Page:Times 1862-01-08 American Mail by Europa.png



The arrangements for expressing the American mails throughout from Queenstown to London which we have described as being so successfully executed with the mails brought by the Africa last week, have been repeated with stiIl more satisfactory results in the case of the mails brought by the Europa. These results are so exceptional that we record them in detail. The Europa arrived off Queenstown, abut five miles from the pier at 9 p.m. on Monday night. Her mails and the despatches from Lord Lyons were placed on board the small tender in waiting, and arrived at the Queenstown pier at 10 5 p.m., at which point they were transferred to an express steamboat for conveyance by river to Cork. Leaving Queenstown pier at 10 10 p.m. they arrived alongside the quay at Cork at 11 15 p.m. and 13 minutes afterwards the special train left the Cork station for Dublin accomplishing the journey to Dublin (166 miles) in four hours and three minutes, i.e. at a speed of about 41 miles an hour, including stoppage. The transmission through the streets between the railway termini in Dublin and by special train to Kingstown occupied only 33 minutes, and in four minutes more the special mailboat Ulster was on her way to Holyhead. The distance across the Irish Channel, about 66 statute miles, was performed by the Ulster, against a contrary tide and heavy sea, in three hours and 47 minutes, giving a speed of about 17 1/2 milea an hour. The special train, which had been in waiting for about 48 hours, left the Holyhead Station at 8 13 a.m., and it was from this point that the most remarkable part of this rapid express commenced. The run from Holyhead to Stafford, 130 miles, occupied only 145 minutes, being at the rate of no less than 54 miles on hour, and although so high a speed was judiciously not attempted over the more crowded portion of the line from Stafford to London, the whole distance from Holyhead to Euston, 264 miles, was performed by the London and North-Western Company in exactly five hours, or at a speed of about 52 2/3 miles an hour, a speed unparalleled over so long a line, crowded with ordinary traffic. The entire distance from Queenstown pier to Euston-square about 515 miles, was thus traversed in 15 hour and three minutes at an average speed of about 34 1/4 miles an hour, including all delays neccessary for the several transfers of the mails from boat to railway or vice versâ. The time occupied by the similar express with the Africa’s mails was 16 hours and 50 minutes, and not 17 hours and 10 minutes at was stated in our last account. By means of the invention for supplying the tender with water from a trough in transitu the engine was enabled to run its first stage of 130 1/2 miles, from Holyhead to Stafford, without stopping.