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By Tania Parker on

Going Underground with the Price & Reeves Collection

How were London's main transport arteries constructed?

Tania Parker, Search Engine assistant on the National Railway Museum’s Collections and Research team, delves into the archives to reveal some of the challenges faced by engineers and labourers working to connect the modern city.


Air Compressing Plant Crambourne Street [Ref: P&R/1/10/13]
Air Compressing Plant Crambourne Street [Ref: P&R/1/10/13]
If you’ve ever travelled on London Underground’s Northern, Central or Piccadilly Lines or driven through the Rotherhithe Tunnel you may well have set eyes on some of the many projects carried out by civil engineering contractors Price & Reeves. This London-based company operated around the late 19th and early 20th centuries, although we’ve not been able to establish the precise dates, and it was a partnership between John Price & T J Reeves.

London Electric Railway, Edgeware Road to Paddington Station Platform, Permanent Way, Tiling Etc [Ref: P&R/2/11]
London Electric Railway, Edgeware Road to Paddington Station Platform, Permanent Way, Tiling Etc [Ref: P&R/2/11]
The Price & Reeves collection mainly consists of drawings for their various tunnelling and wharf construction contracts, including many for London Underground lines. Alongside the drawings there are 17 images that depict the construction of the Charing Cross, Euston and Hampstead Railway (now part of the Northern Line) and the Rotherhithe Tunnel. The prints are in the form of stereo pairs, which when viewed with a stereoscope give the appearance of a 3D image.

Charing Cross, Euston & Hampstead Railway Gas Mains Oxford Street Station [now Tottenham Court Road] [Ref: P&R/1/10/2]
Charing Cross, Euston & Hampstead Railway Gas Mains Oxford Street Station [now Tottenham Court Road] [Ref: P&R/1/10/2]
These images give a fascinating insight into the hard, dirty and dangerous work that went into constructing London’s transport arteries which have become an integral part of the capital today. The image below is captioned matter-of-factly on the back as ‘No. 1 Shield where man’s finger was cut off’. Certainly, injuries seem to have been commonplace on tunnelling projects.

Rotherhithe Tunnel No. 1 Shield Showing Erector Where Man had Finger Cut Off [Ref: P&R/9/15/2]
Rotherhithe Tunnel No. 1 Shield Showing Erector Where Man had Finger Cut Off [Ref: P&R/9/15/2]
In addition to the many visible hazards that caused injury and death to workers, the methods used to construct tunnels under rivers posed serious risks to workers’ health. Price & Reeves used compressed air whereby the tunnel face work area was made into a pressurised chamber between a bulkhead and the tunnelling shield. The increased air pressure acted against the pressure of the water in the ground and was used in an effort to prevent flooding.

When this method was used on the Charing Cross, Euston and Hampstead Railway, gases escaped through the riverbed and caused the Thames to boil to a height of 3 feet. Unfortunately, the tunnelling work under the river coincided with a boat race from Putney to Charing Cross and compensation had to be paid out for damage to a competitor’s boat!

Elevation of Steel Bulkhead – The airlocks for materials and men were located on the bottom of the bulkhead, and the emergency lock was located on the top section. This was for use during a ‘blow’ or loss of air pressure and allowed the men to try to escape any flooding [Ref: P&R/9/6]
Elevation of Steel Bulkhead – The airlocks for materials and men were located on the bottom of the bulkhead, and the emergency lock was located on the top section. This was for use during a ‘blow’ or loss of air pressure and allowed the men to try to escape any flooding [Ref: P&R/9/6]
On a more serious note, working in a pressurised environment could cause ‘compressed air illness’ – now known as decompression sickness – which in modern times is most commonly encountered by divers. Barotrauma to air cavities in the body was another health risk. The chronic condition dysbaric osteonecrosis could also be suffered by tunnelling workers whereby nitrogen bubbles in the bloodstream could inhibit the blood supply to bone causing it to die. There is reference to the low rate of ‘compressed air illness’ in project engineer Edward H Tabor’s report on the Rotherhithe Tunnel contract.

Air Compressing Plant Crambourne Street [Ref: P&R/1/10/13]
Air Compressing Plant Crambourne Street [Ref: P&R/1/10/13]
While working on the Central London Railway (that now forms part of the Central line) John Price developed his eponymous Price Rotary Excavator. This automated soft-ground excavating machine was manufactured by Markham & Co. in Chesterfield. The machine increased the rate of progress on the Charing Cross Euston and Hampstead contract significantly and reduced the number of workers at the tunnelling face. Price & Reeves also put the machine into service during the construction of the Rotherhithe Tunnel. After the First World War more than 40 of these machines were put into use during the inter-war period for further tunnelling work under London.

