commercial education at a Chester school. At the age of sixteen he was
apprenticed to a surveyor, and on the completion of his term became the
partner of his master, eventually assuming the sole management of the
business. In the local surveys to which he devoted his attention during
his early years he acquired the knowledge and practical experience which
were the necessary foundation of his great reputation. His first
engagement as railway contractor was entered upon in 1835, when he
undertook the execution of a portion of the Grand Junction railway, on
the invitation of the distinguished engineer Joseph Locke, who soon
afterwards entrusted him with the completion of the London and
Southampton railway, a task which involved contracts to the amount of
L4,000,000 sterling and the employment of a body of 3000 men. At the
same time he was engaged on portions of several other lines in the north
of England and in Scotland. In conjunction with his partner, W.
Mackenzie, Brassey undertook, in 1840, the construction of the railway
from Paris to Rouen, of which Locke was engineer. He subsequently
carried out the extension of the same line. A few years later he was
engaged with his partner on five other French lines, and on his own
account on the same number of lines in England, Wales and Scotland.
Brassey was now in control of an industrial army of 75,000 men, and the
capital involved in his various contracts amounted to some L36,000,000.
But his energy and capacity were equal to still larger tasks. He
undertook in 1851 other works in England and Scotland; and in the
following year he engaged in the construction of railways in Holland,
Prussia, Spain and Italy. One of his largest undertakings was the Grand
Trunk railway of Canada, 1100 m. in length, with its fine bridge over
the St Lawrence. In this work he was associated with Sir M. Peto and
E.L. Betts. In the following years divisions of his industrial army were
found in almost every country in Europe, in India, in Australia and in
South America. Besides actual railway works, he originated and
maintained a great number of subordinate assistant establishments, coal
and iron works, dockyards, &c., the direction of which alone would be
sufficient to strain the energies of an ordinary mind. His profits were,
of course, enormous, but prosperity did not intoxicate him; and when
heavy losses came, as sometimes they did, he took them bravely and
quietly. Among the greatest of his pecu