Edward Betts
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Edward Ladd Betts (5 June 1815 - 21 January 1872) was an English civil engineering contractor who was mainly involved in the building of railways.
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[edit] Early life
He was born at Buckland, near Dover, the son of a contractor's agent, William Betts. He was apprenticed to a builder at Lincoln but becoming more interested in engineering he then worked as agent for Hugh McIntosh building the Black Rock lighthouse at Beaumaris, Anglesey.
[edit] Railway contractor
His first railway undertaking was to supervise for McIntosh the building of the Dutton viaduct on the Grand Junction Railway under George Stephenson as engineer. After the death of McIntosh in 1840 William Betts & Sons gained contracts on the South Eastern Railway in a stretch which included the Saltwood tunnel. After that Edward Betts continued to gain contracts, now on his own, especially in the Chester area.
In 1843 Betts married the sister of another railway contractor, Samuel Morton Peto. When Peto's partnership with Thomas Grissell was dissolved in 1846 Betts worked with Peto on parts of the Great Northern Railway. In 1848 the pair established a formal partnership and together they were to work on a large number of railway contracts, frequently also working in partnership with Thomas Brassey. Possibly the greatest enterprise of this trio was the building of the Grand Trunk Railway in Canada. Betts undertook the actual management of the venture which included the Victoria bridge across the St Lawrence River at Montreal.[1] Other railways were built by Peto and Betts in Denmark, Russia, Algeria, South America and Australia.
[edit] The Grand Crimean Central Railway
Peto, Betts and Brassey built at great speed the Grand Crimean Central Railway which enabled supplies, particularly heavy ammunition, to be transported from Balaclava to the British troops engaged in the siege of Sevastopol in the Crimean War. Betts in particular was responsible for obtaining the enormous amount of supplies and equipment, the fleet of ships to convey them from England to the Black Sea and the navvies and skilled workers needed to carry out the work, also in a very short period of time.[2]
[edit] Domestic and civil
Around 1850 Betts bought a 'palatial residence', Preston Hall near Aylesford in Kent, and had it rebuilt in a Jacobean style, where he employed a staff of 18. Also in the 1850s he had a London home at 29 Tavistock Square where he employed a further 8 servants and by 1860 he had moved to Great George Street, Westminster. In 1858, already a magistrate and a deputy lieutenant, he became high sheriff of Kent. In the general election of 1865 he contested the Maidstone seat as a Conservative, but was unsuccessful.[1]
[edit] Later life
In the 1860s Betts and Peto overstretched themselves with the result that they ran into financial difficulties in the banking crisis of 1866. They became insolvent in the following year. Only minor works were to follow for Betts; small alterations to the Metropolitan Railway and an abortive attempt to improve the navigation of the River Danube. After his bankruptcy he moved to Bickley, near Bromley, Kent. For the sake of his health he was sent by his doctors to Egypt in 1871 but he died the following year in Aswan. He was buried at Aylesford. His estate was valued at under £16,000.[1]
[edit] References
- ^ a b c Port, M. H., 'Betts, Edward Ladd (1815-1872)', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004. Online edn, Oct 2006, accessed 16 February 2007.
- ^ Cooke, Brian The Grand Crimean Central Railway, pp. 22-26. Cavalier House, Knutsford, 1990. ISBN 0-9515889-0-7
[edit] Further reading
- Joby, R S The Railway Builders: Lives and Works of the Victorian Railway Conctractors, David & Charles, Newton Abbot, 1983, ISBN 0-7153-7959-3
