Huntingdon Beaumont

Who was Huntingdon Beaumont?

Huntingdon Beaumont was an innovative entrepreneur in coal mining, who built what is currently credited as the world's first wagonway. Regrettably he was less successful as a businessman and died having been imprisoned for debt.

Beaumont was the youngest of four sons born to Sir Nicholas Beaumont and his wife Ann. They were an aristocratic family in the English East Midlands. There were several branches to the Beaumont dynasty and this was the one based at Coleorton in Leicestershire. He was therefore of gentleman status in the formal Elizabethan sense.

The family owned coal bearing lands and worked them. Beaumont was involved in this coal working and eventually in the late 16th century during the reign of Elizabeth I he began working in his own right in the Nottingham area. During his partnership with Sir Percival Willoughby, Lord of the Wollaton Manor, in 1603-4 he constructed the Wollaton Wagonway. The Wagonway may not be the world's first wagonway with edged rails, but the earliest known specific documentary evidence relates to it, so that it was credited as the world's first. Recent work suggests that a wagonway in Shropshire may be earlier.

The Wagonway ran from Strelley where he held mining leases to Wollaton Lane. Beaumont can therefore be credited with the title of the "Great Grandfather of railways". He had also worked in the Wollaton and Lenton areas previously.