stephenson to discuss locomotive design, and attended the Rainhill Trials where Stephenson’s Rocket beat all the opposition out of sight.

“No, the locomotive Earl of Airlie has not survived. The photograph is dated from the mid 1860s, when the Earl of Airlie and its sister the Lord Wharncliffe were both retired after 30 years’ service. It was taken to record the appearance before both engines were scrapped.

“It is believed in the family that on the Dundee to Newtyle line they operated the first passenger-carrying service by locomotive traction anywhere in Scotland.

“There had been an earlier locomotive service devoted to the carriage of coal in the Lothians.

“Because of the tightness of some curves on the Dundee to Newtyle line the rear four wheels were mounted on a bogie. The principal of the bogie had already been invented in the very early 1800s, but we believe that our engines were the first anywhere in the world to make use of an actual bogie in practice.

“Another quirk of James’s design is the use of a bell-crank in the motion. It obviously worked for 30 years, but I don’t think anyone else ever used the same principle.”