ABSTRACT
Few of the engineers and contractors who built railways through the predominantly rural districts of Wales were blessed with sufficient capital to realize their ambitions. The central region, for example, failed to attract the support of either of the major English companies then just across the border at Shrewsbury. Rails were eventually laid between the Marches and the coast of Cardigan Bay only through the efforts of prominent Montgomeryshire men like the engineer Benjamin Piercy, the redoubtable David Davies of Llandinam, and the rather more cavalier Savin brothers of Oswestry.
