A short walk around the Forth Bank Works site from Newcastle Central Station.
Above - The original Rocket of 1829.
In 1823 Robert Stephenson & Co established the first purpose built locomotive works at Forth Bank in Newcastle just south of where Newcastle Central station now stands. The first locomotive built was Locomotion for the Stockton and Darlington Railway in 1825. The works eventually became too small to meet the increasing orders for railways all over the world and the company relocated to Darlington. The first locomotive left Darlington in 1902 and Forth Bank closed in 1904, although another locomotive builder Hawthorn Leslie & Co had a works alongside the site. Robert Stephenson took over Hawthorn Leslie during a downturn in the industry in 1937, forming Robert Stephenson & Hawthorns which in turn went on to become part to English Electric. Locomotive building continued until 1961 at Newcastle and Darlington in 1964.
When Stephenson’s Newcastle works closed in 1904 the site passed to George and Jobling motor engineers who used the site to make bodies for imported Ford chassis. In the First World War the site made aircraft.
More about the history of the site can be found on the Robert Stephenson Trust website.
The offices and boiler shop survived in to recent years and an attempt was made to restore them as a museum, though the Robert Stephenson Trust vacated the site in 2009 and the site has since been used as an occasional events venue. I visited in 2008 when it was possible to look around the surviving buildings.
1947 Map The Stephenson works is shown as Motor Engineering Works alongside to the west is Hawthorn Leslie’s Forth Bank Works.
Below - The former rail access to the works, the rails can be seen set in to the road through the gate.
Below - The former works offices on South Street.
Below - The entrance to the boiler shop. Note the recycled beam engine beam used as a lintel.
Below - A recent shot of the entrance to the Boiler Shop venue, looking much more like a night club entrance than an engine works.
Below - A view along South Street.
Below - An earlier view of the site from Wikipedia.
Below - Inside the former boiler shop.
Below - The boiler shop seen from the east side looking across part of the former Hawthorn Leslie.
Below - A recent view looking at the buildings beyond the Boiler Shop, the former Pattern Shop. This wasn't part of the complex that was earmarked for the proposed museum and since the end of the site's industrial use it has been converted to offices.
Below - Site of the rail access to Hawthorn Leslie’s works across Forth Street.
Below - Buildings of the former Hawthorn Leslie works. The site has been redeveloped recently and a modern building for North East Futures UTC occupies the site now.
Below - One small remnant of the Hawthorn Leslie works survives on the other side of the modern North East Futures building. The Tyne & Wear Metro line now cuts through the former works site. In this recent photo one of the new Metro units is about to pass through what was once part of the main works building. What was once an internal wall that supported overhead cranes can be seen on the left. A small part of the works building on the left is incorporated in the North East Futures site.
