New Castle and Frenchtown Railroad - Newark, DE - Unusual Signs on Waymarking.com

The majority of the United States population in the early 1800s resided in the Mid-Atlantic area north and south of Delaware. Travelers along the east coast from highly populated areas such as New York and Philadelphia had to pass through Delaware to reach Baltimore and Washington DC. During this time of increased overland travel the roads of Delaware were poor and travel by water required a 300 mile journey around the Delmarva Peninsula.

The first attempt at providing an alternative route involved developing improved roads such as turnpikes (New Castle and Frenchtown Turnpike in 1816) and canals (Delaware and Chesapeake Canal in 1829.) Turnpikes were hard to maintain and canals froze over during the winter. Steam provided the answer with the invention of the steamboat and steam-drawn carriage.

The result of the New Castle and Frenchtown Railroad which ran a nearly straight sixteen-mile course from New Castle on the Delaware River to Frenchtown, Maryland on the Elk River, at the head of the Chesapeake Bay. As a result, travelers from Philadelphia (the financial capital) headed to Washington (the political capital) would take a steamboat down the Delaware River to New Castle where they would bard the train to Frenchtown. At Frenchtown, travelers embarked on a steamboat for the final leg of the trip down the Chesapeake to Baltimore. It was among the first railroads in the United Stats and the first in Delaware.

The first steam locomotives were imported from England and local stagecoach builders built the coaches which resembled horse-drawn stagecoaches with modified wheels to ride on the tracks. The fright cards were little more than ordinary wagons.

The first experiment in railroad building literally consisted of nothing more than a road with rails for the horse-drawn coaches to ride on. The smooth rails enabled a horse to pull a load 10 times the weight it could pull on a dirt road.

In July 1830 the work began and the route was divided into 17 section, each with a contractor who supervised the excavation fo the roadbed, (especially where inclines had to be overcome) the erection of embankments over marsh areas, the digging of drains and the construction of culverts.

The roadbed was constructed after the fashion of the early English railroads. Rails were placed about the same distance apart as in modern roads, but instead of being laid on wooden sleepers, rails were places upon blocks of stone, 13 to 18 inches square, laid in a base of sand and gravel. Wooden plugs were inserted into two holes drilled into the stones eight inches apart. Wooden rails about six inches square and 10 or 12 feet long were fastened to the stones by a piece of flat L-shaped iron. These stones were placed about three feet apart and each stone had two or three iron attachments, one on each side of the rial, spiked into wooden plugs. Fifty-eight thousand stones were needed to cover the entire length of the railroad. Bars of thin iron imported from England were piked on top of the wooden rails with spiked manufactured by the Tory Nail Works of New York.

The first railroad opened to full passenger service on February 28, 1832. The trip was a success and took only about an hour and twenty minutes being pulled by horses. The railroad directors had arranged as early as June 1831 for a steam engine to be constructed by Robert Stevenson of New Castle, England for £850. The Delaware was to make its maiden voyage on September 1, 1832.

The Niles Register of Baltimore on March 3, 1832 reported: "The Frenchtown and New Castle Railroad was opened for transportation of persons and goods on Thursday last. One of the coaches built to run upon it may well be called a traveling 'Palace' because of its convenience and it will comfortably seat fifty persons inside or out."

By 1837 the railroad had progressed from a rudimentary horse-drawn train to one of the most modern lines in the country. A second track was laid parallel to the first and four trains began to run daily, two in each direction. Three newer engines, the "Maryland", "New Castle" and "Virginia" were made by the New Castle Manufacturing Company' foundry and shop.

The New Castle and Frenchtown Railroad might have remained an important connection link between the north and south, but in 1837 a rival rail line stretching from Philadelphia to Baltimore was completed. The new all-land approach was far superior to the old steamboat and railroad combination. It was faster, more efficient and capable of operating throughout the year. Despite hopes of its promoters, the New Castle and Frenchtown Railroad was obsolete five years after its completion. Delawares first railroad was discontinued in 1853.

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