A GENERAL MANAGER AND HIS OFFICE
January, 1875, was a momentous time for me. In the second week of that
month I commenced my new duties at Glasgow and bade farewell for ever to
the tall stool and "the dry drudgery of the desk's dead wood." Before me
opened a pleasing prospect of attractive and interesting work, brightened
by the beams of youthful hope and awakened ambition. I was now chief
clerk to a general manager. Was it to be wondered at that I felt proud
and elated if also a little scared as to how I should get on.
Mr. Wainwright assumed the office of general manager on the first day of
the year. I say _office_, but in fact a general manager's office
scarcely existed. His predecessor, Mr. Johnstone, a capable but in some
respects a singular man, performed his managerial duties without an
office staff, wrote all his own letters, and not only wrote them but
first carefully drafted them out in a hand minute almost as Jonathan
Swift's. A strenuous worker, Mr. Johnstone, like most men who have no
hobby, did not long survive his retirement from active business life.
Mr. Wainwright, who, like myself, was born in Sheffield, was twenty-three
years my senior. His early railway life was passed in the Manchester,
Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway (now the Great Central), of which the
redoubtable Mr. (afterwards Sir) Edward Watkin was then the lively
general manager.
A different man to his predecessor was Mr. Wainwright. Unlike Mr.
Johnstone he was modern and progressive. _He_ never scorned delights or
loved, for their own sake, laborious days; pleasure to him was as welcome
as sunshine; and work he made a pleasure.
As I have said, no general manager's _office_ existed. Of systematic
managerial supervision there was none. What was to be done? Something
certainly, and soon. Mr. Wainwright concurred in a suggestion I made
that I should visit Derby, see the general manager's office of the
Midland there, and learn how it was conducted. This I did. E. W. Wells,
a principal clerk in that office, who was married to my cousin, showed
and told me everything. I returned laden with knowledge which I embodied
in a report and my recommendations were adopted. Several clerks were
appointed and the general manager's office, of which I was chief clerk,
soon became efficient.
Wells afterwards became Assistant General Manager of the Midland, and
Frank Tatlow, my cousin and brother of Wells' wife, is now its General
Manager, in succession to Sir Guy Granet. I am not a little proud that
the attainments of one who bears the name of Tatlow, and is so nearly
related to myself, have enabled him to reach the topmost post on a
railway such as the Midland Railway of England. He commenced as a junior
clerk in the General Manager's office and worked his way step by step to
that eminent position. No adventitious circumstances helped him on.
I became fond of railway work, which it seems to me for interest and
variety holds a high place among all the occupations by which man, who
was born to labour, may earn his daily bread. My duties were certainly
arduous but intensely interesting. The correspondence with other railway
companies regarding agreements, joint line working, Parliamentary
matters, and many other important subjects, conducted as it required to
be, with skill, care and precision, was for me a liberal education. The
fierce rivalry which, in those days, raged in Scotland for competitive
traffic culminated often in disputes which could only be settled by the
intervention of the general managers, and these brought much exciting
work into the office. Again, the close and intimate relations between
the Midland and the Glasgow and South-Western involved interesting
communications, meetings and discussions, and the keeping of certain
special accounts which it fell to me to supervise.
The Midland and the Glasgow and South-Western alliance was regarded by
the West Coast Companies (the London and North-Western and the
Caledonian) with much disfavour. In their eyes it was an attack upon
their hen roost, and it certainly resulted in the loss to them of a large
share of through traffic between England and Scotland which the West
Coast route had previously had all to itself. To carry on the
competition successfully necessitated a large expenditure of capital by
the Glasgow and South-Western, and the Midland, of course, had to help in
this. The original cost of Saint Enoch Station for instance was nearly
one and three-quarter millions sterling, and a considerable outlay was
also necessary for goods stations and other accommodation. There was in
those days much doing between the general managers' offices of the
Midland and Glasgow and South-Western companies, and it was all
delightfully new and novel to me.
A Committee of Directors of the two companies, called the _Midland and
Glasgow and South-Western Joint Committee_, was established. This
committee, with the two general managers, met periodically either at
Derby, London, Carlisle or Glasgow. Mr. Wainwright acted as secretary
and I kept the minute book and papers relating to the business of the
committee.
Pullman cars had been introduced on the Midland and were run on the
through trains between Saint Pancras and Saint Enoch. The cars were the
property of Mr. Pullman, but the Midland kept them in repair, the Glasgow
and South-Western relieving them of a proportion of the cost
corresponding to the mileage run over their line. Mr. Pullman received
as his remuneration the extra fare paid by the passengers--three
shillings each for drawing-room cars and five shillings each for sleeping
cars. Other through carriages on these trains were jointly owned by the
two companies. The interesting accounts connected with these
arrangements were supervised by me. I commenced work with Mr. Wainwright
on a Monday. The following Saturday afternoon, before leaving the
office, to my great surprise and delight, he presented me with a first-
class station to station pass over the railway. With what pride I showed
it to Tom that evening! Six months later my salary was increased, and
the pleasant fact was announced to me by my kindly chief, coupled with
the expression of a wish that he and I might long work together.
