Le Belge (locomotive)

LE BELGE (French, " The Belgian ") was the first steam locomotive in continental Europe, which are not imported from England, but was built on the European mainland. She left on December 30, 1835, the factories of John Cockerill in Seraing, near Liège in Belgium, where they had been manufactured under license replica of the locomotive by Stephenson in collaboration with the German mechanic Johann Heinrich Ehrhardt.

The locomotive traveling on the line first railway line in continental Europe from Brussels to Mechelen (now part of the railway line Brussels - Antwerp), for the Cockerill 's steel mills and the rails had delivered. This line was opened on May 5, 1835 ceremony in the presence of King Leopold I. and Robert Stephenson, although three assembled in England, not identical locomotives came with LE BELGE used.

Reproduction in a railway museum in Vresse -sur -Semois