Charles Castleman (1807–1876) was an English solicitor, railway planner, justice of the peace and prison inspector.

Personal life

Born 1807 at Allendale House in

Wimborne Wimborne Minster (often referred to as Wimborne, ) is a market town in Dorset in South West England, and the name of the Church of England church in that town. It lies at the confluence of the River Stour and the River Allen, north of Poole ...

to William Castleman (founder of the Christchurch, Wimborne and Ringwood Bank), Charles was one of ten children, only three of whom survived into adulthood (Charles, Henry and Edward - all becoming solicitors). He first married Martha, who died of a fever at the age of 41 in 1848, and then married Louisa Hussey in 1852, who died of tuberculosis in 1854. He married Isabel Swinburne in 1859, and in 1862 they moved to the

Glasshayes Glasshayes House is a historic country house in Lyndhurst, in The New Forest, Hampshire. Used in the 20th century as the ''Grand Hotel'', then the '' Lyndhurst Park Hotel'', it exists today in the form of a 1912 redesign by Sir Arthur Conan Doy ...

estate in Lyndhurst,

New Forest The New Forest is one of the largest remaining tracts of unenclosed pasture land, heathland and forest in Southern England, covering southwest Hampshire and southeast Wiltshire. It was proclaimed a royal forest by William the Conqueror, featu ...

. Whilst in residence at Lyndhurst he gifted the clock to the clocktower of the newly built local church of St Michael and All Angels. He and Isabel later moved to Surrey, and then on to Bishopstoke in Eastleigh where he suffered kidney failure, dying on 17 July 1876.

Railway career

In 1844 Castleman conceived of the

Southampton and Dorchester Railway The Southampton and Dorchester Railway was an English railway company formed to join Southampton in Hampshire with Dorchester, Dorset, Dorchester in Dorset, with hopes of forming part of a route from London to Exeter. It received Parliamentary au ...

, and approached the London and South Western Railway company (LSWR) with the idea. Fully operational by June 1847, the route was a success and (due to its circuitous pattern) is widely known as Castleman's Corkscrew, and remembered today in the

Castleman Trailway The Castleman Trailway is a footpath in Southern England. Portions of the trailway are also used as a cyclepath but the middle section from East Wimborne (close to The Old Thatch public house) to the River Allen bridge (just south of Wimbor ...

. He was appointed director of the LSWR in 1855, then deputy chairman in 1859, and finally chairman in 1872.Jackson, Brian. Castleman's Corkscrew including the Railways of Bournemouth and Associated Lines, ''Oakwood Press publication'' (ISBN 9 780853 616665), 2008

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Castleman, Charles 1807 births 1876 deaths British people in rail transport New Forest English solicitors English justices of the peace People from Wimborne Minster 19th-century English lawyers