ABSTRACT
The first railway promotion boom of 1836 led to the formation of stock exchanges at Liverpool and Manchester. The second and much larger railway mania of the mid-eighteen forties resulted in the setting up of similar institutions in most of the large cities and industrial towns of England, Wales, and Scotland. The City correspondent of The Times in November 1845, held that “these marts for trafficking in stocks and shares were not at all called for, as real business could be transacted through any local banker with little delay and on as good terms and in London”. He further alleged that they had been “principally instrumental in fomenting all over the country the fatal passion for speculating in railways”. 1 His complacency as to the facilities of the early London railway share market is understandable but the sweeping condemnation of provincial markets, and the provincial investor, betray an ignorance of the significant contribution which provincial capital made to railway development, and also the importance which reasonably sophisticated provincial investors attached to having easy access not only to speculative but also to investment facilities.
