The Whitehaven News in 1929 published extracts from the diary/memoire of Mr Noble Steel, a Whitehaven printer, written in the 1890s:
"When I was quite a child, about the year 1812 a locomotive engine was running at Whitehaven, it was called the "Iron Horse" and was used for drawing waggons from the pits toward the harbour, and was invented and built by Mr. Taylor Swainson, engineer to the Earl of Lonsdale ... Mr Swainson took a holiday. Mr John Peile, the Earl of Lonsdale's colliery agent, being anxious to see the "Iron Horse" at work, sent to Newcastle and succeeded in engaging one of the first engineers ... to endeavour to set the wonderful machine in motion. This great man came and after a vast amount of study and labour he was obliged to admit that it was beyond his power; and there the ingenious contrivance stood still ... At lenght the inventor was himself again and the "Iron Horse" was in less than a week set in motion to the wonder and admiration of congregating thousands."
Folk-memory, perhaps but there is a grain of truth. John Peile was indeed the Agent to the Earl of Lonsdale and was certainly interested in locomotives. In March 1815 he wrote from Whitehaven to John Buddle at Wallsend (near Newcastle) enquiring as to the "results of your experiments in perfecting your Union Moving Steam Wagon" and requested to spend a week with him in spring to see the engine in action. In November 1815 he wrote again asking about any progress which had been made wtih the engine.
It is possible Peile had seen the Chapman locomotive on a visit to the Lambton Railway, or perhaps one of the few other locomotives at work in the North East. On the back of this, on 20 November 1816 Peile ordered, via Phineas Crowther of the Ouseburn Foundry, Newcastle, a locomtoive from John Buddle, which used Chapman's patent bogeys in order to spread the weight of the engine over eight wheels rather than four.
A drawing of a locomotive built to Chapman's patent exists in Cumbria Records Office, dated 16 November 1814. It shows an eight-wheeled gear-driven locomtoive. It is signed P.C., presumably Phineas Crowther.
It is likely that the locomotive was either made in Newcastle, dismantled and re-erected in Whitehaven or was made in Whitehaven under the supervision of the Colliery Enginewright, Taylor Swainson. This would, of course, give rise to the local tradition that Swainson had 'invented' the engine. It should also be noted that Swainson was a friend of John Buddle, and that Buddle often visited Whitehaven in his capacity as Consulting Viewer.
The locomotive was first tried on the Croft wagonway in 1817, but despite being on eight wheels broke up the lightly laid rails. Despite this failure, the locomotive was not scrapped and was rebuilt as a stationary engine. It was taken to Distington Quarry, mounted on two stone pillars and used to work a winding drum which could be engaged or disengaged via a clutch so it could 'pump water, and draw out the stone inclinded planewise.' A drawing of the engine thus converted dated August 1818 shows the locomtoive to have had a single large flue through the boiler and two vertical cylinders set on the centre line, and partially sunk into the boiler, and mounted close together over the two crank shafts. The chimney has a large drum near its base, reminiscent of that of the 'Steam Elephant' by Chapman & Buddle.
The locomtoive was supposedly still in existance as late as 1877.
