Chaldron wagon, South Hetton Colliery, 4-sided bucket design, wooden with metal wheels, painted black, with "1155 SH 2.18" picked out in white.

A ‘chaldron’ is an archaic term for a measure of coal; this measure varied regionally, but in the North East was 53cwt. ‘Chaldron Waggon’ as a name therefore has its origins in the North East coal industry. They were the first form of rail vehicle on the above ground coal railways and developed from the pre-railway coal wain.

Well into the 20th Century, waggon / wagon remained a regional spelling difference, with two ‘g’s in Scotland and the North, one ‘g’ in the Midlands and below.