Volume One - Into the Victorian Age - The dock extension of 1883 . . .

On this side, there are two tier-like lines of rails running along the rock, on roads formed above each other. On the lower line, which immediately overlooks the dock, several cranes have already been set up, and generally speaking, matters are beginning to assume a practical shape. In the meantime the work is to be seen at a very interesting stage. It is well worth a visit.

At night the scene is specially remarkable, as the groups of men, the horses, and the engines are all seen working and moving to and fro in a most weird fashion among the lights of torches and fires, which are rendered all the more lurid and dreamy by the red walls of newly-disclosed rock which surround, as in a kind of amphitheatre, the multifarious operations which are going on. To the unobservant eye, the whole work would appear to be a hugh confusion, and the object of hurrying to and fro of men, horses, machinery would not be seen; but to the intelligent observer it might seem to resemble the operations of a large colony of ants, no single movement being made without an economical purpose, and everything tending to one ultimate result, viz., the completion in perfect order of a beneficial and, indeed, a gigantic piece of work. We may mention that the engineers are Sir John Hawkshaw and Mr. G. Fisher; resident engineer Mr. Henry Fisher. The cost of the work is estimated at about £150,000, the area of dock being 5½ acres." Cardiff Times [019] 30th June 1883.

On the 10th April 1884, The Western Daily Press of Bristol [022] stated:

“Penarth Dock Extension - The masonry has been finished some time, and the water admitted, an opening having been made in the old embankment for that purpose. A vessel on Monday passed through the opening, and took up her station under one of the coal-tips, which are worked by hydraulic pressure.

The lines connecting the tip with the railway were completed on Tuesday, and on Wednesday in the presence of Mr Fisher (the resident director), Mr H. O. Fisher (engineer), Mr Hurman (traffic manager), Mr Edwards (manager of the Penarth traffic at the Docks), and a number of promoters of Barry Dock, who happened to be at Penarth for purposes connected with the Barry Docks Bill, the first wagon was tipped into the vessel from the new tip. There are four tips in the extension, and the water area as well as the power of tipping coal, will be increased one-third by the extension.”