_To the Editor of the_ DUDLEY AND MIDLAND COUNTIES EXPRESS.
SIR,--Scarcely three months have rolled over our heads, since
the leading officials of the above line did penance on the
stool of public opinion, erected at a town's meeting held in
the Old Town Hall, Dudley, "to consider the disgraceful state
of the Railway Station in Dudley, and the want of railway
accommodation afforded to the town generally."
On that occasion a considerable amount of _special pleading_
was resorted to by the parties complained of; and much _stress_
was placed upon _their intentions for the future_, promising to
mend their ways (and the station also) if the indulgent public
would only continue to pay their money, take their trips, and
cease grumbling.
Such, in June last, was the _promise given_; now, Mr.
Editor, let us see how the _performance_ has tallied with
that pledge of amendment. Report, with her thousand tongues,
runs rife in our busy streets and gossiping saloons, saying
that the good people located at Queen's Cross, in the
densely populated streets surrounding the Gas Works, and the
industrious community at Netherton, are to have _their station
accommodation increased_ (when they wish to go to Stourbridge,
&c.) like the Yankee fashion of _progressing backwards_; for
it is said, that the Netherton station is doomed to be blotted
out of the fair features of this eccentric line, by being
knocked off the line for passenger traffic altogether. If such
be correct, this false economising system seems fitted to make
those inhabitants _pay an extra fare_, and stretch their aged
or rheumatic limbs, by walking to and from their domiciles down
to the Dudley station; besides giving the timorous the benefit
of an unnecessary fright in our waterproof tunnel.
Doubtless, Mr. Editor, you can furnish the public with some
_official contradiction to this rumour_; otherwise we must be
up and doing, ere our contested rights (hardly fought for,
and fairly won in 1845-6) are wrested from our hands by some
mistaken system of cheeseparing and illiberality.
If the aged, lame, infirm, or timid railway traveller casts
his anxious eye towards the Dudley station, expecting to find
_any improvement_ effected at that delightful arena of decorum
and propriety, (more especially on a wet Saturday night), he
will be most woefully deceived. For can it be supposed, Mr.
Editor, that a railway company, already prolific in blunders,
misunderstandings, and broken promises, could be so egregiously
foolish as recently to remove their ticket office at the
Dudley Station from its legitimate ground-floor platform to
the extreme entrance of that _highly artistic wooden tunnel_,
spanning its unwieldy proportions across the domain of two
important railway companies!! To passengers starting from
Dudley _the boon_ is offered, we presume, as being highly
convenient to take your ticket before you take your choice of
_standing_ upon that spacious gallery. In warm weather it may
be thought pleasant to cool one's heels in a mighty torrent
of wind and dust, usually generated in that elegant ladies'
waiting room (?); but pray, Mr. Editor, are our shivering limbs
to be subjected to the piercing winds of a severe winter's
night,--_sans fire, sans doors, sans seats_--yea, _sans
everything_ that ought to be afforded to an important town like
Dudley?
This, truly, may suit the economy of the O. W. and W. R. Co.,
but surely the sensible, well-thinking, and comfort-loving
people of Dudley _will not tamely submit to this additional_
indignity. To the casual traveller (more especially the infirm,
aged, and children) who may be so unlucky as to require
_rebooking from an in-coming train_ on the South Stafford line,
the amount of annoyance and physical exertion cannot fail to be
intolerable. Fancy, sir, some poor aged traveller, or a lady
with children (_not an O. W. and W. Railway Director_) arriving
by a late train on the South Stafford line, and having to
hobble or rush up and down two pairs of slippery stairs, then
along that precious gangway, for another ticket, occupying some
considerable time at the present spacious ticket office, ere
they can arrive at the object of their solicitude, the waiting
train below.
Such scenes would appear decidedly improbable in this our day
of tidy railway accommodation; but, Mr. Editor, if you or the
proper officials connected with the line are at all doubtful
of the truthfulness of the same, pray let me induce both to
witness (on any coming dark or rainy Thursday or Saturday
evening) the arrival of a South Stafford train, laden with its
living freight of young and old, halt and timid--and I venture
to predict that you will think that my remonstrance and call
to duty are not overcharged, but that we live in times when
the honour, integrity, and liberality of a railway company can
be summoned legitimately to the bar of public judgment _for
neglect of duty and broken promises_, viz., for committing
a positive and palpable deviation--thereby breaking faith
with the public--from the offered accommodation intended to
be secured to the inhabitants of Dudley when its promoters
originally _solicited that public_ to give it their preference
to a competing line in 1844-5-6.
I am, your obedient servant,
C. F. G. CLARK.
_Dudley, Oct. 27, 1857._
[In our first number we drew attention to the disgraceful
state of the station accommodation of this town. Unless strong
measures are adopted we think little will be done.]
A long-suffering period of twenty-two years passed over our heads
before the London and North Western Railway Company could be prevailed
upon to erect a decent Railway Station for Dudley.