Robert Sharpe (1804-1868) was a contractor on railway projects in England, Wales and Brazil. He was also a noted farmer and stockbreeder on his estate, Hewelsfield Court, in Gloucestershire. He was born in

Grindon, County Durham Grindon is a village and former civil parish, now in the parish of Grindon and Thorpe Thewles, in the Stockton-on-Tees district, in the ceremonial county of Durham, England. The civil parish population at the census 2001 was 2,603 reducing t ...

, England in 1804. He and his brothers John and Paul were later engaged in various railway works in England and Wales including Whiteball Tunnell on the

Bristol and Exeter Railway The Bristol and Exeter Railway (B&ER) was an English railway company formed to connect Bristol and Exeter. It was built on the broad gauge and its engineer was Isambard Kingdom Brunel. It opened in stages between 1841 and 1844. It was allied wi ...

, the South Devon Railway and the

South Wales Railway The South Wales Railway () was a main line railway which opened in stages from 1850, connecting the Great Western Railway from Gloucester to South Wales. It was constructed on the broad gauge. An original aspiration was to reach Fishguard to eng ...

. Robert Sharpe also completed works for Gloucester and Deane Forest Railway,

Cornwall Railway The Cornwall Railway was a broad gauge railway from Plymouth in Devon to Falmouth, Cornwall, Falmouth in Cornwall, England, built in the second half of the nineteenth century. It was constantly beset with shortage of capital for the construct ...

and the

Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a History of rail transport in Great Britain, British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, ...

. In 1851, Robert had a steam powered flour and grist mill built in Chepstow, between the gas works and the railway embankment. He ran the mill in partnership with Mr. James Ireland, a cornfactor and miller from Bristol, under the name The Chepstow Steam Mill Company. The firm was successful for a number of years, but was sold in 1863 after running into difficulties. On 8 February 1860, Robert Sharpe & Sons (a partnership between Robert and his two sons Paul Wallace and William John) signed a contract with the San Paulo Railway Company, to build a line between Santos and Jundiahy, via

São Paulo São Paulo (; ; Portuguese for 'Paul the Apostle, Saint Paul') is the capital of the São Paulo (state), state of São Paulo, as well as the List of cities in Brazil by population, most populous city in Brazil, the List of largest cities in the ...

, for the agreed sum of £1,745,000. On 1 October 1866 the railway was completed, handed over to and accepted by the company. Robert Sharpe died on 25 July 1868 at

Addlestone Addlestone ( or ) is a town in Surrey, England. It is located approximately southwest of London. The town is the administrative centre of the Runnymede (borough), Borough of Runnymede, of which it is the largest settlement. Geography Addlesto ...

, Chertsey, Surrey, aged sixty four. He was buried at St. Margarets,

West Hoathly West Hoathly is a village and civil parish in the Mid Sussex District of West Sussex, England, located south west of East Grinstead. In the 2001 census 2,121 people, of whom 1,150 were economically active, lived in 813 households. At the 201 ...

Chancery Court of Appeal: Sharpe v. San Paulo Railway

In 1871 Paul Wallace Sharpe and William John Sharpe attempted to sue San Paulo Railway to recover additional costs of £617,143 which they had incurred when the company's engineer had altered the plans from the original specification. The case reached the Chancery Court of Appeal in 1872, but was thrown out.

Lord Romilly John Romilly, 1st Baron Romilly PC (20 January 1802 – 23 December 1874), known as Sir John Romilly between 1848 and 1866, was an English Whig politician and judge. He served in Lord John Russell's first administration as Solicitor-General ...

and Sir W. M. James stated that if the contractors had disapproved of the new arrangements, they ought to have entered into a fresh contract with the company. It was clear, they said, that the engineer had no power to alter the contract, and that the verbal agreement between him and contractor could not bind the company. Shortly after this, the company Robert Sharpe & Sons was dissolved.

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Sharpe, Robert 19th-century English businesspeople 1804 births 1868 deaths