On the Scottish railways the financial half-years ended, not in June and
December, as in other parts of the United Kingdom, but at the end of July
and January. This was for the better equalisation of receipts, taking a
month from the fat half-year to the lean, and giving, in exchange, a
month from the lean to the fat. Soon after the first-half-year was
concluded and the accounts published, which was in the month of September
(my first September with the Glasgow and South-Western), Mr. Wainwright
handed to me a large sheet of closely printed figures, giving a detailed
analysis and comparison of the accounts of five of the principal English
and the three principal Scottish railways in columnar form, with a
request that I should take out the figures and compile for printing a
similar statement for the past half-year, from the accounts of the eight
companies. I trembled inwardly for I had never yet looked at a railway
account, but I took them home, and, as in the case of the Acts of
Parliament, found them simpler than I thought; and, with less trouble
than I expected, succeeded in accomplishing the task.
Mr. Wainwright was himself a skilful statistician and tested everything
he could by the cold logic of figures. I was soon surprised to find that
I too had a taste for statistics and acquired some skill in their
compilation. Up to this I had always imagined that I disliked everything
in the shape of arithmetic. At school I was certainly never fond of it,
and since school my acquaintance with figures had been little more than
the adding up of long columns in huge books at the half-yearly
stocktaking in the stores department at St. Rollox, a thing I detested,
and which invariably gave me a headache. Well pleased was Mr. Wainwright
to see that statistics took my fancy. As general manager he had not much
time himself to devote to them, but the office was now well manned and we
were able to establish, and keep up, tables, statistics and returns
concerning matters of railway working in a way which I have not seen
surpassed. These statistics were of much practical use when considering
questions of economy and other matters from day to day.
My first year as general manager's clerk was, I have always thought, the
most important in my railway life. Certainly in that year I learned much
and acquired from my chief business habits which have stood me in good
stead since. Mr. Wainwright was a man of no ordinary nature, as all who
knew him will admit. He was a pattern of punctuality and promptitude,
never spared himself in doing a thing well and expected the same
thoroughness in others, though he would make allowance for want of
capacity, but not for indolence or carelessness. Straightforwardness,
honesty and rectitude marked all he did. His word was his bond. His
disposition was to trust those around him, and his generous confidence
was usually justified. High-minded and possessing a keen sense of honor
himself, he had an instinctive aversion to anything mean or low in
others. A man of great liberality and generous to a fault he often found
it hard to say no, but when obliged to adopt that attitude it was done
with a tact and courtesy which left no sting. In all business matters he
required a rigid economy though never at the expense of efficiency.
Intellectually he stood high, as I had ample opportunity of judging, but
if asked what were his most striking qualities I should say _goodness_
and a charm of manner which eludes description, but irresistibly
attracted all who met him. In appearance he was tall and portly, and his
bearing, carriage and presence were gentlemanly and refined. He was of
fair complexion, was possessed of a delightful smile, and had side
whiskers (turning white) continued in the old-fashioned way under the
chin, and yet he was so bright and debonair that he never looked
old-fashioned. Like myself he was a great lover of Dickens, and I think
his most prized possession was a small bookcase which had belonged to
Dickens' study and which he purchased at the sale at _Gad's Hill_. His
directors esteemed him highly, and the officers of the company were all
sincerely attached to him. In his room he held almost daily conferences.
Correspondence formed but a small part in his method of dealing with
departments. He believed in the value of _viva voce_ discussion, and
discouraged all unnecessary inter-departmental correspondence. In this
he was right I am sure. The daily conferences were cheerful and
pleasant, for he had the delightful faculty of "mixing business with
pleasure and wisdom with mirth." I consider that I was singularly
fortunate at this period of my life in finding myself placed in close and
intimate association with such a man as Mr. Wainwright, in enjoying his
confidence as I did, and in being afforded the opportunity of benefiting
by his kind precepts and fine example.
[W. J. Wainwright: wainwright.jpg]
In Glasgow there was a weekly paper of much humour and spirit called _The
Bailie_. With each issue it published an article on some prominent man
of the day under the title of _Men You Know_, accompanied by a portrait
of the person selected. It is the Glasgow _Punch_. It was established
in 1873,and "_Ma Conscience_!" is its motto. It still, I am glad to
hear, runs an honorable and profitable course, which its merits well
deserve. In its issue of September 13th, 1882, Mr. Wainwright was _The
Man You Know_, and, at the request of the Editor, I wrote the article
upon him. In it are some words which, penned when I was with him daily,
and his influence was strong upon me, are, perhaps, more true and
faithful than any I could at this distance of time write, and so I will
quote them here, and with them conclude this chapter.
"He (_The Man You Know_) is one upon whom responsibility rests gracefully
and lightly, who accomplishes great things without apparent effort, and
whose personal influence smoothes the daily friction of official life. He
rules with a gentler sway than many who are accustomed to other methods
of command would believe possible. He believes in Emerson's maxim that
if you deal nobly with men they will act nobly, and his habit towards
everyone around him, and its success, lends force to the genial truth of
the American philosopher."