'Rotherhithe Tunnel' by E H Tabor, Preprint from Minutes of Proceedings of Institution of Civil Engineers, 21pp, 2 plates [Ref: P&R/9/14]
‘Rotherhithe Tunnel’ by E H Tabor, Preprint from Minutes of Proceedings of Institution of Civil Engineers, 21pp, 2 plates [Ref: P&R/9/14]
In addition to the tunnels and wharves that are documented by the collection, Price & Reeves were also involved in a wide range of other projects such as the construction of the world’s first purpose-built motor racing circuit at Brooklands in Surrey in 1907. They were also involved in the reconstruction efforts in Flanders after the First World War. They worked on the Louvain (or Leuvan) Library, which was destroyed in both world wars, and also had a contract in 1923 with the Imperial War Graves (now known as the Commonwealth War Graves Commission) in Ypres.

Many of the tunnels and wharves that Price & Reeves built still stand today, unfortunately details of the firm’s administrative history, such as when they were founded and ceased operation, have become buried with the passage of time. If you know of any details about the firm or are aware of any sources that might be useful for reconstructing their history then we’d love to hear from you, you can leave a comment below or email me directly at tania.parker@nrm.org.uk.

The Price & Reeves Collection can be found on our new archives catalogue here: http://archives.sciencemuseumgroup.ac.uk/Details/archive/110073967. You can access the collection through Search Engine, our library and archive centre, who can be contacted at search.engine@nrm.org.uk.

7 comments on “Going Underground with the Price & Reeves Collection

  1. More information on this subject would be most welcomed. I worked on the UnderGround as a railway operating apprentice in the mid 1960’s . I feel there maybe many more people with an interest on this subject .

  2. John Price was my great-great-uncle. He’s another example of the observation that engineering skills seem to run in families: his father David Pryce (John changed the spelling so as to seem less Welsh) was a drainage contractor, as was his grandfather, also David, and his two surviving sons Harry and Sidney were both civil engineers. He also had *nine* daughters. His wife Ruth travelled with him to his various projects so the children were born all over England; most notably, his seventh child Eva was born at Pilning in Gloucestershire, from which railway enthusiasts will be able to deduce that Price and Reeves were contractors for the construction of the Severn Railway Tunnel.

    1. Mr T J Reeves is the father-in-law of my 2nd great-grandaunt. He was born on the 12th January 1840. In his later life he also worked with Charles Joseph Wills who is my 3rd Great grandfather, they were in partnership as well as John price from 1893 as the Price, Wills and Reeves partnership. His full name was Thomas James Reeves and he died in 1927 hence no records for his works after this date. The earliest construction work I have reference to in work on the 14 and 15 Portsmouth Docks from 1893-96.

      C J Wills worked as a contractor outside of partnership at various times including works on the Famagusta Harbour in Cyprus. At some point before 1903 he established his own company C.J. Wills and Sons Ltd with two of his sons they then worked for around seven years on projects on the Great Western Railway and most well-known the Becontree housing estate

    2. I am, like yourself, a descendant of John Price. I am a Railway Engineer by profession and have worked abroad on many railway projects I think I can clear up John’s connection with the Severn Tunnel project; the Price, Wills & Reeve Partnership wasn’t formed until 1893, so I assume that John was working for another contractor on that project. The offices of Price, Wills & Reeve were located at 12 Waterloo Place, London, just off Pall Mall. After having a long conversation with my family this week, I can confirm that he lived at Southbank, 17 Lansdowne Road, Wimbledon, London, my late Grandfather Henry, was named after John’s middle name, as he already had an older brother called John.
      The partnership during its existence acquired a sizable fleet of locomotives and tugs, which were used on various contracts all over the world, I believe that one of the locomotives still survives on the Kent & East Sussex Railway. The spelling of my surname changed was changed to its present form: Prise, from Price during the early part of the 20th Century, for reasons I have not quite got to the bottom of as of yet, but i hope this information about our family member is of use to you.

  3. John Henry Price is an ancestor of mine, my Great, Great Grandfather had the same Grandfather (David Pryce, the Elder,) as John Henry Price. Like John Henry Price, the spelling of my family’s surname has changed over the years, to it’s present form, but growing up the name John Henry Price was mentioned quite a lot by my alter Grandfather Henry, who was named after the middle name of John Price, as my Grandfather already had an older brother John, at the time of his birth, in 1911. I have followed into the family tradition, as I am a Railway Engineer by profession and I to have worked on various projects abroad. The name “Southbank,” along with Wimbledon was mentioned quite a lot, in the stories that my late Grandfather, used to tell me about my family history, as a young boy. I know that the company offices were in Waterloo Place just off Pall Mall, I think they were located at number twelve, Waterloo Place. The partnership of Price, Wills & Reeve was founded in 1893, Mr Wills left in approximately 1903, but I can’t confirm if this is correct, the partnership ended with the death of Mr Reeves in 1927, I believe the goodwill was taken over by one of the larger construction companies, but I am not sure which one it was, I don’t have that information. As a Graduate of the University of York’s, “Institute of Railway Studies, ” I am more than happy to pass on the information about my famous ancestor, if it helps with the academic study of our railway history and of those who helped to build our railways.

  4. I envy your attending the Institute of Railway Studies – I’d have loved to do the MA (now inexplicably dropped, I believe).

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