1859 England and Wales, Scotland, and Ireland Parliamentary Railway Return
This is an original 1859 parliamentary blue book report titled "Return Showing the Number of Passengers conveyed on all the Railways in England and Wales, Scotland, and Ireland..." for the half-year ended 30th June 1859. Printed by George Edward Eyre and William Spottiswoode, printers to the Queen's Most Excellent Majesty, it provides an incredibly detailed statistical snapshot of the Victorian railway network at the height of its expansion.
The report contains exhaustive, line-by-line tabular data for dozens of historic railway companies across England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, detailing passenger numbers by class (including Parliamentary Class), receipts, mileage, live stock, and mineral traffic (such as coal, iron ore, and stone).
Type: Original Parliamentary Return / Blue Book / Railway History Ephemera.
Year / Date: 1859 (for the half-year ending 30th June 1859).
Publisher: George Edward Eyre and William Spottiswoode, London.
Pagination: 37 pages.
Dimensions: Measures approximately 32 cm by 20 cm.
Content Details: Includes data on historic lines such as the Birkenhead, Bodmin and Wadebridge, Bristol and Exeter, Caledonian, Dundee and Arbroath, Belfast and Ballymena, Cork and Bandon, Dublin and Wicklow, and many others.
Condition: Clean internal pages with clear, crisp typography and data tables. It is clearly disbound from a larger volume of acts, with sellotape strengthening applied to the spine. There is minor edge wear and light uniform toning appropriate for its age, but otherwise it remains an excellent, complete research or collector's piece.
Shipping: Will be packaged flat inside a rigid, board-backed envelope to guarantee it arrives safely without bending.