The Great Northern was a late-comer, and had to fight for both its construction and survival. The Great Northern Railway Bill was bitterly opposed by the London and North Western Railway, by the Midland and by the Eastern Counties. At the outset there were two companies, and the Direct Northern Railway and the London & York were foes in the early 1840s, but combined in the face of the formidable opposition. When the line was built it served few large cities - the first was Peterborough, 76 miles from the Maiden Lane terminus, and then there were only Lincoln and Retford before York was reached by the grace and favour of other lines. The Great Northern was superbly built, which is hardly surprising as William Cubitt was the engineer and Thomas Brassey the contractor. The company were fortunate in having an able chairman in Edmund Denison, MP, who appointed Cubitt after Joseph Locke had had to resign the appointment, partly because he was busy building lines in France.

While the Direct Northern and the London & York were still in competition, they are mentioned in the Bedford Estate correspondence. The Woburn Steward, Thomas Bennett, wrote to the Agent-in-Chief on 19th April 1844: