ENGLISH RAILROAD REGULATOR (CA. 1870)

B.R.(BRITISH RAIL) N.E. (NORTH EAST) #2648

In the years before 1840 there were different local times in use all over the United Kingdom, but in November 1840 the Great Western Railway first adopted Railway Time, this was brought about largely by the advances in the electric telegraph apparatus which had been developed in the early part of the 19th century and was first installed on a short section of the Great Western Railway in 1839.

By 1852 a telegraphic link had been established between a new electro-magnetic clock at Greenwich connected via the Central Telegraph Station of the Electric Time Company in the City of London which enabled the transmission of a time signal along the railway telegraphic network to other stations by 1855 time signals from Greenwich could be sent through the railway companies wires than ran alongside the railway lines across the length and breadth of Britain.

On 22 September 1847 the Railway Clearing House set up in 1842 to coordinate the distribution of passenger fares and charges for the transport of goods between the individual railway companies, decreed that “GMT be adopted at all stations as soon as the General Post Office permitted it”, by 1855 95 percent of towns and cities had transferred to GMT but it was not until 2 August 1880, when the Statutes (Definition of Time) Act received the Royal Assent and a unified standard time for the whole of Great Britain finally achieved legal status. Most British Railway clocks were purchased in the period from 1850 to 1920, later purchases were due to clocks being replaced after becoming time expired.

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Link here to the video

Many thanks to CJ Clock Galleries