Title
Aquatinted illustration - The Tunnel
Reference
YA1983.9/4/1
Production date
1831 - 1831
Creator
- Pyall, HenryBiographyBiography
Henry Pyall was an engraver and aquatinter who sometimes worked in partnership with Charles and George Hunt. He produced a series of views on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway with S. G. Hughes.
- Ackermann, RudolphBiographyBiography
Rudolph Ackermann was born on 20 April 1764 at Stollberg, near Leipzig, in Saxony. When he was fifteen, Ackermann was apprenticed to his elder brother Friedrich, a saddler. During his apprenticeship, he also learned to draw and engrave. In 1782 started training as a carriage designer, first in Dresden and then at Hueningen, in Switzerland. In 1784 he was employed for six months by Antoine Carassi in Paris. He worked for the carriage maker Simons in Brussels in 1785–6. He moved to England in 1787, where his model of a state coach for the carriage maker Goodall led to his first important commission in 1790, to design a state coach for the lord lieutenant of Ireland. Between 1791 and 1820 he published thirteen books of designs for carriages.
Ackermann formed close connections with other émigrés from Saxony, most significantly with the Facius brothers and with J. C. Stadler, who worked as engravers for the leading print publisher John Boydell. From 1795-1805, he ran a drawing school in Strand, and in 1796 he published the first of many drawing books. In 1797, he began publishing decorative hand-coloured prints.
During the first decade of the 19th century, Ackermann continued to design state and other carriages.
He became a United Kingdom citizen on 24 March 1809.
In 1808 and 1809, Ackermann issued two publications which secured his reputation as a publisher of the finest colour plate books: The Microcosm of London, and the monthly magazine Repository of Arts. Ackermann employed the architectural draughtsman Augustus Pugin, and the figure drawer Thomas Rowlandson to provide illustrations and architectural drawings for his engravings.
Ackermann formally handed over his business, Ackermann & Co, to his younger sons in October 1832. He suffered a stroke in November 1833 and died on 30 March 1834 at his home at Cold Harbour, Finchley.
Scope and Content
Plate 1 of a series of aquatints of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, titled 'The Tunnel'. It was engraved by Henry Pyall, after an image by Thomas Talbot Bury, and was published by R. Ackermann, London, 1831.
Using gunpowder and muscle power, railway builders tunnelled for over two kilometres under Liverpool’s bustling streets. This tunnel carried the Liverpool and Manchester Railway to the docks where goods where loaded and unloaded.
The tunnel was created by 300 workers hacking with simple tools and blasting with explosives. They dug out earth and rock by candlelight. Once complete, the tunnel was lit by gas.
Level of description
ITEM
Repository name
Science and Industry Museum
Associated people and organisations
- Bury, Thomas TalbotBiographyBiography
The architect and engraver Thomas Talbot Bury was born in London in 1809. He studied under Augustus Charles Pugin as an articled apprentice from 1824-1830. In 1830, he established his own studio at 7 Gerrard Street, Soho. From 1845-1849, Bury was in partnership with Charles Lee. Alongside his architectural practice, Bury produced engravings and lithographs of his own and other architects' drawings, notably those of Augustus Welby Pugin and Owen Jones. Bury worked with A W Pugin on designs for the details of the houses of parliament under Sir Charles Barry. Bury became an associate of the Institute of British Architects in 1839, and a fellow in 1843. He became a vice-president in 1876. In 1863, he was made a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, and was also a member of the council of the Royal Archaeological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, a member of the Cambrian Archaeological Association, and an associate of the Society of Civil Engineers.
The first edition of his Coloured Views of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway was published by Rudolph Ackermann in 1831. Bury’s prints are the finest of the various series of prints published to commemorate the opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, on 15 September 1830. The prints include thirteen hand-coloured aquatint plates engraved by H. Pyall and S. G. Hughes from drawings made by Bury.
Bury died on 23 February 1877 at home at 50 Welbeck Street, Cavendish Square, London, and is buried at Norwood cemetery.
- Liverpool & Manchester Railway CoBiographyBiography
The Liverpool and Manchester Railway was first proposed by William James and Joseph Sanders in 1821. In 1826 George Stephenson was appointed chief engineer. The company originally intended to use fixed locomotives to pull freight trains between Liverpool and Manchester, but following the Rainhill Trial competition of 6 October 1829, locomotives in the style of Stephenson's Rocket were commissioned. The company opened the line between Liverpool and Manchester on 15 September 1830. The first passengers travelled along the line two days later and goods on 1 December. The Liverpool and Manchester Railway was absorbed into the Grand Junction Railway on 8 August 1845.
Subject
Conditions governing access
Open access.
Conditions governing Reproduction
Copies may be supplied in accordance with current copyright legislation and Science Museum Group terms and conditions.
